He got up and sat on the edge of the bedstead with his back to the window. “It’s better not to sleep at all,” he decided. There was a cold damp draught from the window, however; without getting up he drew the blanket over him and wrapped himself in it. He was not thinking of anything and did not want to think. But one image rose after another, incoherent scraps of thought without beginning or end passed through his mind. He sank into drowsiness. Perhaps the cold, or the dampness, or the dark, or the wind that howled under the window and tossed the trees roused a sort of persistent craving for the fantastic. He kept dwelling on images of flowers, he fancied a charming flower garden, a bright, warm, almost hot day, a holiday—Trinity day. A fine, sumptuous country cottage in the English taste overgrown with fragrant flowers, with flower beds going round the house; the porch, wreathed in climbers, was surrounded with beds of roses. A light, cool staircase, carpeted with rich rugs, was decorated with rare plants in china pots. He noticed particularly in the windows nosegays of tender, white, heavily fragrant narcissus bending over their bright, green, thick long stalks. He was reluctant to move away from them, but he went up the stairs and came into a large, high drawing-room and again everywhere—at the windows, the doors on to the balcony, and on the balcony itself—were flowers. The floors were strewn with freshly-cut fragrant hay, the windows were open, a fresh, cool, light air came into the room. The birds were chirruping under the window, and in the middle of the room, on a table covered with a white satin shroud, stood a coffin. The coffin was covered with white silk and edged with a thick white frill; wreaths of flowers surrounded it on all sides. Among the flowers lay a girl in a white muslin dress, with her arms crossed and pressed on her bosom, as though carved out of marble. But her loose fair hair was wet; there was a wreath of roses on her head. The stern and already rigid profile of her face looked as though chiselled of marble too, and the smile on her pale lips was full of an immense unchildish misery and sorrowful appeal. Svidrigaïlov knew that girl; there was no holy image, no burning candle beside the coffin; no sound of prayers: the girl had drowned herself. She was only fourteen, but her heart was broken. And she had destroyed herself, crushed by an insult that had appalled and amazed that childish soul, had smirched that angel purity with unmerited disgrace and torn from her a last scream of despair, unheeded and brutally disregarded, on a dark night in the cold and wet while the wind howled

The Blog

  • The Short Roundup image of tag icon

    One-of-a-kind stories inserted into bottles. Speaking of stories in unique formats, check out this story by Gregory Norminton told in footnotes. As mentioned on Critical Mass, when the nominees for Oscars were announced, nothing was mentioned about the original source of the films. Nothing about “The Bear Came Over the Mountain” by Alice Munro which […]

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  • Jhumpa Lahiri Unaccustomed Earth image of tag icon

    I’ve been enjoying an advance copy of Jhumpa Lahiri’s new collection of short fiction, Unaccustomed Earth. These stories don’t significantly diverge from her previous fiction, either in theme or tone or style, but they still are moving renditions of Indian immigrants torn between being American and being Indian. Of these eight stories, only three (so […]

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  • Salmonella, Sex, and Short Stories image of tag icon

    And the best title for a short story collection since the Read This! nomination of Skinny Dipping in the Lake of the Dead goes to . . . . Salmonella Men on Planet Porno. Yes, that’s right. Tsutsui Yasutaka, a Japanese author, published this in 2005, and it came out here in April, 2007. What’s […]

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  • Short Review of Reviews image of tag icon

    Bookforum reviews Donald Barthelme’s new collection of short stories, Flying to America: 45 More Stories. But only three of the stories are brand new. Over at A Work In Progress, there’s a post about John Cheever’s short stories and their adaptations into theater pieces. The Village Voice reviews Wanda Coleman’s new collection, Jazz and Twelve […]

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  • Make Your Own Short Story Anthology image of tag icon

    Apparently there is a website that will allow you to pick a number of short stories that will be bound in a one-of-a-kind anthology. Hence the name of the site, Anthologybuilder.com. This is so beautiful – imagine the gifting potential! Instead of burning a friend a mix tape, you select and buy them a mix […]

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  • Rejections, Raymond Carver, and Kelly Link image of tag icon

    Over at The Millions, there is a great post on what to do with your rejection slips. There is a suggestion about a dress. There is also one about a tux. And there is the famous reminder that Steven King impales his on a nail. Me, I just keep them in a big stack, but […]

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  • Review of the Short Story Reviews image of tag icon

    It’s lovely that the NYTBR reviewed Max Apple’s collection of stories, A Jew in Home Depot, the first collection he’s published in twenty years, but just strange that the review is coming out now, nearly four months after the book was released (The LA Times review, written by Tod Goldberg, came out in late November). […]

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  • Tessa Hadley – Sunstroke image of tag icon

    I decided to read Tessa Hadley’s collection Sunstroke and other Stories mainly because it had been nominated for the Short Story Prize. Hadley’s a Welsh writer that writes short stories of manners, usually with female protagonists, and always concerned about interpersonal interactions in domestic environments. Most of the stories in this collection share a theme […]

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  • Short Roundup of Prizes image of tag icon

    I’ve always been fascinated with, yet never entered, the Writers Weekly 24 hour short story contest. Seems a bit gimmicky (in the same vein as NaNoWriMO), but also could be rather fun, in that collectivist, lets-all-make-art-simultaneously type of way. Anyway, it starts Jan. 26th. If you want some great, constantly updated information about short story […]

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