ARMEL DAGORN reveals the cruelty within two poignant short stories, one French, one Irish: ‘Picture this: a man steps out, and maybe it’s a good day, and the stars, or traffic lights, align, and all the simple pleasures of a sweet summer morn are revealed to the purposeful flaneur.’
ALLYSON DOWLING looks at the evocative description in ‘Boule de Suif’ by Guy de Maupassant: ‘Maupassant was incapable of writing a dull sentence. His prose is naturalistic, full of finely wrought and vivid detail…’
In this feature, MIKE SMITH explores The World’s Thousand Best Short Stories: ‘Some of the stories are still well-known and still anthologised regularly. Some of the authors are still household names. But many, too, are long forgotten and it is amongst these that I have found the greatest reading pleasure…’
BELLA REID introduces us to ‘A Mother of Monsters’ by French 19th century author Guy de Maupassant: ‘It is very nearly a horror story; I was twelve when I first read it and, at that age, it was the most shocking thing I’d come across…’
