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Archive for the ‘Canadian Content’ Category

Saki–“Tobermory” (Myanmar) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #13] (1912)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Burma, Canadian Content, Cats, Christmas, Funny (ha ha), Hingston & Olsen, Myanmar, Short Story, Supernatural, Surreal, Talking animals, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 13, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 13, 2021] “Tobermory”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

Saki was the pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, a British author born in Myanmar (then British Burma).  He loved skewering the British upper class.

This story is hilarious.

An upper class couple is throwing a party and they have invited a host of boorish people.  They’ve also invited Mr. Cornelius Appin, a “clever” man with a vague reputation.

It soon came out that Appin discovered a means for instructing animals in the art of human speech.  The room is incredulous, until he says that his first subject was the hosts’ own cat Tobermory. (more…)

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Franz Kafka–“Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk” [Czech Republic] (translated by Willa & Edwin Muir) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #12] (1946/translation 1946 [that’s what it says, I think])

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, Czech Republic, Franz Kafka, Hingston & Olsen, Huh?, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 12, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 12, 2021] “Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

This was the first story in this collection that I really didn’t like.  I once wanted to read all of Kafka’s stories, but this one was so remarkably tedious, that it took me a few days to read it.

The premise is that the village has a singer named Josephine.  And no one understands why her voice is so magical to them.  So he’ll try to find out why.

And that’s it.  For 24 pages. (more…)

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Geoffrey Drayton–“Mr. Dombey, the Zombie” (Barbados) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #11] (1990)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, Death, Geoffrey Drayton, Hingston & Olsen, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar, Zombies on December 11, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 11, 2021] “Mr. Dombey, the Zombie”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

Mr Dombey was, indeed a zombie.  He travelled the morning train every day and read the daily newspaper for his hounsi.  His hounsi was interested in the latest rapes and murders, but not enough to read the paper herself. (more…)

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Aleksandar Hemon–“The Bees, Part 1” (Bosnia) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #10] (2009)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Aleksandar Hemon, Bees, Canadian Content, Christmas, Death, Funny (ha ha), Hingston & Olsen, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar, War on December 10, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 10, 2021] “The Bees, Part 1”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

I’ve enjoyed Aleksandar Hemon’s stories.  And this one was a huge mix of humor and sadness.

This story begins simply enough.  The narrator and his family are watching a film.  But his father is so annoyed that the film isn’t real that he (and the family) walk out before it’s over.

His father only wants to see things that are real so he sets out to make his own film. (more…)

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Mia Couto–“The Marine House” [Mozambique] (translated by David Brookshaw) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #9] (1997/translation 2021[that’s what it says])

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, David Brookshaw, Hingston & Olsen, Mia Couto, Mozambique, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 9, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 9, 2021] “The Marine House”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

This is the story of a young person being enamored with an old hermit named Tiane Kumadzi.

The narrator’s parents said to avoid this strange man, but the narrator loved that Tiane saw signs from the world beyond.

One day Grandad Tiane tossed the narrator a piece of wood–it’s what he’d been looking for, he said.  The narrator started looking for more wood and son enough Tiane built a boat==a boat that could walk on water.

The villagers were horrified by this abomination and decided to set fire to it.

The fire seemed to make the villagers drunk–was the wood covered in poison?  And when the smoke cleared, the boat was still intact.

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Liliana Heker–“The Night of the Comet” [Argentina] (translated by Alberto Manguel) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #8] (2001/translation 1997 [that’s what it says])

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, Comets, Hingston & Olsen, Liliana Heker, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 8, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 8, 2021] “The Night of the Comet”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

Somehow it feels cheating that Manguel is the translator of this story (although it does suggest that he really likes the story).

Not much happens on the night of the comet.  There is talk about the comet before its arrival (a man plunged to his death to avoid its arrival).

Everyone talked about it.  Some people said they’d seen it (like a scarf made of light).

The newspapers predicted fabulous things–it would pass so close to earth!  It would be the size of a small melon.  It would cover seventy percent of the visible sky. (more…)

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Amos Tutuola–“The Complete Gentleman” (Nigeria) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #7] (1952)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Amos Tutuola, Canadian Content, Christmas, Hingston & Olsen, Huh?, Magic, Nigeria, Short Story, Supernatural, Superstitions, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 7, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 7, 2021] “The Complete Gentleman”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

Manguel has this to say about Amos Tutuola:

He was educated in an English school but never quite abandoned his native Yoruba. Instead, he began to write stories and novels drawn from the collective imagination of his people in an English that is certainly not that of English schoolbooks, but is enriched by strange turns of phrase and an idiosyncratic grammar and spelling that the reader can follow easily.

That’s pretty interesting.

As is this story which is, indeed, pretty unusual.

Each small section has a heading which outlines the action.  First we meet the “complete” gentleman.  He was perfect in every way.  So much so that a woman decided to follow him. (more…)

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Ray Bradbury–“The Fire Balloons” (United States) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #6] (1951)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, Hingston & Olsen, Mars, Ray Bradbury, Religion, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 6, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 6, 2021] “The Fire Balloons”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

I haven’t read very much by Ray Bradbury.  In the past it was because I kind of dismissed him as a genre writer.  But I have read a few things in the last few years that I liked and thought I should give him more of my time.

This story is from The Martian Chronicles, which I have not read.  I actually don’t really know much about the Chronicles at all.

This story is set in 2033.  Two priests are headed to Mars as missionaries.  Father Peregrine and Father Stone spoke about the Martians and the kind of sins they would find among them.  Mars was so different, no doubt sin was like a virtue.  (more…)

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Homer–“Ulysses and the Cyclops” [Greece] (translator Alexander Pope) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #5] (8th century B.C,/translated 1725)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Alexander Pope, Canadian Content, Christmas, Cyclops, Death, Greece, Hingston & Olsen, Homer, Sheep, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar, Violence on December 5, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 5, 2021] “Ulysses and the Cyclops”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

Obviously Homer is a classic–the classic–poet.  But it seemed an odd choice to pick Homer (from B.C. days) when surely there was a more recent Greek writer who deserved some attention.

I’ve read The Odyssey at least three times.  However, I’ve never read it in verse form.   And I found this form to be very challenging.  I was certainly glad I knew the story already. (more…)

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Marcel Aymé–“The State of Grace” [France] (translator Norman Denny) [The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar #4] (1947/translated 1947)

Posted in Alberto Manguel, Canadian Content, Christmas, France, Funny (ha ha), Hingston & Olsen, Marcel Aymé, Norman Denny, Prostitution, Religion, Seven deadly sins, Sex, Short Story, The Short Story Advent Calendar on December 4, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK:  hiatus

[READ: December 4, 2021] “The State of Grace”

This year, S. ordered me The Short Story Advent Calendar.  This is my seventh time reading the Calendar.  The 2021 Short Story Advent Calendar is a deluxe box set of individually bound short stories.

As always, each story is a surprise, so you won’t know what you’re getting until you crack the seal every morning starting December 1. Once you’ve read that day’s story, check this link where editor Alberto Manguel is providing daily commentary on each of the stories he selected for this year’s calendar.

This story was funny but also had a moral.

Set in 1939, we meet the best Christian in all of Rue Gabrielle and indeed all Montmartre.   Monsieur Duperrier was “a man of such piety, uprightness and charity that God, without awaiting his death… crowned his head with never left it by day or by night.”

He was grateful, of course, but his modesty did not allow him to show it off in public.  However, his wife did have to look at it and she was filled with resentment and exasperation.  She was afraid of what others would think of him if they saw him like that, so she encouraged him to sin a little but to lose the halo. (more…)

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