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40 Short Stories
A Portable Anthology
40
Short Stories
A Portable Anthology
Fifth Edition
Edited by
BEVERLY LAWN
Adelphi University
For Robert Lawn
For Bedford/St. Martin’s
Vice President, Editorial, Macmillan Learning Humanities: Edwin Hill
Editorial Director, English: Karen S. Henry
Executive Editor for Literature: Vivian Garcia
Senior Executive Editor: Stephen A. Scipione
Production Editor: Pamela Lawson
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Production Supervisor: Robert Cherry
Marketing Manager: Sophia Latorre-Zengierski
Project Management: Jouve
Permissions Manager: Kalina Ingham
Text Permissions Researcher: Arthur Johnson
Senior Art Director: Anna Palchik
Cover Design: John Callahan
Cover Photo: Paul Moore/Arcangel
Composition: Jouve
Printing and Binding: RR Donnelley and Sons
1 0 9 8 7 6
f e d c b a
For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street, Boston,
MA 02116 (617-399-4000)
ISBN 978-1-319-11042-0
Acknowledgments
Text acknowledgments and copyrights appear at the back of the book on
pages 534–36, which constitute an extension of the copyright page. Art
acknowledgments and copyrights appear on the same page as the art
selections they cover.
Preface for Instructors
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am grateful to the instructors who responded so thoughtfully to our queries
about their experience with the fourth edition: Alan Ambrisco, University of
Akron; Jane Arnold, SUNY Adirondack Community College; George H.
Bailey, Wentworth Institute of Technology; Jessica Best, SUNY Adirondack
Community College; Abby Coykendall, Eastern Michigan University; Lila
Harper, Central Washington University; Michael Herman, Molloy College;
Emily Isaacson, Heidelberg University; Bonni Miller, University of
Maryland—Eastern Shore; Tim Oldakowski, Slippery Rock University; Thor
Polukoshko, Langara College; Alison Powell, Oakland University; Heidi
Stoffer, Cleveland State University; Susan Stone, Loras College; Melanie
Sumner, Kennesaw State University; Stephen Tuttle, Brigham Young
University; and Robert Vettese, Southern Maine Community College.
I also remain thankful to those who reviewed earlier editions of the book,
going back to the turn of the millennium: Sonya Alvarado, Eastern Michigan
University; Tom Averill, Washburn University; Mark Baker, Langara
College; Dianne Bateman, Champlain College, Saint-Lambert, Québec; Mark
Bilbrey, University of Iowa; Daniel Boscaljon, University of Iowa; William
Bradley, Chowan University; Ayse Bucak, Florida Atlantic University;
Shannon Bush, El Camino College; Jeff Chan, Austin Community College;
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Community College; Steven Daniels, Southern Methodist University; Donald
Deeley, Temple University; Charles Donaldson, Santa Monica College;
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College; Africa Fine, Palm Beach State College; George Greenlee, Missouri
Southern State University; Christine Guedon-DeConcini, Rutgers University;
James Guthrie, Wright State University; William David Halloran, Indiana
University; Barbara Henning, Long Island University; Kelly Jarvis, Central
Connecticut State University; Stephen Jones, University of Colorado at
Boulder; Renee Karp, Vanier College; Patricia S. Kennedy, University of
North Carolina—Chapel Hill; Alice Kinder, Virginia Tech; Carrie Krantz,
Washtenaw Community College; Brenda Kwon, Honolulu Community
College; Ruth Lane, Loyola Marymount University; Don S. Lawson, Lander
University; Simon Lewis, College of Charleston; Cory Lund, Southwestern
Illinois College; Courtney Mauk, College of Staten Island/CUNY; Betsy
McCully, Kingsborough Community College/CUNY; Adam McKible, John
Jay College of Criminal Justice; Mildred R. Mickle, University of North
Carolina—Chapel Hill; Sturgis Monteith, Northwest Mississippi Community
College; Meg Morgan, University of North Carolina—Charlotte; Faye
Moskowitz, George Washington University; Carolyn Nelson, West Virginia
University; Brian Norman, Loyola University Maryland; Michele A.
