If you are looking for a story with a traditional plot structure, this work of contemporary fiction by Pam Houston is not for you. The story comprises fourteen anecdotes and observations about the life of a thirty-one-year-old woman who comes to San Francisco seeking order and romantic love. Instead, she finds chaos and frustration. Obsessed with finding the right man, she always seems to identify with the wrong ones. The one man in her life she has strong feelings for calls himself the best girlfriend you never had. Themes: order vs. chaos, friendship vs. romantic love, self-esteem, fear, enlightenment, change. More…
Beware of the Dog
This story by Roald Dahl opens with a World War 2 fighter pilot trying to get his badly damaged plane back to England. As he muses about how stoically he will tell his ground crew that he has lost a leg, he is forced to bail out. He wakes up, his injuries already treated, in hospital. He is initially relieved to learn that he had landed in Brighton. However, over the next twenty-four hours, he gradually realizes that something is wrong. Themes: war casualties, courage, determination, deception (looks can be deceiving), duty.. More…
Games at Twilight
This story from Anita Desai highlights what children did in the evening before the electronic age: played together outside! Although set in India, it could have taken place almost anywhere in the world. A sensitive young boy playing ‘tag’ with his siblings courageously hides out in a dark and threatening shed. He loses track of time and is shattered when he emerges to claim the glory and finds the other children have forgotten about him and moved on. Major theme: the disillusionment that comes with confronting your potential insignificance in the world. Other themes: identity, fear, courage, expectation, disappointment, humiliation. More…
Initiation
In this story Sylvia Plath, a candidate declines membership of an elite high school sorority after successfully completing its demeaning initiation process. Her reasons for doing so reflect the major themes of the story: friendship (fear of being distanced from a friend) and identity (conformity vs. individuality). She visualizes the sorority as being like a flock of sparrows, one like the other, all exactly alike. Her decision is strengthened by imagining herself as a mythical “heather bird”, strong and proud in their freedom and their sometime loneliness. Other themes include hazing, isolation vs. social acceptance, human connection, personal growth. More…
The Emperor’s New Clothes
The main theme of this famous children’s story from Hans Christian Andersen is, of course, vanity. Other themes include deceit, gullibility, honesty (fear of speaking up) and pride. The Emperor who puts appearance before the well-being of his people, and his courtiers who sense that something is amiss but don’t have the courage to report it, carry two important messages. We shouldn’t judge people by the clothes they wear, what brand of phone they carry etc., and children should be encouraged to speak up if safe to do so when they see something that is wrong. More…