Short Stories

Here are my two lists of short stories . The first is a list of books that I have bought in the last few years. The second lists the books of short stories that I have read this year.

Date Bought	Author	Title	Read
Jan 11/03	George Fetherling (Ed.)	The Vintage Book of Canadian Memoirs
Oct 24/03	Anton Chekhov	Ward No. 6 and Other Stories

Jul 08/04	Norman Levine	The Ability to Forget

Sep 16/05	Italo Calvino	Difficult Loves	Mar 19/08

Jul 24/07	Anton Chekov	The Undiscovered Chekov: 43 New Stories
Jul 31/07	Alexander Pushkin	The Collected Stories
Aug 07/07	Nikolai Gogol	The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol

May 16/08	Jane Urquhart	The Penguin Book of Canadian Short Stories
	Ron Wood	And God Created Manyberries	May 22/08
Jul 01/08	O. Henry	Selected Stories of O. Henry

Here is the list of books of short stories that I have read this year.

Date Start	Author	Date	Title of Novel	Date End
Mar 18/08	Italo Calvino	1983	Difficult Loves	Mar 19/08
May 20/08	Ron Wood	2007	And God Created Manyberries	May 22/08

July 13/08

I have created a separate page to keep track of my books of short stories. This is it. A quick review of the above two tables indicates that I began 2008 with 8 books to read. I have bought 3 more books of short stories this year and have read two. I now have 9 more books to read.

I am dissatisfied with the notes I make for these books. Each short story has a particular point that it wants to make. Yet I have no record of this.

I think I should create a table for each book.

This seems like it might be a lot of work, but if a story is worth reading, it certainly must be worth making a few notes.

Difficult Loves (1983) by Italo Calvino
Title	The adventure of a soldier. [3 - 12] [10 pages]
Summary	A woman sits down beside a young soldier in a train compartment and he is in turmoil as to what he should say or do.
Point	We are often unsure of what we should say when we find ourselves with someone for the first time.
Comment	The suspense builds as he reflects on the significance of each little movement. The ending is tantalizingly ambiguous.
Rating	5/5

Title	The adventure of a crook. [13 - 19] [7 pages]
Summary	A petty thief hides from the police by visiting the town prostitute.
Point	The relationships among people are often not what you expect.
Comment	This is a light story with many unexpected twists.
Rating	5/5

Title	The adventure of a bather. [20 - 30] [11 pages]
Summary	A woman loses the bottom of her bikini while swimming at a public beach.
Point	We become irrationally embarrassed in certain situations.
Comment	Another great story where we continually wonder what will happen next.
Rating	5/5

Title	The adventure of a clerk. [31 - 39] [9 pages]
Summary	A clerk goes back to work after spending the night with a woman he met at a party.
Point	Even a meaningless affair can disrupt one from his regular daily routine.
Comment	Why do some events, which do not involve any feelings of intimacy, still have an inordinate impact on our behavior?
Rating	4/5

Title	The adventure of a photographer. [40 - 52] [13 pages]
Summary	A man becomes interested in photography, which then becomes an obsession.
Point	The map is not the territory.
Comment	There is a progression from non-photographer to photographer to nudes to having an affair to treating the photos as more important than the relationship.
Rating	4/5

Title	The adventure of a traveller. [53 - 66] [14 pages]
Summary	A man tries unsuccessfully to keep a train compartment to himself while travelling to visit his girlfriend.
Point	In spite of careful plans, sometimes things fail to unfold according to plan. Yet if one is in love, this is of no consequence.
Comment	This story failed to have the suspense of the earlier stories, but the ending has a nice moral.
Rating	4/5

Title	The adventure of a reader. [67 - 81] [15 pages]
Summary	A woman takes up a place near where a man is reading. He is primarily interested in the book, but eventually they come together and make quick love. However his interest remains in the book rather than her.
Point	Reading can be a form of escapism that prevents one from enjoying life.
Comment	This is a rather pathetic caricature of a man who is afraid of engaging in any meaningful relationship.
Rating	4/5