Panossian, Lehman College/CUNY; Jude Roy, Madisonville Community
College; Chris Ruiz-Velasco, California State University—Fullerton; Margot
Singer, Denison University; Will Smiley, University of Iowa; Natalie Yasmin
Soto, Cornell University; Michael Steinman, Nassau Community College;
Robert Love Taylor, Bucknell University; Gary Tessmer, University of
Pittsburgh—Bradford; Deborah Chappel Traylor, Arkansas State University;
Catherine Tudish, Dartmouth College; James G. Van Belle, Edmonds
Community College; Annette Wannamaker, Eastern Michigan University;
John Wegner, Angelo State University; Jess Westover, University of Nevada
—Reno; Lawrence Wharton, University of Alabama—Birmingham; Holly A.
Wheeler, Monroe Community College; Charlene Williams, Ocean County
College; Charles Yarnoff, Northwestern University; John Zackel, Portland
Community College—Rock Creek. Some of these reviewers may have retired
or moved on by now, but they all left their mark on earlier editions of 40
Short Stories.
My deep thanks to all those at Bedford/St. Martin’s who devoted their
professional knowledge and skill to the creation of this book: especially Steve
Scipione, for his sophisticated and profound knowledge of literature and
publishing and his compassionate and cooperative involvement in the making
of this book. Others in editorial positions I wish to thank include Edwin Hill,
Vice President Editorial, Humanities; Karen Henry, Editorial Director;
Vivian Garcia, Acquistions Editor; and especially Julia Domenicucci for all
her assistance in matters of manuscript preparation and last-minute problem-
solving. In the production department, thanks go to Elise Kaiser, Managing
Editor, and Pamela Lawson, Production Editor. I am grateful to Permissions
Manager Kalina Ingham and to Arthur Johnson, who cleared the permissions
for the fifth edition.
I wish to thank my daughters Pamela Lawn-Williams and Hilary Lawn
Cantilina for their patience and encouragement of this task, and to thank my
late husband, artist and teacher Bob Lawn, for his love and unswerving
support of my writing and research. I dedicate this book to Robert Lawn,
artist and teacher.
—Beverly Lawn
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ELEMENTS OF FICTION
PLOT
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Cask of Amontillado”
Kate Chopin, “The Story of an Hour”
Eudora Welty, “A Worn Path”
Shirley Jackson, “The Lottery”
Edith Pearlman, “Inbound”
Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings”
Yiyun Li, “A Man Like Him”
CHARACTER
Herman Melville, “Bartleby, the Scrivener”
Anton Chekhov, “The Lady with the Dog”
Willa Cather, “Paul’s Case”
Katherine Mansfield, “Miss Brill”
Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”
Jhumpa Lahiri, “Interpreter of Maladies”
SETTING
Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown”
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Yellow Wallpaper”
William Faulkner, “A Rose for Emily”
Edith Pearlman, “Inbound”
Joshua Ferris, “The Breeze”
Lauren Groff, “At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners”
POINT OF VIEW
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Yellow Wallpaper”
Katherine Mansfield, “Miss Brill”
William Faulkner, “A Rose for Emily”
James Baldwin, “Sonny’s Blues”
Sandra Cisneros, “The House on Mango Street”
Junot Díaz, “Fiesta, 1980”
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “Birdsong”
STYLE, TONE, IRONY
Herman Melville, “Bartleby, the Scrivener”
William Faulkner, “A Rose for Emily”
Ernest Hemingway, “Hills Like White Elephants”
Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”
Raymond Carver, “Cathedral”
Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson”
Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl”
SYMBOL AND METAPHOR
James Joyce, “Araby”
Gabriel García Márquez, “A Very Old Man with Enormous
Wings”
40 Short Stories: John Updike, “A & P”
Tim O’Brien, “The Things They Carried”
T. Coraghessan Boyle, “The Night of the Satellite”
Mark Haddon, “The Gun”
Lauren Groff, “At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners”
THEMATIC GROUPINGS
ARTISTIC EXPRESSION
Willa Cather, “Paul’s Case”
Franz Kafka, “A Hunger Artist”
James Baldwin, “Sonny’s Blues”
Raymond Carver, “Cathedral”
Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings”
CULTURAL CONFRONTATIONS
Ralph Ellison, “Battle Royal”
Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson”
Alice Walker, “Everyday Use”
Sherman Alexie, “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in
Heaven”
Yiyun Li, “A Man Like Him”
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES
James Joyce, “Araby”
Leslie Marmon Silko, “The Man to Send Rain Clouds”
Amy Tan, “Two Kinds”
Jhumpa Lahiri, “Interpreter of Maladies”
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “Birdsong”
FAMILIES
Edith Pearlman, “Inbound”
Alice Walker, “Everyday Use”
Amy Tan, “Two Kinds”
Sandra Cisneros, “The House on Mango Street”
Junot Díaz, “Fiesta, 1980”
Lauren Groff, “At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners”
INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE
Willa Cather, “Paul’s Case”
James Joyce, “Araby”
Ralph Ellison, “Battle Royal”
40 Short Stories: John Updike, “A & P”
Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You
Been?”
Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson”
Junot Díaz, “Fiesta, 1980”
JOURNEYS
Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown”
James Joyce, “Araby”
Eudora Welty, “A Worn Path”
Edith Pearlman, “Inbound”
Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson”
Tim O’Brien, “The Things They Carried”
T. Coraghessan Boyle, “The Night of the Satellite”
Joshua Ferris, “The Breeze”
LOVE AND HATE
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Cask of Amontillado”
Kate Chopin, “The Story of an Hour”
Anton Chekhov, “The Lady with the Dog”
Ernest Hemingway, “Hills Like White Elephants”
Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings”
T. Coraghessan Boyle, “The Night of the Satellite”
Joshua Ferris, “The Breeze”
Lauren Groff, “At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners”
THE LURE OF THE FORBIDDEN
Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown”
James Joyce, “Araby”
James Baldwin, “Sonny’s Blues”
Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You
Been?”
Mark Haddon, “The Gun”
Karen Russell, “Vampires in the Lemon Grove”
MYTH AND ARCHETYPE
Franz Kafka, “A Hunger Artist”
Eudora Welty, “A Worn Path”
Gabriel García Márquez, “A Very Old Man with Enormous
Wings”
Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You
Been?”
Leslie Marmon Silko, “The Man to Send Rain Clouds”
Sherman Alexie, “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in
Heaven”
Karen Russell, “Vampires in the Lemon Grove”
STORIES FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Anton Chekhov, “The Lady with the Dog” (Russia)
James Joyce, “Araby” (Ireland)
Franz Kafka, “A Hunger Artist” (then Austria-Hungary, now
Czech Republic)
Katherine Mansfield, “Miss Brill” (New Zealand)
Gabriel García Márquez, “A Very Old Man with Enormous
Wings” (Colombia)
Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings” (Canada)
Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl” (Antigua)
Mark Haddon, “The Gun” (England)
Jhumpa Lahiri, “Interpreter of Maladies” (India)
Junot Díaz, “Fiesta, 1980” (Dominican Republic)
Yiyun Li, “A Man Like Him” (China)
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “Birdsong”(Nigeria)
SUSPENSE AND TERROR
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Cask of Amontillado”
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Yellow Wallpaper”
William Faulkner, “A Rose for Emily”
Shirley Jackson, “The Lottery”
Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You
Been?”
Mark Haddon, “The Gun”
Karen Russell, “Vampires in the Lemon Grove”
YOUTH AND AGE
Willa Cather, “Paul’s Case”
Katherine Mansfield, “Miss Brill”
Eudora Welty, “A Worn Path”
Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”
40 Short Stories: John Updike, “A & P”
Tony Cade Bambara, “The Lesson”
Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl”
Karen Russell, “Vampires in the Lemon Grove”
Young Goodman Brown
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
[1804–1864]
Young Goodman Brown came forth at sunset into the street at Salem village;
but put his head back, after crossing the threshold, to exchange a parting kiss
with his young wife. And Faith, as the wife was aptly named, thrust her own
pretty head into the street, letting the wind play with the pink ribbons of her
cap while she called to Goodman Brown.
“Dearest heart,” whispered she, softly and rather sadly, when her lips were
close to his ear, “prithee put off your journey until sunrise and sleep in your
own bed to-night. A lone woman is troubled with such dreams and such
thoughts that she’s afeared of herself sometimes. Pray tarry with me this
night, dear husband, of all nights in the year.”
“My love and my Faith,” replied young Goodman Brown, “of all nights in
the year, this one night must I tarry away from thee. My journey, as thou
callest it, forth and back again, must needs be done ’twixt now and sunrise.
What, my sweet, pretty wife, dost thou doubt me already, and we but three
months married?”
“Then God bless you!” said Faith, with the pink ribbons, “and may you
find all well when you come back.”
“Amen!” cried Goodman Brown. “Say thy prayers, dear Faith, and go to
bed at dusk, and no harm will come to thee.”
