On the surface, this story by Ernest Hemingway is a simple tale about a couple spending a rainy afternoon in a hotel room during an Italian holiday. The woman feels pity for a cat she sees trying to stay dry under an outside table. Readers often interpret this as a symbol of the woman feeling trapped in an empty relationship. Does the problem between the couple arise from having no common interests because of their age difference, a lack of love for the woman on the part of the man, or the woman’s childishness and greed? More…
Category Archives: Quick Reads
Neighbours
The underlying message of this heart-warming story by Tim Winton is the importance of cultural acceptance in a multicultural environment. A naïve Australian couple initially feel uncomfortable when they move into their first home and find that their street is full of European migrants. Despite language barriers, as time goes by the couple and migrants develop a mutual understanding, friendships and a sense of community. This culminates in a tearful scene where a migrant family gathers at their fence to cheer on the home-birth of the couple’s first child. Themes include prejudice, cultural differences, understanding, acceptance, friendship and community. More…
Vision out of the Corner of One Eye
Two frequent themes in Luisa Valenzuela’s short stories are the daily violence associated with living in 1960/70s Argentina and feminism. Vision out of the Corner of One Eye is one of the latter. A woman traveling on a crowded bus feels herself being groped. When she tries to move away, more people get on the bus and the groping develops into “fondling” and “jiggling”. Rather than make a scene, she decides to give the pervert some of his own medicine. Although this achieves the desired result, she is disappointed she could not be alone with the man. More…
He-y, Come On Ou-t!
In this parable by Shinichi Hoshi, a landslide opens up a seemingly bottomless hole in the ground. A businessman obtains the rights to fill the hole. He gets permission to dispose of toxic waste, and soon hazardous materials from nuclear power plants and contagious disease experiments are being poured into the hole along with domestic waste and classified government documents from a nearby city. The city and ocean are cleaner, and even the sky seems clearer than before. That is until a workman atop a tall city building hears a voice from above shouting: He-y, come on ou-t! More…
A Respectable Woman
Kate Chopin’s ‘respectable woman’ is happily married and looking forward to spending quality time with her husband. She is so disappointed when he invites an old school friend to visit that she decides to be polite but not friendly towards him. At first, the two barely communicate. However, there is a growing chemistry between them. This disturbs the woman, who finds an excuse to visit an Aunt for the remainder of his stay. When the woman learns the man will visit again, she tells her husband: I have overcome everything! Overcome what? Does she plan to remain a ‘respectable woman’? More…
Annie’s Day
Andy Weir’s Annie is a bad girl who sleeps around and likes to play nasty pranks on people. Whenever she has a free night she sleeps with Paul, whose wife has left him. However, she has two problems with Paul. First, he is a morning person and she is a night owl. He wakes at 6.00am every day while she doesn’t like getting up until 10.00am at the earliest. More importantly, there is a big age difference between them. Her dream, which she achieves in the story, is to sleep with Paul’s sixteen-year-old son. More…
The Spider Thread
Although initially published in a children’s magazine, this story from Ryūnosuke Akutagawa is equally relevant to adults. Lord Buddha takes pity on a notorious criminal and sends a “life-line” in the form of a spider’s thread to help him escape from hell. For young readers, this is a parable about selfishness and sharing. For older readers, it is also a lesson on compassion. Kandata’s fate was sealed well before he screamed at those following to get off “his” thread. True compassion would have involved finding a way to share the thread with fellow sufferers before he started climbing. More…
Born of Man and Woman
Many readers find this short horror story by Richard Matheson incredibly moving. One of its major themes is Beauty vs. Ugliness. The protagonist is an eight-year-old child who has been locked in a basement for most of its life because of his/her monstrous form and size. The child does not appear to be possessed by an evil or supernatural force. The child is inquisitive about the outside world, but is cruelly beaten every time he/she ventures upstairs. The horror aspect comes from the cruelty the child suffers and the threat of impending violence if it continues. More…
Sleeping
