This Louise Erdrich story about the relationship between a former blindfold trapeze artist and her daughter involves three leaps. The first is the tragic failed leap that resulted in the deaths of the woman’s first husband and their unborn child. The second is the successful leap through which the mother saves the then seven-year-old girl from a house fire. The third is a leap of time. The now elderly mother is physically blind and requires her daughter’s help to engage her passion for books and reading. Themes: choice & consequences, mother-child relationships, love, courage, trust, aging, the joy of reading. More…
My Kinsman, Major Molineux
This Nathaniel Hawthorne story is set in the unsettling times shortly before the American Revolution. A naïve eighteen-year-old man travels from the countryside to an unnamed town seeking promised favors from Major Molineux, a distant relative and officer in the British army. Whenever he enquires about the Major’s address, he is met with either scorn or an evasive answer. He learns why when his tarred-and-feathered kinsman is led past him in a street parade. Fortunately, thanks to a kind stranger, there is still a possible future for him in the town. Themes: hope, political unrest, disorder, loss of innocence, compassion. More…
Slave on the Block
This early Langston Hughes story satirizes attitudes toward African American music and culture during the Harlem Renaissance. A wealthy, artistic couple seek to improve their social status through paintings and music inspired by their African American servants. Although superficially respectful of the servant’s African heritage, they privately exhibit a condescending tone towards these natural, childlike people who should be left unspoiled and simply enjoyed. A young negro, fresh from the south, learns to manipulate the patronizing couple before orchestrating a metaphorical bid for “freedom”. Themes: freedom vs. slavery, the beauty of black music and art, moral superiority, suppressed desire, racism. More…
The Daffodil Sky
In this story by H. E. Bates, a man sent to prison for killing a love rival in a jealous rage returns to the scene of the crime. His intent is to confront the woman they were fighting over, who was once his fiancé. As he knocks on her door he has a premonition that if she opened the door he might not be able to restrain himself but would rush straight at her and kill her. Fortunately for him, the person who opens it is a pleasant surprise. Themes: passion, jealousy and rage, choices and consequences, alienation and loneliness. More…
The Summer Solstice
This story by Filipino writer Nick Joaquin takes place over the final two days of a “hybrid” religious festival. Because both take place over the summer solstice, the Catholic feast of St John and pagan Tadtarin fertility rituals are celebrated together. Tadtarin is performed exclusively by women (or men dressed up as women), invoking their power to ensure a bountiful harvest. Events lead to an unsettling climax where a usually submissive wife pitilessly humiliates her rich landowner husband. Themes include gender stereotypes (especially male domination and cruelty towards women) and cultural changes brought about by Westernization. More…