So they parted; and the young man pursued his way until, being about to
turn the corner by the meeting-house, he looked back and saw the head of
Faith still peeping after him with a melancholy air, in spite of her pink
ribbons.
“Poor little Faith!” thought he, for his heart smote him. “What a wretch
am I to leave her on such an errand! She talks of dreams, too. Methought as
she spoke there was trouble in her face, as if a dream had warned her what
work is to be done to-night. But no, no; ’t would kill her to think it. Well,
she’s a blessed angel on earth, and after this one night I’ll cling to her skirts
and follow her to heaven.”
With this excellent resolve for the future, Goodman Brown felt himself
justified in making more haste on his present evil purpose. He had taken a
dreary road, darkened by all the gloomiest trees of the forest, which barely
stood aside to let the narrow path creep through, and closed immediately
behind. It was all as lonely as could be; and there is this peculiarity in such a
solitude, that the traveller knows not who may be concealed by the
innumerable trunks and the thick boughs overhead; so that with lonely
footsteps he may yet be passing through an unseen multitude.
“There may be a devilish Indian behind every tree,” said Goodman Brown
to himself; and he glanced fearfully behind him as he added, “What if the
devil himself should be at my very elbow!”
His head being turned back, he passed a crook of the road, and, looking
forward again, beheld the figure of a man, in grave and decent attire, seated at
the foot of an old tree. He arose at Goodman Brown’s approach and walked
onward side by side with him.
“You are late, Goodman Brown,” said he. “The clock of the Old South
was striking as I came through Boston, and that is full fifteen minutes agone.”
“Faith kept me back a while,” replied the young man, with a tremor in his
voice, caused by the sudden appearance of his companion, though not wholly
unexpected.
It was now deep dusk in the forest, and deepest in that part of it where
these two were journeying. As nearly as could be discerned, the second
traveller was about fifty years old, apparently in the same rank of life as
Goodman Brown, and bearing a considerable resemblance to him, though
perhaps more in expression than features. Still they might have been taken for
father and son. And yet, though the elder person was as simply clad as the
younger, and as simple in manner too, he had an indescribable air of one who
knew the world, and who would not have felt abashed at the governor’s
dinner table or in King William’s court, were it possible that his affairs
should call him thither. But the only thing about him that could be fixed upon
as remarkable was his staff, which bore the likeness of a great black snake, so
curiously wrought that it might almost be seen to twist and wriggle itself like
a living serpent. This, of course, must have been an ocular deception, assisted
by the uncertain light.
“Come, Goodman Brown,” cried his fellow-traveller, “this is a dull pace
for the beginning of a journey. Take my staff, if you are so soon weary.”
“Friend,” said the other, exchanging his slow pace for a full stop, “having
kept covenant by meeting thee here, it is my purpose now to return whence I
came. I have scruples touching the matter thou wot’st of.”
“Sayest thou so?” replied he of the serpent, smiling apart. “Let us walk on,
nevertheless, reasoning as we go; and if I convince thee not thou shalt turn
back. We are but a little way in the forest yet.”
“Too far! too far!” exclaimed the goodman, unconsciously resuming his
walk. “My father never went into the woods on such an errand, nor his father
before him. We have been a race of honest men and good Christians since the
days of the martyrs; and shall I be the first of the name of Brown that ever
took this path and kept—”
“Such company, thou wouldst say,” observed the elder person, interpreting
his pause. “Well said, Goodman Brown! I have been as well acquainted with
your family as with ever a one among the Puritans; and that’s no trifle to say.
I helped your grandfather, the constable, when he lashed the Quaker woman
so smartly through the streets of Salem; and it was I that brought your father
a pitch-pine knot, kindled at my own hearth, to set fire to an Indian village, in
King Philip’s war.1 They were my good friends, both; and many a pleasant
walk have we had along this path, and returned merrily after midnight. I
would fain be friends with you for their sake.”
“If it be as thou sayest,” replied Goodman Brown, “I marvel they never
spoke of these matters; or, verily, I marvel not, seeing that the least rumor of
the sort would have driven them from New England. We are a people of
prayer, and good works to boot, and abide no such wickedness.”
“Wickedness or not,” said the traveller with the twisted staff, “I have a
very general acquaintance here in New England. The deacons of many a
church have drunk the communion wine with me; the selectmen of divers
towns make me their chairman; and a majority of the Great and General
Court are firm supporters of my interest. The governor and I, too—But these
are state secrets.”