In this story by Katharine Weber, a young girl is hired by a couple she has never met before to baby-sit while they go to the movies. They tell her the baby is a very sound sleeper and won’t need to be fed or changed. In addition, that she mustn’t open the door because it squeaks and will wake the baby. As the evening wears on, she becomes curious. She listens at the door and hears nothing. She gently tries the door but it seems locked. When the father drives her home, he asks a question that explains the mystery. More…
Answer
A goodreads.com reviewer aptly describes Answer by Fredric Brown as one of the most concise SciFi horror stories I have ever read. There are eerie similarities between the new supercomputer’s response to the first question asked of it in this story and the final sentence of Isaac Asimov’s The Last Question. Both stories were published in the mid-1950s and reflect concerns about the future influence of computers on society. An interesting observation on some other websites is that Brown’s one cybernetics machine that would combine all the knowledge of all the galaxies is already here… it’s called the Internet! More…
The Cranes
Peter Meinke’s The Cranes is a story about enduring love. Both members of a frail, elderly couple suffer from serious medical issues that have destroyed their quality of life. The woman appears to be the sicker of the two, and may be terminally ill. They reflect on their lives together as they sit in their car near some isolated marshland. As they talk, they observe two aged whooping cranes feeding along the shoreline. These birds, which are long-lived and mate for life, symbolize the couple. As a shot rings out, the cranes soar into the sky. More…
The Visitor
This flash story by Lydia Davis starts with the narrator foreshadowing a visitor to his/her home who will require around the clock care and attention. The visit reminds the narrator of two similar experiences, one by a family member and the other by a friend. In both cases, healthy old men with whom they were living deteriorated physically to the point that their bodily functions collapsed and they became dependent on others for their day-to-day care and well-being. The story takes an unexpected twist in the heart-warming final paragraph, where the narrator reminds us of the circle of life. More…
The Flowers
In this “coming of age” story from Alice Walker, a ten-year-old farm girl finds the decomposed body of a decapitated man while collecting flowers in a field. Surprisingly, this doesn’t seem to faze her; she gazes around the spot with interest, then stoops to pick a wild rose. It is not until she notices something else on the ground that we are told her summer was over. As a testament to Walker’s talent, the story contains no dialogue and minimal narrator interpretation of the girl’s emotions; changes in mood and atmosphere are almost solely engendered through actions and setting. More…
The Sacrificial Egg
The theme of this story by Chinua Achebe is culture clash. He addresses it by describing some of the changes that took place in the lives of his people, the Ibo (Igbo) of South-Eastern Nigeria, as they reconciled their traditional values and beliefs with the effects of Westernization under British colonial rule. One of the biggest changes observed by the narrator is the move from a village-based to urbanized society, which has resulted in a resurgence of smallpox. We also learn how some people, including the narrator, try to minimize such conflicts by maintaining a foot in both cultural camps. More…
The Autopsy (Dissection)
Only an accomplished poet like Georg Heym could tastefully write such an absorbing vignette about the dissection of a human body. This early example of expressionist literature (written a year before Kafka’s The Judgement) describes the procedure in the form of a prose poem. Extensive use of literary devices softens the gore and lends a surreal quality to the story. The backstory of love and beauty humanizes the dead man, making the juxtaposition in the final sentence (the dead man quivered in happiness … while the … doctors broke open the bones of his temple) seem all the more powerful. More…
The Pedestrian
This is our second Ray Bradbury story that questions the social effects of television (the first being The Veldt). Set in 2053, almost everyone stays indoors all night watching TV. Leonard Mead doesn’t. He enjoys going out for a long walk every evening. This is so unusual that he comes to the attention of police. Fortunately, Bradbury’s predictions about TV were wrong. Other than people binge watching streamed content when there are better things they could be doing, TV has proved to be relatively harmless. However, something far more dangerous may be replacing it: social networking on mobile devices! More…
Indian Camp
This story by Ernest Hemingway tells how a young boy ‘comes of age’ as he witnesses the saving of a woman’s life, the birth of her baby, and the death of her husband – all in the space of just a few hours. A feature of Hemingway’s short stories is that he often leaves important details open to the reader’s interpretation. In this story, we come away wondering why the woman’s husband killed himself. Some people suggest that the boy’s Uncle George may have had something to do with it. Themes: birth and death, suffering, masculinity, suicide. More…
