
Waiting in Line to Get Your Soul Weighed Up Against a Feather
George Saoulidis
Publisher: Mythography Studios
Summary
So, you died. What happens next?Apparently, you get to wait in line.A short story.
Publisher: Mythography Studios
So, you died. What happens next?Apparently, you get to wait in line.A short story.
John Davys Beresford (1873-1947) was an English writer, now remembered for his early science fiction and short stories in the horror story and ghost story genres."The Hidden Beast" is a strange and evocative tale of superstition, supernatural forces and suspense. Could the rumours about a strange beast, imprisoned and tortured in the lonely house in the woods where the weird man lives really be true?Show book
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born on 29th January 1860 in Taganrog, on the south coast of Russia. His family life was difficult; his father was strict and over-bearing but his mother was a passionate story-teller, a subject Chekhov warmed to. As he later said; ‘our talents we got from our father, but our soul from our mother’. At school Chekhov was distinctly average. At 16 his father mis-managed his finances and was declared bankrupt. His family fled to Moscow. Chekhov remained and eked out a living by various means, including writing and selling short sketches to newspapers, to finish his schooling. That completed and with a scholarship to Moscow University obtained he rejoined his family. He was able to help support them by selling satirical sketches and vignettes of Russian lifestyles and gradually obtained further commissions. In 1884, he qualified as a physician and, although it earned him little, he often treated the poor for free, he was fond of saying ‘Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress.’ His own health was now an issue as he began to cough up blood, a symptom of tuberculosis. Despite this his writing success enabled him to move the family into more comfortable accommodation. Chekhov wrote over 500 short stories which included many, many classics including ‘The Kiss’ and ‘The Lady with a Dog’. His collection ‘At Dusk’ won him the coveted Pushkin Prize when was only 26. He was also a major playwright beginning with the huge success of ‘Ivanov’ in 1887. In 1892 Chekhov bought a country estate north of Moscow. Here his medical skills and money helped the peasants tackle outbreaks of cholera and bouts of famine. He also built three schools, a fire station and a clinic. It left him with less time for writing but the interactions with real people gained him detailed knowledge about the peasantry and their living conditions for his stories. His most famous work, ‘The Seagull’ was received disastrously at its premiere in St Petersburg. It was later restaged in Moscow to highlight its psychological aspects and was a huge success. It led to ‘Uncle Vanya’, ‘The Three Sisters’ and ‘The Cherry Orchard’. Chekhov suffered a major lung hemorrhage in 1897 while visiting Moscow. A formal diagnosis confirmed tuberculosis and the doctors ordered changes to his lifestyle. Despite a dread of weddings the elusive literary bachelor quietly married the actress Olga Knipper, whom he had met at rehearsals for ‘The Seagull’, on 25th May 1901. By May 1904 with his tuberculosis worsening and death imminent he set off for the German town of Badenweiler writing cheerful, witty letters to his family and assuring them his health was improving. On 15th July 1904 Anton Chekhov died at Badenweiler. He was 44. 1 - Anton Chekhov - A Short Story Collection - An Introduction 2 - The Lady with the Dog by Anton Chekhov 3 - Volodya by Anton Chekhov 4 - Misery by Anton Chekhov 5 - The Death of a Government Clerk by Anton Chekhov 6 - The Bet by Anton Chekhov 7 - A Chameleon by Anton Chekhov 8 - Vanka by Anton Chekhov 9 - The Student by Anton Chekhov 10 - The Looking Glass by Anton Chekhov 11 - Gooseberries by Anton Chekhov 12 - About Love by Anton Chekhov 13 - The Kiss by Anton ChekhovShow book
The first English language publication of the work of Izumi Suzuki, a legend of Japanese science fiction and a countercultural icon. At turns nonchalantly hip and charmingly deranged, Suzuki's singular slant on speculative fiction would be echoed in countless later works, from Margaret Atwood and Harumi Murakami, to Black Mirror and Ex Machina. In these darkly playful and punky stories, the fantastical elements are always earthed by the universal pettiness of strife between the sexes, and the gritty reality of life on the lower rungs, whatever planet that ladder might be on. Translated by Polly Barton, Sam Bett, David Boyd, Daniel Joseph, Aiko Masubuchi, and Helen O'Horan.Show book
Five great American short story writers, dating from the turn of the nineteenth/twentieth centuries are represented here. Different in atmosphere and writing style, they nevertheless caught the mood and concerns of the day in a way that was distinctly American. Bierce’s ‘An Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge’ leaves echoes in the imagination; the stories by Crane and London recall the themes of the Civil War and the Klondike for which they are well known. Twain’s humour is to the fore in ‘The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County’ and O. Henry’s sharp observation makes his neat tales a joy to listen to. An attractive and accessible collection.Show book
Why does Sherlock Holmes declare that the person he is to meet is the worst man in London? Included in the anthology of short stories, The Return of Sherlock Holmes, this story contains the first meeting of Holmes and Watson, and chronicles their first adventure together. While also a notable author of science fiction, fantasy, non-fiction and poetry, Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous creation was that of Sherlock Holmes. His consulting detective is absolutely embedded in Western culture, and we are all better for it.Show book
From Harold Brodkey come three remarkable stories about the brief lives of two women and the troubling appearance of an angel above Harvard UniversityConsidered by many to be among the greatest American writers of the twentieth century, Harold Brodkey created fiction that startled, provoked, and often confounded. These three novellas, told through the recollections of fictional alter ego, Wiley Silenowicz, serve as sterling examples of Brodkey’s magnificent talent. In “Ceil,” Wiley imagines the mother he never knew, brilliantly reinventing the woman who died when he was a child of two, creating a parent both idealized and painfully real. In “Lila,” Wiley remembers his adoptive mother, an unloving and unlovable, self-involved woman, whose early death from cancer left a permanent void in his family. And in “Angel,”the book’s remarkable closing piece, Wiley recalls a heavenly visitation that came to him and many others while studying at Harvard University, and which heralded a truth most difficult to bear. For lovers of literature who have yet to experience Brodkey’s unique style, soaring language, and conceptual brilliance, Women and Angels is a marvelous introduction to an American master.Show book