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  Two Offers - From their pens to...

  Frances E W Harper

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  Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was born free on 24th September 1825 in Baltimore, Maryland which, at that time, was still a slave state. 
  By age 3 Frances had been orphaned and thereafter raised by her maternal aunt and uncle who also gave her her surname; Watkins. 
  At 13 she was working as a seamstress and then as a nursemaid for a white family that owned a bookshop.  Here any spare time was used to read books in the shop and work on her own writing which from 1839 included pieces in anti-slavery journals. 
  By the age of 20 Frances had published her first poetry book ‘Forest Leaves, or Autumn Leaves’, marking her out as an abolitionist voice of note.  Her second book, ‘Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects’ followed and was reprinted many times.  It was the beginning of a remarkable career both for her literary pursuits and also her social activism. 
  In 1850, at age 26, she moved to teach domestic science at Union Seminary, a school for Black students near Columbus, Ohio.  She was its first female teacher.  
  After joining the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1853, Frances began her career as a public speaker and political activist. 
  In 1858, Frances refused to vacate her seat or ride in the ‘colored’ section of a segregated trolley car in Philadelphia.  That same year her poem ‘Bury Me in a Free Land’ was published in The Anti-Slavery Bugle.  She created literary history in 1859 when her short story ‘Two Offers’ was the first short story published by a Black woman.  
  In 1860 she married a widower named Fenton Harper. They had one daughter together in addition to his three children from a previous marriage. When her husband died four years later she kept custody of their daughter and moved to the East Coast. 
  Frances founded, supported, and held high office in several national progressive organizations.  In 1886 she became superintendent of the Colored Section of the Philadelphia and Pennsylvania Women's Christian Temperance Union.  A decade later she helped found the National Association of Colored Women and served as its vice president. 
  Throughout her activist activities she continued to write, weaving politics into her fictional narratives.  Although her canon is small it contains work that advanced thinking on the roles of black women in society.  
  Frances E W Harper, abolitionist, suffragist, poet, teacher, public speaker, and writer, died of heart failure on 22nd February 1911 in Philadelphia.  She was 85.  Women were still not permitted to vote,

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  Candide

  Voltaire

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  Candide is characterised by its sarcastic tone, as well as by its erratic, fantastical and fast-moving plot. A picaresque novel with a story similar to that of a more serious bildungsroman, it parodies many adventure and romance clichés, the struggles of which are caricatured in a tone that is mordantly matter-of-fact. Still, the events discussed are often based on historical happenings, such as the Seven Years' War and the 1755 Lisbon earthquake. As philosophers of Voltaire's day contended with the problem of evil, so too does Candide in this short novel, albeit more directly and humorously.    Voltaire ridicules religion, theologians, governments, armies, philosophies, and philosophers through allegory; most conspicuously, he assaults Leibniz and his optimism. Voltaire's men and women point his case against optimism by starting high and falling low. A modern could not go about it after this fashion. He would not plunge his people into an unfamiliar misery. He would just keep them in the misery they were born to. But such an account of Voltaire's procedure is as misleading as the plaster cast of a dance.    Look at his procedure again. Mademoiselle Cunégonde, the illustrious Westphalian, sprung from a family that could prove seventy-one quarterings, descends and descends until we find her earning her keep by washing dishes in the Propontis. The aged faithful attendant, victim of a hundred acts of rape by negro pirates, remembers that she is the daughter of a pope, and that in honor of her approaching marriage with a Prince of Massa-Carrara all Italy wrote sonnets of which not one was passable. We do not need to know French literature before Voltaire in order to feel, although the lurking parody may escape us, that he is poking fun at us and at himself. His laughter at his own methods grows more unmistakable at the last, when he caricatures them by casually assembling six fallen monarchs in an inn at Venice.    A modern assailant of optimism would arm himself with social pity. There is no social pity in "Candide." Voltaire, whose light touch on familiar institutions opens them and reveals their absurdity, likes to remind us that the slaughter and pillage and murder which Candide witnessed among the Bulgarians was perfectly regular, having been conducted according to the laws and usages of war. Had Voltaire lived today he would have done to poverty what he did to war. Pitying the poor, he would have shown us poverty as a ridiculous anachronism, and both the ridicule and the pity would have expressed his indignation.

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  The Leo Tolstoy Collection -...