My Jockey
Today we have what is probably the best-known (and shortest!) story of Lucia Berlin. Although not much more than a snippet, it is a wonderful example of the descriptive and emotive power of her writing. Set in a hospital, the protagonist is an emergency room nurse who finds “connection” in the broken bodies and needs of the real men who come into her care. Her favorites (the most broken) are the jockeys, and her favorite among these is Muñoz whose pain results in her comforting and cradling him like a baby. Themes: loneliness, human connection, empathy, motherhood. More…
In the Family
This story from Cuban writer María Elena Llana uses a combination of humour and magical realty to highlight the potentially fatal consequences of pride. The victim (Clara), having excelled at university but never bothered to look for work, seems to think her formal education puts her above other family members. One evening, while “holding court” over dinner with her extended family (both living and dead) she learns the error of her ways. The next day she finds herself sitting on the other (dead family’s) side of the table. Themes: pride, acceptance of the unusual, the supernatural. More…
A City of Churches
This story begins with a woman talking to a realtor about moving to the city of Prester to open a car rental business. As they talk, she notices that every building in the city is a church of some kind. Typical of Donald Barthelme, things get stranger. Nobody rents cars in Prester, but the city has a problem. It needs a girl to work in its car-rental agency to make the town ‘complete’. The girl has a special talent; she can will her dreams. When told she cannot leave, she threatens to dream the life [they] are most afraid of. More…
The Mouse
H. H. Munro (aka Saki) is the British master of satirical stories with surprise endings. As you read about this train journey by a prudish young man, you soon realize that it could end badly for him. He is returning home from a farm visit and feels what he thinks is a mouse in his pants. The only other person in his compartment is a young lady who appears to be sleeping. He must find a way of taking off his trousers without offending the woman or, even worse, giving her the wrong idea and causing a scene. More…
The Werewolf
This is the first of Angela Carter’s well-known “wolf tales” series. Although the beginning resembles the Red Riding Hood children’s story, things soon take a very different turn. A wolf loses a paw, grandma is missing a hand, and the villagers show their bravery by beating the poor woman to death. What I particularly like is the way that Carter uses foreshadowing and omissions in the story-line to leave readers with a question: Was the grandmother really a witch/were-woman, or was the “good child” one of those northern country people with a cold heart mentioned in the opening sentence? More…
The Far and the Near
This story from Thomas Wolfe is about perception, connection and disappointment. A railway engineer works the same route for over twenty years. Every day, he pays particular attention to a small, well-kept farmhouse from which a woman, and later a woman and child, emerge to wave cheerfully as the train passes. He feels a special connection with them, which helps through the monotony and occasional tragedies encountered in his work. On retirement, he decides to pay the woman a visit. This does not go as he had planned. Themes: appearances, false assumptions, confusion, isolation, suspicion, disillusionment, regret. More…
Snow
On the surface, Anne Beattie’s Snow is a simple story about a woman’s recollections of a romantic winter in the snow-covered countryside. She doesn’t appear to be speaking directly to the man, so one wonders if she might be writing him a letter, looking at his photograph, or simply re-living events in her mind. The major theme of the story is nostalgia and the nature of memory. She recalls the good times they had together and a bitter-sweet return visit after their parting, but suggests that the man may remember the winter differently. Other themes: storytelling, love, loss. More…
Can-Can
This story by Arturo Vivante is about a happily married family man with a loving, trusting wife. When his wife dances the Can-Can for one of their children, we can see that he also still finds her attractive. He knows she will not question his going out alone for a long drive, even though this is out of character. He has made plans to meet with another woman. It is clear that he has no real love for her, which leads to a question. Why do many happily married men put their marriage and family life at risk like this? More…
A Day’s Wait
