A Selection of Short Stories

As the days grow shorter, we leave behind the long, languishing sessions of summer reading in favour of cosy bookish nights. Short stories make for a perfect autumn comforter, like a mug of hot chocolate for the mind. Here is a little selection of small, but perfectly formed tales for you to devour.

The Insect World – Jean Rhys

‘Almost any book was better than life, Audrey thought. Or rather, life as she was living it.’

In this haunting story, Rhys combines the two worlds she knew so well – war torn London in the Blitz and memories of her childhood in Dominica. Mentally fragile Audrey, a representation of Rhys herself, begins to see parallels between the humans that buzz around the London underground with a type of tropical insect that gave her nightmares as a child.

The Fox – D. H. Lawrence

‘She stretched out her hand, but suddenly he bit her wrist, and at the same instant, as she drew back, the fox, turning round to bound away, whisked his brush across her face, and it seemed his brush was on fire, for it seared and burned her mouth with a great pain. She awoke with the pain of it, and lay trembling as if she were really seared.’

This short story is a miniature masterpiece. Two female farmers living in solitude have their lives uprooted when a young man arrives. Like the fox that steals the women’s chickens, the man comes into their little world leaving a trail of destruction. Lawrence explores the battle of the sexes, control and hate in this story that drives to a dramatic climax that will stay with you long after reading. Read it here.

The Withered Arm – Thomas Hardy

‘Gasping for breath, Rhoda, in a last desperate effort, swung out her right hand, seized the confronting spectre by its obtrusive left arm, and whirled it backward to the floor, starting up herself as she did so with a low cry.’

This is like a little piece of distilled Hardy. All the hallmarks are here – haunting pasts, human effort versus fate, magic and superstition. This story follows the legacy of one jealous woman’s curse upon her love rival. You can read it for free here.

Kew Gardens – Virginia Woolf

‘The figures of these men and women straggled past the flower-bed with a curiously irregular movement not unlike that of the white and blue butterflies who crossed the turf in zig-zag flights from bed to bed.’

For those dreading the impending dark evening and mornings, Woolf brings some floral cheer with Kew Gardens. This description, however, is to over simplify big, important themes of life that Woolf ponders in this stroll past flowerbeds. Memory and thought are the threads Woolf uses to weave this tale with a zooming in and out of people and things. Read it for free here.

Which of these short stories will you add to your reading list? Which short story would you recommend? Feel free to leave a comment below…