  Leo Tolstoy

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  This collection brings together stories and reflections in which Leo Tolstoy turns inward.
  Stripped of grandeur, these works offer something more intimate: the inner noise of conscience, the weight of faith, the silence before death.
  A servant's silence, a horse's memory, a dying man's doubt—these are not performances.
  They are questions, waiting quietly for whoever dares to ask the same.
  Tolstoy isn't offering answers. He's writing toward something deeper. And the questions haven't aged a day.
  Contents:
  • Alyosha the Pot
  • Kholstomer: The Story of a Horse
  • A Russian Christmas Party
  • A Confession
  • God Sees the Truth, But Waits
  • A Letter to a Hindu
  • The Death of Ivan Ilyich

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  The History of Mr Polly

  H. G. Wells

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  The History of Mr. Polly is a witty, humane, and deeply reflective novel by H. G. Wells that explores the quiet struggles of ordinary life, personal failure, and the search for meaning. First published in 1910, the novel stands apart from Wells's more famous scientific romances, offering instead a richly observed portrait of a man overwhelmed by the expectations of society and his own limitations.
  
  The story follows Alfred Polly, a restless and good-hearted man whose life is shaped by poor decisions, social pressure, and a persistent sense of dissatisfaction. Trapped in an unhappy marriage and an unfulfilling business, Mr. Polly feels increasingly stifled by the routines and respectability of lower-middle-class English life. His inner world—full of humor, regret, and longing—stands in sharp contrast to the narrow path laid out before him.
  
  As circumstances push Mr. Polly toward desperation, an unexpected turn of events forces him to confront the possibility of change and reinvention. Through Polly's journey, Wells examines themes of personal freedom, social constraint, class anxiety, and the courage it takes to escape a life that feels predetermined.
  
  Combining gentle satire with profound empathy, The History of Mr. Polly is both a critique of social conformity and a celebration of individual resilience. With its memorable protagonist and insightful commentary, the novel remains a timeless exploration of the human desire for dignity, purpose, and a second chance at happiness.

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  The Scandal of Father Brown

  G.K. Chesterton

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  The Scandal of Father Brown was G.K. Chesterton's final set of Father Brown short stories. Also included in this collection is the short story "The Mask of Midas". 
  The enigmatic and diminutive priest continues to fathom the deepest of mysteries in a set of 11 fascinating stories which are set in such diverse locations as a Mexican Hotel, an English Seaside Pier, and an Oxford University Garden. Chesterton presents his humble and blinking detective as an almost childlike contrast to the bizarre and dark machinations of the fallen world. And yet Father Brown is far from a saintly figure; with his enjoyment of good wine and cigars, he is fully in the world but not of the world. Indeed, it is his accurate and insightful reading of Men and Women's souls that often lead him to understand their actions and motives. If any has taken to heart Christ's admonition to be as “wise as serpents and harmless as doves" it is Father Brown! 
  Head Stories Audio presents "The Scandal of Father Brown" :narrated by Simon Hester. With original music.

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  The Pale Man

  Julius Long

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  🎬 Experience the atmospheric visual edition of this tale by searching 'Jonathan Dunne Horror' on YouTube.  
  Title: The Pale Man 
  Series Name: Timeless Terrors 
  Series Entry: 131 
  Author: Julius Long 
  Narrator: Jonathan Dunne 
  Original Publication: 1934 
  Public Domain: Yes 
  YouTube Channel: Jonathan Dunne Horror Stories & Audiobooks (search on YouTube) 
  Description: 
  The Pale Man by Julius Long is a haunting tale of quiet dread and creeping inevitability. Known for his ability to blend psychological tension with subtle supernatural menace, Long crafts a story that lingers long after its final line. 
  The narrative centers on an encounter with a strange, cadaverous figure—a man unnaturally pale, watchful, and unsettlingly persistent. What begins as a fleeting glimpse soon becomes a recurring presence, appearing in places where he should not be and at times that defy coincidence. His expression is unreadable, his movements deliberate, and his silence more oppressive than any spoken threat. 
  As the appearances multiply, the protagonist is forced to confront an unbearable question: is the Pale Man a living stalker of flesh and blood, a hallucination born of fraying nerves, or something far older and more inhuman? Julius Long masterfully sustains ambiguity, allowing dread to grow not through violence, but through anticipation and the slow erosion of certainty. 
  Narrated by Amazon bestselling horror author Jonathan Dunne, this performance captures the oppressive atmosphere, mounting paranoia, and shadowed inevitability that define The Pale Man—a tale where fear does not shout, but watches… and waits.

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