The message of this story from Ernest Hemingway is the importance of two-way parent-child communication. A doctor attributes a boy’s high temperature to influenza and prescribes medicine. Over the course of the day, the boy remains “detached” and begins to act strangely. He is sure the doctor and his father are hiding something more serious from him. Had the father taken the time to make sure his son fully understood what the doctor said, or the son raised his concerns immediately, both would have been spared a lot of anxiety. Themes: father-son relationships, innocence, misunderstanding, fear, masculinity, stoicism. More…
The Last Unicorns
This flash story by Edward Hoch begins with the startling news that thousands of years ago unicorns once roamed Africa. A clever trader manages to buy a pair and transport them to the Middle East. As unicorns are much stronger than horses, he plans to make his fortune by breeding them and selling the young. Before he can do this, a stranger arrives and offers to buy his unicorns. When he says “No”, the stranger tries to steal them. The angry trader drives the stranger away, little knowing that his unicorns will soon become the last two in the world. More…
Fatso
The concept of shapeshifting is not new. Examples exist in mythology, fairy-tales, and innumerable science fiction plots. The protagonist in this Etgar Keret story falls in love with a woman who is beautiful by day but, in a twist on Princess Fiona of Shrek fame, turns into a fat, hairy man by night. The man and womanly side remain lovers and even contemplate a family (ugh!), while he and the fat man become good friends. As absurd as the story might seem, it contains an important message about the role of friends in ensuring a complete and fulfilling life. More…
Ripe Figs
This flash story by Kate Chopin packs several themes into less than 300 words. The most obvious are the different perspectives on the marking and passage of time. Maman-Nainaine is close to the land and marks events by natural cycles as opposed to the calendar. For her, like many older people, the weeks and months pass quickly. For Babette, thanks to the impatience of youth, time seems to move slowly when looking forward to something. The symbolism of ripening figs (representing the maturing of Babette into womanhood) and chrysanthemums (the “death flower” in Creole culture) indicate other possible themes. More…
Borrowing a Match
Have you ever asked someone if you could borrow something, and then watched them go to so much trouble looking for it that you wish you hadn’t asked? If so, you will understand the building frustration of the man in this Stephen Leacock story. All he asked of a “decent, ordinary-looking” stranger was the loan of a match. In the process of looking for one, the stranger destroys his overcoat and the parcels and letters he is carrying, and then threatens to beat his young son when he gets home. Finally, (…you’ll have to read the story to find out!) More…
A Letter to God
This inspirational story by Gregorio López Fuentes is about a hardworking farmer (Lencho) whose crops are destroyed in a hailstorm. Facing a year in which his wife and children will go hungry, Lencho decides to write to the only one he knows of that is sure to help them: God. He posts the letter, and his faith is such that he is not at all surprised when he gets a letter in reply containing money. In the humorous denouement, Lencho’s faith in God is vindicated, but not so his faith in the post office. Themes: faith, unpredictability, kindness, misunderstanding, ingratitude. More…
The Last Night of the World
This Ray Bradbury story opens with a question: What would you do if you knew this was the last night of the world? A couple believe the world will end sometime during the coming night. The idea came in a dream. They and everyone they know shared the same dream. The couple decide the best thing to do is accept the fact and go through their evening routine as usual. They even manage to share a joke and go to bed laughing. What would you do? Themes: family, powerlessness, acceptance of the “inevitable”, comfort in routine, selfishness vs. global concern. More…
After Twenty Years
This story by William Porter (aka O. Henry) shows how keeping a promise to a friend is sometimes not such a good idea. Two boyhood friends lose touch after one of them decided to “go West” to make his fortune. When he left, the two made a solemn promise to meet again outside their favorite New York restaurant in twenty years’ time. Both kept the promise. The man who went West came back rich; the man who stayed had a basic job working for the city. However, it was the one who stayed that had the better future life. More…
Solipsist
Wikipedia defines solipsism as the philosophical idea that only one’s (your own) mind is sure to exist. This flash story by Fredric Brown takes an irreverent view of the universe and the place of one solipsist in it. Walter B. Jehovah has had a bad week. He decides to end it all… not just his life, but everything. After some initial success, he finds that willing the universe out of existence is not as easy as it had first seemed. In fact, it looks like he may have to float around alone in the void for millions of years! More…
