Ćamil, a wealthy young man of Smyrna living in the last years of the Ottoman Empire, is fascinated by the story of Džem, ill-fated brother of the Sultan Bajazet, who ruled Turkey in the fifteenth century. Ćamil, in his isolation, comes to believe that he is Džem, and that he shares his evil destiny: he is born to be a victim of the State. Because of his stories about Džem’s ambitions to overthrow his brother, Ćamil is arrested under suspicion of plotting against the Sultan. He is taken to a prison in Istanbul, where he tells his story, to Petar, a monk.Out of these exotic materials, Andrić has constructed a book of great clarity, brevity and interest. No doubt it will be read by some as a political parable about the tyranny of the State, but also as a quite simply story about ill-fortune and human misunderstanding, fear and ignorance. Džem and Ćamil are doomed – and the certainty of their persecution is sometimes relieved, sometimes intensified by the stupidity and fright of the people who cross their ill-starred lives.Construction takes up most of the book’s space: the central story of Džem as related by Ćamil lasts only a chapter or two. For the rest of the time the reader strips layer off layer, as one narrator passes him on the next. There is an interesting passage that helps to explain this method, at the moment when Ćamil starts narrating Džem’s story in the first person. “I” is a word, we are told, which fixes the position of the speaker in such a way that the exercise of will is no longer possible, and the speaker strength is exceeded – strength, presumably, to break out of the identification that all his past actions and thoughts force upon him when he uses the word. “I” is both a confession and an imprisonment. The fact that the novel passes the reader on from one narrator to the next rather suggests that the author is taking constant evasive action, lest he betray himself or his reader into the kind of “personal confession” which seals the fate of Ćamil. What exactly this game of form flirting with meaning signifies, must be left to the individual reader.The movement is centripetal, towards Džem’s story, and then disperses. Details within the story are made to mimic this form. Thus when Peter receives the message telling him of his impending release:“Two younger prisoners...were chasing around using him as the centerpoint of ever narrowing circles. Annoyed, he tried to break away from these exuberant youths when one of them brushed against him and he felt a folded scrap of paper thrust into his hand. The youths continued their chase but now in widening circles...”The reader is led on just such a chase in the course of the novel. The effect of this is to make the plot seem more like a poetic image than an ordinary plot: capable, therefore, of as many meanings as are the images of an allusive poem. Yet the language is simple and direct, not at all “poetic”. The characters are remarkable alive, even in conversation. Karađoz, the governor of the goal, is a spidery authoritarian, who loves to torment the charges he loves. The prisoners “complained about the way one complains about one’s life and curses one’s destiny...it would have been hard for them to imagine life without him”.“The Devil’s Yard” is justified, as all symbolic and figurative novels must be, by the extent to which it touches the emotions. It is extremely moving. Fear, horror, despair, amusement at times – all these indicate that the threat of the meaning has been recognized.

    Her story of a woman incarcerated in a madhouse by her abusive husband dramatizes the effect of the English marriage laws, which made women virtually the property of their husbands.

    She was born and raised on the Yankton Sioux Reservation in South Dakota by her mother. Zitkala-Sa lived a traditional lifestyle until the age of eight when she left her reservation to attend Whites Manual Labor Institute, a Quaker mission school in Indiana. She went on to study for a time at Earlham College in Indiana and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. A considerable talent, Bonnin co-composed the first American Indian grand opera, The Sun Dance in 1913. After working as a teacher at Carlisle Indian Industrial School, she began publishing short stories and autobiographical vignettes. Her autobiographical writings were serialized in Atlantic Monthly and, later, published in a collection called American Indian Stories in 1921. Her first book, Old Indian Legends (1901), is a collection of folktales that she gathered during her visits home to the Yankton Reservation. Her other works include Stories of Iktomi and Other Legends of the Dakotas (1901) and Oklahoma's Poor Rich Indians (1924).