“Can this be so?” cried Goodman Brown, with a stare of amazement at his
undisturbed companion. “Howbeit, I have nothing to do with the governor
and council; they have their own ways, and are no rule for a simple
husbandman like me. But, were I to go on with thee, how should I meet the
eye of that good old man, our minister, at Salem village? Oh, his voice would
make me tremble both Sabbath day and lecture day.”
Thus far the elder traveller had listened with due gravity; but now burst
into a fit of irrepressible mirth, shaking himself so violently that his snake-
like staff actually seemed to wriggle in sympathy.
“Ha! ha! ha!” shouted he again and again; then composing himself, “Well,
go on, Goodman Brown, go on; but, prithee, don’t kill me with laughing.”
“Well, then, to end the matter at once,” said Goodman Brown,
considerably nettled, “there is my wife, Faith. It would break her dear little
heart; and I’d rather break my own.”
“Nay, if that be the case,” answered the other, “e’en go thy ways,
Goodman Brown. I would not for twenty old women like the one hobbling
before us that Faith should come to any harm.”
As he spoke he pointed his staff at a female figure on the path, in whom
Goodman Brown recognized a very pious and exemplary dame, who had
taught him his catechism in youth, and was still his moral and spiritual
adviser, jointly with the minister and Deacon Gookin.
“A marvel, truly that Goody Cloyse should be so far in the wilderness at
nightfall,” said he. “But with your leave, friend, I shall take a cut through the
woods until we have left this Christian woman behind. Being a stranger to
you, she might ask whom I was consorting with and whither I was going.”
“Be it so,” said his fellow-traveller. “Betake you to the woods, and let me
keep the path.”
Accordingly the young man turned aside, but took care to watch his
companion, who advanced softly along the road until he had come within a
staff’s length of the old dame. She, meanwhile, was making the best of her
way, with singular speed for so aged a woman, and mumbling some indistinct
words—a prayer, doubtless—as she went. The traveller put forth his staff and
touched her withered neck with what seemed the serpent’s tail.
“The devil!” screamed the pious old lady.
“Then Goody Cloyse knows her old friend?” observed the traveller,
confronting her and leaning on his writhing stick.
“Ah, forsooth, and is it your worship indeed?” cried the good dame. “Yea,
truly is it, and in the very image of my old gossip, Goodman Brown, the
grandfather of the silly fellow that now is. But—would your worship believe
it?—my broomstick hath strangely disappeared, stolen, as I suspect, by that
unhanged witch, Goody Cory, and that, too, when I was all anointed with the
juice of smallage, and cinquefoil, and wolf’s bane—”2
“Mingled with fine wheat and the fat of a new-born babe,” said the shape
of old Goodman Brown.
“Ah, your worship knows the recipe,” cried the old lady, cackling aloud.
“So, as I was saying, being all ready for the meeting, and no horse to ride on,
I made up my mind to foot it; for they tell me there is a nice young man to be
taken into communion to-night. But now your good worship will lend me
your arm, and we shall be there in a twinkling.”
“That can hardly be,” answered her friend. “I may not spare you my arm,
Goody Cloyse; but here is my staff, if you will.”
So saying, he threw it down at her feet, where, perhaps, it assumed life,
being one of the rods which its owner had formerly lent to the Egyptian magi.
Of this fact, however, Goodman Brown could not take cognizance. He had
cast up his eyes in astonishment, and, looking down again, beheld neither
Goody Cloyse nor the serpentine staff, but his fellow-traveller alone, who
waited for him as calmly as if nothing had happened.
“That old woman taught me my catechism,” said the young man; and there
was a world of meaning in this simple comment.
They continued to walk onward, while the elder traveller exhorted his
companion to make good speed and persevere in the path, discoursing so
aptly that his arguments seemed rather to spring up in the bosom of his
auditor than to be suggested by himself. As they went, he plucked a branch of
maple to serve for a walking stick, and began to strip it of the twigs and little
boughs, which were wet with evening dew. The moment his fingers touched
them they became strangely withered and dried up as with a week’s sunshine.
Thus the pair proceeded, at a good free pace, until suddenly, in a gloomy
hollow of the road, Goodman Brown sat himself down on the stump of a tree
and refused to go any farther.
“Friend,” he said, stubbornly, “my mind is made up. Not another step will
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