Jose Maria de Heredia - 324 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

Jose Maria de Heredia


Heredia was a Cuban-born French poet. He was known as a Parnassian poet. Parnassian was a French literary style that began during the positivist period of the 19th century.

Being of that league, his poems were on ‘exotic and (neo-)classical subjects’ and the sentimentality in his writings was minimal.




Death Of The Eagle Poem by Jose Maria de Heredia


He rises. Sparks in torrents he inspires.

Still up, in proud, calm flight, he glories where

The storm breeds lightnings in its inmost lair;

Whereat his wings are smit by their fierce fires.

Roland Barthes - 316 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

Roland Barthes (1915-1980) was a French literary critic, philosopher, and semiotician. His ideas influenced the development of structuralism. He was a key figure to have influenced schools of theory such as many schools of theory, including structuralism, anthropology and literary theory. Barthes explored diverse cultural spheres as semiotic systems and studied the relationship between language and authority. His seminal early works include Writing Degree Zero (1953), Mythologies (1957), The Fashion System (1967), and S/Z (1970).


A Lover's Discourse: Fragments

A Lover's Discourse, at its 1978 publication, was a revolutionary book. Essentially it is a collection of fragments - some of his own thoughts, some of his observances and many influenced from literature. Roland Barthes made use of the tools of structuralism to explore the whimsical phenomenon of love. Rich with references ranging from Goethe's Werther to Winnicott, from Plato to Proust, from Baudelaire to Schubert, A Lover's Discourse artfully draws a portrait where any one in or has been in a relationship, can refer to.

The Growing Stone - Albert Camus - 311 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

Albert Camus


Though he denied it quite often, Camus was called a philosopher along with being an editor, playwright, director, novelist, journalist, political essayist and activist.

Existentialist topics were in his earliest writings, a 1942 philosophical essay - The Myth of Sisyphus and in the 1951 essay - The Rebel. He wrote many popular novels - The Stranger , The Plague amongst others and a collection of short stories - Exile and the Kingdom in 1957.

The Growing Stone

The Growing Stone is a short story by the French writer Albert Camus. It is the final short story in the collection Exile and the Kingdom.

A French engineer, D’Arrast arrives in a town in Iguape, Brazil, where he is commissioned to construct a sea-wall to prevent flooding. The chief of police in a drunk state checks his belongings and accuses him of holding a fake passport. The kind town dwellers and other dignitaries manage to solve the issue. They apologise on behalf of the chief of police and ask D’Arrast what kind of punishment he would like to give him. But D’Arrast lets the matter go.

At this point the story shows the empathy the protagonist has and the direction the story takes.


On further visits to the town, he observes the poverty and the resentment they have towards the rich, their side of town and towards the dignitaries, including him. The story shows the rich vs poor life the town has.


There is a religious festival and a procession related to an incident which happened long ago. Someone had found a floating statue of Jesus in the local river. They had put it in a cave and a stone was believed to have grown there. A meeting with a local sailor reveals to them a promise he had made to God for pulling him to safety from drowning one night. The promise is that the sailor would carry a heavy stone in the religious procession.

This has a Christian symbolism, and refers to the saying of Jesus where he preaches that one has to carry one’s cross ( difficulties and burdens of life) with patience and perseverance just as he had carried his cross on the path to his death by Roman soldiers.

But after an evening of partying and dancing, the sailor is unable to carry the stone in the next day’s procession. Seeing this, D’Arrast decides to fulfil the sailor’s promise on his behalf. But while he walks and struggles, the stone seems to grow heavier, testing his patience, the motive of doing it and the end goal.

The Hand - Guy de Maupassant - 121 / 365 of reading one short story every day

The Hand


A man who keeps a severed hand attached to the wall of his drawing room is found mysteriously strangled at the same time that the hand disappears.



Not just another supernatural horror story but a story within a story. In this case, the story is narrated by a policeman about the strange events involving a man who kept a human hand hanging on his room wall. He was found murdered with a finger in his mouth and the hand missing. The hand later shows up on the man’s grave and a finger was found missing. The policeman offers a logical explanation which is more suited to him and more real in the modern world but is rejected by the listeners in preference of the supernatural illusion of the whole story.



With this ends the Maupassant's story collection review. Hope to read more of his work in the coming days.


The next one week is for my favorite author L M Montgomery. Woohoo! Back to cherry blossoms and green pastures.

picture courtesy - Creepypasta

The Madwoman - Guy de Maupassant - 120 / 365 of reading one short story every day

The Madwoman 

“The Madwoman” describe personal tragedies that can result from war and military occupation. This is one of the scary or supernatural and psychological story section of Maupassant collection.

This particular story is evocative of those men and women who are victimized by the arbitrary abuse of power during war. In this particular case, the Prussian occupation of France. It is a story within a story. The narrator is an unnamed man from Normandy. He tells his friend d’Endolin, of a tale long ago where a woman was affected by hearing woodcocks used to go into a strange stressful stage. What was the relation of the woodcocks to the woman?

It was the time during the Prussian occupation of Normandy. The narrator speaks of a woman who suffered a great grief after her father, husband, and baby had all died one after the other. Unable to sleep because of her trauma, she descended gradually into madness.

“The Madwoman” is a portrayal of the grim reality left behind after war.

Images courtesy - Pinterest

In the Countryside - Guy de Maupassant - 119 / 365 of reading a short story everyday

In the Countryside - Guy de Maupassant

This collection focuses upon the land he knew and loved so well - Normandy.