    The same family appears in Act Two 25 years older and back in London, only now it’s 1979. Cloud 9 is about relationships between women and men, men and men, women and women. It is about sex, work, mothers, Africa, power, children, grandmothers, politics, money, Queen Victoria, and Sex. Cloud 9 premiered in London at the Royal Court Theatre in 1979 and has since been staged all over the world.

    A noose is tied around his neck. In a moment he will meet his fate: DEATH BY HANGING. There is no escape. Or is there? Find out in . . . An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.

    In this autobiographical piece about her own color, Hurston reflects on her early childhood in an all-black Florida town and her first experiences in life feeling different. In this beautiful piece, Hurston largely focuses on the similarities we all share and on her own self-identity in the face of difference. Through it all, I remain myself.This short work is part of Applewood's American Roots series, tactile mementos of American passions by some of America's most famous writers and thinkers.

    He writes, "The Children's Story came into being that day. It was then that I really realized how vulnerable my child's mind was —any mind, for that matter—under controlled circumstances. Normally I write and rewrite and re-rewrite, but this story came quickly—almost by itself. Barely three words were changed. It pleases me greatly because I kept asking the questions…Questions like, What's the use of 'I pledge allegiance' without understanding? Like Why is it so easy to divert thoughts? Like What is freedom? and Why is so hard to explain?The Children's Story keeps asking me all sorts of questions I cannot answer. Perhaps you can—then your child will...."

    Akira Kurosawa used this story as the basis for his award-winning movie Rashōmon."In a Grove" is an early modernist short story consisting of seven varying accounts of the murder of a samurai, Kanazawa no Takehiro, whose corpse has been found in a bamboo forest near Kyoto. Each section simultaneously clarifies and obfuscates what the reader knows about the murder, eventually creating a complex and contradictory vision of events that brings into question humanity's ability or willingness to perceive and transmit objective truth.The story is often praised as being among the greatest in Japanese literature.

    A general introduction providing historical and cultural background, a chronology of Davis' life and times, an introduction to each thematic group of documents, headnotes, extensive annotations, a generous selection of illustrations, and a selected bibliography make this volume the definitive scholarly text of this classic work of industrial fiction.---- Life in the iron-mills: the complete text --Introduction: cultural and historical background --A note on the text --Life in the iron-mills (1861 Atlantic Monthly edition) --Life in the iron-mills: cultural context --Work and class --The village blacksmith / Henry Wadsworth Longfellow --That aristocracy may be engendered by manufactures / Alexis de Tocqueville --Iron interests of wheeling / A.W. Campbell --Senate testimony from iron foundry proprietor / John Roach --In Soho on Saturday night (song) / Anonymous --Perils- immigration / Josiah Strong --The Anglo-Saxon and the world's future / Josiah Strong --Senate testimony on the kitchen garden movement / Anna Gordon --Ten nights in a bar-room (excerpt) / T.S. Arthur --The Quaker of the olden time / John Greenleaf Whittier --The Quaker settlement (from uncle tom's cabin) / Harriet Beecher Stowe --Looking Backward: 2000-1887 (excerpt) / Edward Bellamy --Art and artists --An inquiry into the art-conditions and prospects of America / James Jackson Jarves --Art thoughts (excerpt) / James Jackson Jarves --Hints to American artists / Anonymous --Conversations in a studio (excerpt)William Wetmore Story --The Stewart art gallery / Anonymous --The process of sculpture / Anonymous --The Greek slave / Anonymous --A sculptor's studio (from the marble faun) / Nathaniel Hawthorne --Roderick Hudson (excerpt) / Henry James --/ Senate testimony on the arts and art education in the United States / Wilson McDonald --Senate testimony on industrial art schools for women / Florence Elizabeth Cory --Women and writing: the public platform --Letter to George D. Ticknor / Nathaniel Hawthorne --The great lawsuit (excerpt) / Margaret Fuller --St. Elmo (excerpt) / Augusta Evans Wilson --Literary women / Caroline Kirkland --Ruth Hall (excerpt) / Fanny Fern --A New England girlhood (excerpt) / Lucy Larcom --Little Women (excerpt) / Louisa May Alcott --Life and letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (excerpt) / Annie Fields.