All About Suicide
Like many Luisa Valenzuela stories, the main theme of All About Suicide is the unchecked violence of daily life in 1960/70s Argentina. The story is notable for its unusual plot structure. It begins with a description of a shooting, travels back to (supposedly) irrelevant events in the distant past, fast forwards to the immediate past, and then re-describes the shooting. Thanks to the way Valenzuela playfully misleads readers with ambiguous possessive adjectives, the true nature of the shooting remains unclear until the last sentence. The resulting confusion highlights the uncertainty of living in Argentina at the time. More…
The Open Window
The British writer H. H. Munro (aka Saki), is considered the master of both the very short story and unexpected endings. In this story, a pompous hypochondriac is holidaying in a peaceful country village as treatment for a nervous condition. He doesn’t like visiting strangers, but does so as a courtesy to his sister who has written letters of introduction to people she knows there. During one such visit, an imaginative fifteen-year-old girl plays an innocent practical joke on the neurotic man, causing him to run from her house in horror. Themes: mental illness, escapism, deception, gullibility, perception (appearance vs. reality). More…
The Chef
You don’t need to get far into this story from Andy Weir to realize that things aren’t as the protagonist describes them. When the doctor finally reveals the truth following some unnecessary theatrics involving the difference between a teaspoon and tablespoon, most readers experience a mild “aha moment” and move on to something else. It is only the very perceptive and those who take the time to follow Weir’s advice and read the story again knowing the outcome, who realize the true horror of the life the poor woman must have lived. More…
Other People
This Neil Gaiman story provides an interesting perspective on punishment in the afterlife. However, it is not for the fainthearted. Upon entering a room in hell, a man meets the “demon” that will become his tormentor. After suffering excruciating pain from each of the 211 torture instruments lining the walls, he asks the demon what comes next. The answer: the true pain begins! And so it does for what seems like several thousand more years. In the last sentence, we learn why Gaiman agreed to change the title of the story from his original choice (Afterlife) to Other People. More…
Girl
In this story by Jamaica Kincaid, a mother provides what she believes to be essential ‘life advice’ to her maturing daughter. This ranges from tips for young girls (how to cook, sew, sweep, etc.) to things older girls should know (how to love a man, bring on a miscarriage, etc.). The advice consists of a single sentence of 649 words. The daughter gives only two responses, the first of which the mother ignores. The major theme is motherhood: the mother’s concern that her daughter will become a “slut”. Other themes: coming of age, gender stereotypes, generation gap, appearances. More…
Bigfoot Stole My Wife / I Am Bigfoot
Today we have two linked stories from Ron Carlson: Bigfoot Stole My Wife and I am Bigfoot. In the first, despite a host of context clues suggesting that the protagonist’s wife has left him, shame and denial lead him to believe that the legendary Bigfoot has abducted her. Using flawed logic, he argues that this must be true because another seemingly impossible event in his life was also true. The story opens with the line: “The problem is credibility.” In the ironic second story, credibility comes as Bigfoot issues a fearful warning to all men of the world. More…
They’re Made Out Of Meat
At first read, this very short story by Terry Bisson appears to be a humorous exchange with little substance. Two alien space explorers are discussing whether to make contact with a newly discovered intelligent life form. They are uneasy about it because the life form seems to be composed entirely of meat. The major theme of the story is prejudice: the aliens consider themselves above all other life. How can beings so different to them be capable of such advanced thought? Also, an interesting dietary theme: Is it right that one sentient life form (man) kills and eats others (animals)? More…
Identities
In this story from W. D. Valgardson, the smell of burning leaves on a Saturday morning evokes pleasant memories for a man of childhood drives in the countryside. With his family otherwise occupied, he decides to leave his up-market neighborhood and re-live the experience. Unfortunately, the open spaces of his youth have been replaced by urban sprawl. Late in the day, he finds himself lost in a seedy, seemingly dangerous neighborhood. A stop to call home and warn his family that he will be late for dinner is the last act in his life. Themes: nostalgia, appearance, prejudice, stereotyping, misjudgement. More…
