Yet another busy but interesting reading day at RobAround Manor. Tuesdays can only mean Chekhov around here, and taking another step towards completing my Checkin’ Off the Chekhov Shorts reading challenge. So I began the day with two Chekhovian short stories which were mildly linked (unintentionally) by the theme of acting. First off was An Actor’s End, a story about a simpleton actor who falls ill and begins yearning for his hometown. All in all an OK story – rather tender at times – but ultimately nothing outstanding from the Russian master. You can read my full afterthoughts on the story HERE.
The second Chekhov short, The Requiem, follows shopkeeper Andrey Andreyitch, as he laments the death of his daughter. This is not a straightforward tale of lamentation however. Chekhov gets the story rolling in a completely unconnected way, with the priest of the church being angry at Andrey for the contents of a note that was passed to him. The story then begins to evolve and ends up being rather clever, and superbly engineered. Nice one Mr. Chekhov! Full afterthoughts HERE.
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Back into the short stories of Arthur Miller in Presence: Collected Stories (Bloomsbury) then, and a read through of the first story of the titular collection, Presence. It’s a 2001 story entitled Bulldog (so written quite late on in Miller’s life), and it’s about a thirteen-year-old boy who travels across Brooklyn in order to pick one of a number of Brindle Bulldogs which have been advertised in the newspaper. When he arrives at the address he ends up getting more than he bargains for. It’s difficult to expand on this without leaking a major spoiler, but suffice it to say that this new-found experience becomes the story’s primary driving force.
Thankfully, after Monday’s not so enjoyable Arthur Miller reading experience, Bulldog turns out to be a really good story. More about coming-of-age than anything else it is only eleven pages long, so not terribly lengthy, but contained within those eleven pages is a story as powerful as any that I’ve read from Miller so far. Good stuff. Story Rating: 
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Well I’ve written up enough of my forethoughts post for Kader Abdolah’s The House of the Mosque (Canongate) so that any reading of it won’t spoil my initial impressions. So I decided to start diving into it last night. I’m only 30+ pages in so far so it’s still early days, but already I’m rather enjoying it. It’s one of these novels that both entertains and informs at the same time – which I love, and the story is moving along at a nice pace.
Unfortunately, as is often the case with Islamic-based texts, one is quickly swept up by the cornucopia of names and family relationships. However, the writer has seen fit to include a rather nifty family tree diagram at the start of the book (which is actually drawn to look like the branches of a tree – very nice), which helps massively in establishing who’s who and what they mean to each other. How very thoughtful Mr. Abdolah!
::Wednesday’s reading plans::
- I want to play a bit of catch up on my Fifty-Two Stories backlog so in my short story reading ‘breech’ today I have Belinda by Amity Gaige, and the superbly titled Cicada Cadence, Katie Didn’t by Craig Davis. Both writers are an unknown to me so I’m really looking forward to getting to know them.
- My journey through Presence: Collected Stories marches on and the next story in line is the rather enigmatically but interestingly titled The Performance.
- My foray into revolutionary Iran continues with Kader Abdolah’s The House of the Mosque.
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