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Siblings in Short Stories

  Q: “What do the sibling stories we’ve read have to say about sibling relationships?” A: All the sibling stories we’ve read have shared some common features. They’ve largely focused on an older/younger pair (which makes sense, as that is an important factor in family dynamics) but not on people similar in age/twins, or three or more siblings. They take place from one sibling’s point of view, limiting our knowledge of the other sibling’s feelings, and tend to feature lack of understanding (“Sonny’s Blues”; “If You See Me, Don’t Say Hi”) or jealousy (“If You See Me, Don’t Say Hi”). They mostly take place over a long period of time– because sibling relationships by nature are lasting. Except for “Black-Eyed Women,” they’ve been about two siblings in conflict and feature internal fights between them rather than external forces taking apart the siblings, except for the passage of time of course. I think these features are all done somewhat necessarily, as it’s a lot harder to fit in ...
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Reimagining of Roman Fever

               The two ladies had had a sumptuous lunch with their young and very pretty daughters. In the rush of the luncheon-hour, the head-waiter hadn’t paid them extra attention, but now the daughters had left and the ladies had moved to the parapet. With the aim of hinting that they should leave now that they weren’t spending any money, Antonio ambled near them. One of the ladies was knitting something red and slightly lumpy. The other lady, who had a stalwart nose, signaled to him.                 With all the confidence and authority that came with wealth, she said, “Ah, sir. As old lovers of Rome, we would like to spend the end of the afternoon looking down on the view— that is, if it does not disturb the service?”  Antonio took the rather stodgy tip and bowed. “Of course you are most welcome, and would be still more so if you would condescend to remain for dinner. It will be a f...
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A Rose for the Short Story

  From the ‘Genre Study’ prompt: In his famous review of Hawthorne’s Twice-told Tales, Edgar Allan Poe classifies the short story based on its “unity of effect and impression.” Building on this idea, literary critic Brander Matthews (1901) adds that this “essential unity of impression” “shows one action, in one place, on one day. A Short-story deals with a single character, a single event, a single emotion, or the series of emotions called forth by a single situation.” While “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner doesn’t show “one action, in one place, on one day,” it does fit into Edgar Allan Poe and Brander Matthews’s idea of “unity of effect and impression,” which is increased by its dealing with both the town and Emily. “A Rose for Emily” jumps around across a long period of time, from when Miss Emily was young to her death of old age. “A Rose for Emily” also doesn’t deal with “a single emotion” or “the series of emotions called forth by a single situation.” And though the stor...
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Personality in "The Machine Stops"

“And in time” – his voice rose– “there will come a generation that had got beyond facts, beyond impressions, a generation absolutely colorless, a generation ‘seraphically free From taint of personality,’ which will see the French Revolution not as it happened, nor as they would like it to have happened, but as it would have happened, had it taken place in the days of the Machine” (Forster, 70). I decided to write about this sentence from E. M. Forster’s 1909 short story “The Machine Stops” because I think it really illuminates the mindset and ideology of the people living in a Machine-dominated world. This quote is from an incredibly well-received speech given by a lecturer after respirators, and by extension the only real way of interacting with the world outside the Machine, are banned. Humanity has become so internalized to the point where they explicitly forbid anything new from the outside, and no one cares (except for a few lecturers who quickly give in). The stated goal is for t...
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