    Now, in Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, she takes a probing look at her family's history to give us a lyrical, complex memoir that explores how the gossip of one generation can become legends for the next.Illustrated with photographs from the author's personal collection, Two or Three Things I Know for Sure tells the story of the Gibson women -- sisters, cousins, daughters, and aunts -- and the men who loved them, often abused them, and, nonetheless, shared their destinies. With luminous clarity, Allison explores how desire surprises and what power feels like to a young girl as she confronts abuse. As always, Dorothy Allison is provocative, confrontational, and brutally honest. Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, steeped in the hard-won wisdom of experience, expresses the strength of her unique vision with beauty and eloquence.

    He died in 1989, at the age of 58. “The School,” which appeared first in the 1976 collection, Amateurs, is one of Barthelme’s more accessible stories. To describe it is to sound ridiculous: a very funny story about death and the negation of meaning, and the only story ever written, by anyone, in which a resurrected gerbil is the bringer of hope. - Steven Polansky, Author of Dating Miss Universe: Nine Stories About the Author: Donald Barthelme published seventeen books, including four novels and a prize-winning children's book. He was a longtime contributor to The New Yorker, winner of the National Book Award, a director of PEN and the Authors Guild, and a member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. He died in July of 1989. About the Guest Editor: Steven Polansky was born in New York City. He was educated at Wesleyan, Hollins, and Princeton. He has taught at St. Olaf College, Macalester, and the University of Minnesota. His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, Glimmer Train, Best American Short Stories, New England Review, and Minnesota Monthly. He has published two books: The Bradbury Report, a novel, and a book of short stories, Dating Miss Universe, which won the Sandstone Prize and the Minnesota Book Award. He has a wife, two sons, and a daughter. He lives in Wisconsin. About the Publisher: Electric Literature is an independent publisher amplifying the power of storytelling through digital innovation. Electric Literature’s weekly fiction magazine, Recommended Reading, invites established authors, indie presses, and literary magazines to recommended great fiction. Once a month we feature our own recommendation of original, previously unpublished fiction.

    Karratha is a mining town a long way further north. The landscape is extraordinary, being composed of vast heaps of dark red earth and rock poking out of the never-ending bush. I imagine that Mars must have a similar feel to it. I went exploring and discovered the bronze statue to Red Dog outside the town of Dampier. I felt straight away that I had to find out more about this splendid dog. A few months later I returned to Western Australia and spent two glorious weeks driving around collecting Red Dog stories and visiting the places that he knew, writing up the text as I went along. I hope my cat never finds out that I have written a story to celebrate the life of a dog.’ Louis de Bernières.‘If you love Australia it will have you aching for the scent of gums and sight of the Southern Cross, while if you love dogs it is sure to make you highly indulgent towards the one you love’ Observer

    Trethewey's resonant and beguiling collection is a haunting conversation between personal experience and national history.

    Each book in the series has been designed with today's young reader in mind. As the words come to life, students will develop a lasting appreciation for great literature.The humor of Mark Twain...the suspense of Edgar Allan Poe...the danger of Jack London...the sensitivity of Katherine Mansfield. Creative Short Stories has it all and will prove to be a welcome addition to any library.

    Seven of her finest are reprinted here.Written from a feminist perspective, often focusing on the inferior status accorded to women by society, the tales include "turned," an ironic story with a startling twist, in which a husband seduces and impregnates a naïve servant; "Cottagette," concerning the romance of a young artist and a man who's apparently too good to be true; "Mr. Peebles' Heart," a liberating tale of a fiftyish shopkeeper whose sister-in-law, a doctor, persuades him to take a solo trip to Europe, with revivifying results; "The Yellow Wallpaper"; and three other outstanding stories.These charming tales are not only highly readable and full of humor and invention, but also offer ample food for thought about the social, economic, and personal relationship of men and women — and how they might be improved.The yellow wallpaper Three Thanksgivings The cottagette Turned Making a change If I were a man Mr. Peebles' heart.