Passing Wind
For me, the most enjoyable aspect of this humorous flash story from Lydia Davis is that it describes an embarrassing situation we have all probably encountered: after going to great lengths to silently pass wind among a group of strangers, the smell gives us away. Do we say nothing, excuse ourselves, or immediately cast a dirty look at the person standing next to us? Here the narrator faces a slightly different dilemma. She tries to think of a polite way to let a guest know that if he didn’t do it, then it wasn’t her but the dog. More…
My Name / Geraldo No Last Name
What’s in a name? These two vignettes from Sandra Cisneros answer the question from different viewpoints. The narrator is unhappy with the anglicized spelling of her name (Esperanza) but proud of what it symbolizes — the strength of her great-grandmother who defied the Mexican stereotype of women being weak and subservient to their men. It provides a link to her heritage. Neighbor Geraldo, who illegally entered the USA for a better life, has no official name or identity. One moment, full of life and promise at a dance club. The next, dead with nobody to care or mourn his passing. More…
The King of Jazz
The King of Jazz provides a satirical account of several aspects of the American music scene. Donald Barthelme loved jazz, and his main target here are fickle music critics and the way they try to out-do each other with flowery and often meaningless language when describing performances. He also makes fun of the ‘cutting contests’ once used by musicians to judge themselves against one another and, in so doing, satirizes the system of ‘chair challenges’ that were (are?) common in U.S. school bands. Finally, he sends up the notion that American musicians are the preeminent force in world jazz. More…
The Hit Man
T. C. Boyle’s The Hit Man is a clever satire of the short story genre. Written in short paragraphs under sub-headings, the story contains all the necessary elements of a short story. What makes it unusual is that Boyle is able to provide a meaningful account of his protagonist’s entire life (boyhood, adolescence, courtship, death of parents, ‘career’, marriage, family, retirement, death… and even dislike of peas!) in less than 1,200 words. He also manages to deal with some serious issues (bullying, schoolyard violence, judicial system failure, gratuitous murder, glamorized crime and death) along the way. More…
The Blue Jar
In this Isak Dinesen (aka Karen Blixen) story, a shipwreck leads to a quest. A sailor rescues the daughter of an art-collecting nobleman from a burning ship. They spend nine days alone in a lifeboat, during which they become lovers. The nobleman pays the sailor to return to sea, and she spends the rest of her life sailing the world, ostensibly seeking a uniquely colored Chinese porcelain jar. The jar, a symbol of the woman’s lost youth and time in the lifeboat, becomes her final resting place. Themes: enduring love, class, aging, beauty in art vs. the beauty of nature. More…
Happy-Endings
The six “mini-stories” in this short meta-fictional narrative from Margaret Atwood satirize a common element of the story form. In the process, they touch on a myriad of themes including marriage and romance, family life, self-gratification, desperation, suicide, murder, virtue and compassion. The message seems to be that the ultimate denouement of a story matters little; the key is in its exposition and “How and Why” of events in between. The story also provides a lesson in life: What people will remember most about us after our book is closed is the how and why of the way we lived. More…
Key Item
Some time ago we featured a story about how Multivac, Isaac Asimov’s favorite supercomputer, was NOT The Machine That Won the War. In this Asimov story, Multivac has problems. It does not respond to commands, and isn’t following its built-in program to self-diagnose the cause. As the global economy depends on Mulitvac, this could result in panic across the world. Teams of technicians have been trying to identify what is wrong for three days. Finally, a scientist discovers the “key item” needed to fix the problem. It is a simple thing that we are all taught to use as children. More…
Hills Like White Elephants
This story by Ernest Hemingway is aptly set at a railway junction. A couple waiting for a train have an important decision to make that will determine the direction of their lives. Unfortunately, they have reached a point in their relationship where they find it hard to open up and talk about their feelings. Although the man says he will leave it up to the woman, he puts subtle pressure on her to choose his way. Themes: perspective (male vs. female views on pregnancy and abortion), choices and consequences (freedom vs. family), language and communication (disconnection), dependence and control. More…