 Its people and its countryside are portrayed here in vivid color and with great warmth. Amusing, quirky  and with a lot of earthy character they may be, but they are also capable of great pathos, often branching off to end tragically. 

Eva bane Photograph

The Baptism - Guy de Maupassant - 118 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

The Baptism - Guy de Maupassant

The story is about an old navy doctor who lives in a country house near home. His gardener, Kérandec, has asked the doctor to be the godfather to his son. But things don't go as planned. We are given an intriguing account of the deadly nature of alcohol, which is referred to as "the seductive murderer and the delightful destroyer."

On the River - Guy de Maupassant - 117 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

On the River

AUTHOR: GUY DE MAUPASSANT

This short story is about a fisherman, which is the writer himself, who describes one of his adventures on the Seine. He decided to tell all about the night he was coming back from his friend Louis with who he dined every evening. He was very tired so he decided to throw the anchor into the depth and rest in his boat. All of the sudden he felt an invisible force moving the boat so he decided to go back home.

The writer shows us reality through the eyes of a common fisherman. He describes the nature he sees himself starting from the fog, moonlight etc. He also described the inner battles of the character and his fears. Maupassant strived for space descriptions in which the everyday, common things exist.

Courtesy the Frenchstories blog

Mademoiselle Fifi - Guy de Maupassant - 116 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

Mademoiselle Fifi - Guy de Maupassant

During the Franco-Prussian War, a young French laundress shares a coach ride with several of her condescending superiors. When a Prussian officer holds the coach over, social standings are leveled and integrity and spirit are put to the test.


'Mademoiselle Fifi' is about a young French woman's bold defiance of a brutish Prussian soldier during the Franco-Prussian War. The story is not just the portrayal of bravery by a woman but also about social classes and the disparities still prevalent now.

My Uncle Jules by Guy de Maupassant - 115 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

My Uncle Jules by Guy de Maupassant

My Uncle Jules is a story within a story. Set around the Paris culture and lifestyle and drawing a lot on the social norms of the time, the story conveys the standards expected from the rich and their preferences for friends and family who follow the very same standard.

The narrator's family builds high hopes around one member of the family, which is the narrator's uncle Jules. Jules was considered a worthless young man who squandered the family money and was finally shipped off to America so that he can work and understand the value of money. The family members waited for his return in Havre.

 
One day, the family is on a ship for a trip.
In the ship there was a ragged old sailor who was selling oysters. The narrator’s father and sisters liked eating oysters on a moving ship and therefore they went near the old sailor. The narrator’s father recognized the sailor who was none other than his own brother, Jules. The whole family was upset. They did not want to talk with him as he was very poor they also did not want their son-in-law to know about it. They reached the place Jersey. The narrator wanted to talk with him. But the old man left the place as no one was eating any more oysters the family members were disillusioned and frustrated when the reality turns out to be quite different from what they had anticipated. They had expected a bright future for Jules but all their hopes were dashed.
Their disappointment was not so much that Jules did not learn a lesson of hardwork, rather that they now have a member who they will be reluctant to talk about in their parties and social circles.

Mammon and the Archer - O Henry - 94 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

#TreezShort


94 / 365 of reading one short story every day.


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Mammon and the Archer

This story of money vs love is from 1906, collection of stories of O Henry. A soap manufacturer, Anthony Rockwall devotes his energy and time to ‘Mammon’, money above everything else. However his son is all​​ about the things outside of money and the world of wealth. He is the ‘Archer’ of the story’s title - Cupid, the god of love.


Rockwall tells his son Richard that money can buy him anything in life, but Richard points out that the girl he loves is leaving in a few days’ time and he hasn’t managed to win her hand. He takes a ring with him, which his mother left to him in her will, with the intention of asking his sweetheart to marry him, but he drops the ring and … O. Henry’s gift for twist endings turns things around.



Summary adapted from Interesting literature.​

On Horseback and Other Stories -by Guy de Maupassant - 93 / 365 of reading one short story every day. TreezShort

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93 / 365 of reading one short story every day.

On Horseback and Other Stories -by Guy de Maupassant

On Horseback is a short story by popular French writer Guy de Maupassant ( 1850 - 1893). The stories in this collection give an overview of contemporary Paris and Parisian society. They also show the imitating and aspirational trait in humans - the desire to have the same thing which someone else has. A need for want and possession things beyond our means can bring us down and cause calamity.

 
Mr de Griblen and his wife are poor noblemen, and with meagre means they attempt to scrape through their life. Mr. Griblen one day gets extra income from hsi manager and he is overjoyed. It is like a bright day amongst many dark days for him and he wants to spend it. He consults his wife and they decide to treat themselves to a day out horse riding. Derbys and horse riding was considered a sign of wealth of noblemen. Since Mr. Griblen was not born poor, he had some good memories of a life lived once. Hence he wants to live in those glorious days again.

They rent a carriage for Mrs. de Griblen and the children and for the husband - the saddle-horse. But a good day turns into an unfortunate one. Mr Griblen, unable to control the horse or rather not used to it, manages to hit a sixty year old lady. He ends up paying for her hospital expenses and he realizes that what he attempted in spending, turned into futility.


A tale of want and dreams said in a sweet and funny way, Maupassant's writing is non complicated and non preachy. I look forward to reading the collection very soon.

This is day 93 of my reading project for 2022. The previous days - Day 1 to Day 92 is up on my Instagram page. I plan to continue the rest of the project on my blog here so that I can give a longer viewpoint and summary of the stories read. Join me if you like and comment your suggestions and views!