Imagine waking up one day and realizing your whole life has moved on without you and now you are left to wander. That is exactly what happened to Rip Van Winkle, the protagonist of the similarly titled work by Washington Irving. Rip Van Winkle’s story is an interesting one, and it explores ideas of nature and changing tides. In this post, we are going to summarize the story and expand on its meaning and impact.
Continue reading Rip Van Winkle: Long Sleep, Short StoryTag Archives: short story
“Hills Like White Elephants” by Ernest Hemingway
In “Hills Like White Elephants,” Ernest Hemingway demonstrates how setting can fully impact a story’s narrative, symbolism, and theme. In the story, an American man and a Spanish woman have a discussion before he departs for Madrid. Hemingway published this story in his short-story collection Men Without Women in 1927.
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Social Class in “The Garden Party” by Katherine Mansfield
Regularly, you will see collections of short stories marked The Greatest Short Stories of All Time, or Short Stories to Read Before You Die. Typically, these books have a number of great stories inside. Edgar Allan Poe will undoubtedly make an appearance. So will “Beyond the Door” by Philip K. Dick, and certainly “The Other Side of the Hedge” by E. M. Forster. In addition, you might find Kate Chopin’s extraordinary “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and the following short story: “The Garden Party” by Katherine Mansfield.
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“Beyond the Wall” by Ambrose Bierce
“Beyond the Wall” is a supernatural short story by American author Ambrose Bierce. It is a horror story that utilizes some tried and true tropes in the horror genre, and comes from Bierce’s collection of ghost stories titled Can Such Things Be? published Jan. 1, 1893. The horror of this story is a slow burn, and explores gothic elements discreetly, such as slowly creeping questions of sanity and failure to understand ones own guilt, sin, and failure to take action.
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“The Willows” by Algernon Blackwood: Eeriness, Horror, and Doom
“Yet what I felt of dread was no ordinary ghostly fear. It was infinitely greater, stranger, and seemed to arise from some dim ancestral sense of terror more profoundly disturbing than anything I had known or dreamed of. “ — “The Willows” by Algernon Blackwood
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“To Build a Fire” by Jack London Analysis
When considering literary realism and naturalism, there are many stories that come to mind. However, there is one I often think of that is extremely important to both genres. The short story I am referring one of the more popular stories of the realism and naturalist movement: “To Build a Fire” (1908) by Jack London. Much like how one feels after reading “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” (1890) by Ambrose Bierce, “To Build a Fire” (1902) typically ignites an emotional reaction. Essentially, it has much to do with London’s ability to tell a story about humanity’s fight with nature, and its often despondent outcome.
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