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The Goophered Grapevine
Charles W. Chesnutt
22 min
http://The%20Goophered%20Grapevine
USA
Some years ago my wife was in poor health, and...
Mars Jeems's Nightmare
Charles W. Chesnutt
25 min
http://Mars%20Jeems's%20Nightmare
USA
We found old Julius very useful when we moved to...
The Passing of Grandison
Charles W. Chesnutt
26 min
http://The%20Passing%20of%20Grandison
USA
I When it is said that it was done to...
The Wife of His Youth
Charles W. Chesnutt
18 min
http://The%20Wife%20of%20His%20Youth
USA
I Mr. Ryder was going to give a ball. There...

Short Stories from around the world  |

Short Stories from around the world  |

Short Stories from around the world  |

Hidden Gems

On the Tram
Czech Republic
I stand on the end platform of the tram and am completely unsure of my footing in this world, in this town, in my family. Not even casually could I indicate any claims that I might...
On the Tram
Franz Kafka
1 min
The Death of a Bachelor
Austria
Someone had knocked at the door, quite gently, but the doctor awoke at once, turned on the light, and sat up in bed. He glanced at his wife who was sleeping quietly, picked up his dressing-gown,...
The Death of a Bachelor
Arthur Schnitzler
17 min
The Model Millionaire
UK
A Note of Admiration   Unless one is wealthy there is no use in being a charming fellow. Romance is the privilege of the rich, not the profession of the unemployed. The poor should be practical...
The Model Millionaire
Oscar Wilde
7 min
The Red Crown
Russia
Most of all I hate the sun, loud human voices, and pounding. Rapid, rapid pounding. I am so afraid of people that if I hear someone else’s footsteps and the sound of voices in the corridor...
The Red Crown
Mikhail Bulgakov
8 min
The Decameron: Day the Fifth, The Ninth Story
Italy
FEDERIGO DEGLI ALBERIGHI LOVETH AND IS NOT LOVED. HE WASTETH HIS SUBSTANCE IN PRODIGAL HOSPITALITY TILL THERE IS LEFT HIM BUT ONE SOLE FALCON, WHICH, HAVING NOUGHT ELSE, HE GIVETH HIS MISTRESS TO EAT, ON HER...
The Decameron: Day the Fifth, The Ninth Story
Giovanni Boccaccio
10 min
Fragment of a Novel
UK
“In the year 17__, having for some time determined on a journey through countries not hitherto much frequented by travellers, I set out, accompanied by a friend, whom I shall designate by the name of Augustus...
Fragment of a Novel
Lord Byron
7 min
Napoleon and the Spectre
UK
Well, as I was saying, the Emperor got into bed. “Chevalier,” says he to his valet, “let down those window-curtains, and shut the casement before you leave the room.” Chevalier did as he was told, and...
Napoleon and the Spectre
Charlotte Brontë
4 min
D.H. Lawrence
There were some twiggy apple trees, winter-crack trees, and ragged cabbages. Beside the path hung dishevelled pink chrysanthemums, like pink cloths hung on bushes. A woman came stooping out of the felt-covered fowl-house, half-way down the garden
Anna Starobinets
And the name of the investor who had recently undertaken to fund the magazine, and who had actually commissioned this very article, accidentally migrated from a list of oligarchs who meticulously paid their taxes into a list of inveterate tax-dodgers
Sabrina Huang
This felt like that fairy tale, the shoemaker and the elves—he wondered if something was coming in the middle of the night and only leaving at dawn, working day after day on his sleeping body, filling in and carving out, turning him into a lean-torsoed, clean-featured hunk of a man
Anton Chekhov
It was cold and the snow was still on the ground, the trees were lifeless, but the scent of spring was in the air, and the rooks were cawing noisily as they settled themselves for the night

Our Classics

The Mark on the Wall
UK
Perhaps it was the middle of January in the present year that I first looked up and saw the mark on the wall. In order to fix a date it is necessary to remember what one...
The Mark on the Wall
Virginia Woolf
12 min
The Fisherman and His Soul
UK
Every evening the young Fisherman went out upon the sea, and threw his nets into the water.      When the wind blew from the land he caught nothing, or but little at best, for it was...
The Fisherman and His Soul
Oscar Wilde
55 min
The City
Russia
It was an immense city in which they lived: Petrov, clerk in a commercial bank, and he, the other,—name unknown. They used to meet once a year, at Easter, when they both went to pay a...
The City
Leonid Andreyev
11 min
Two Brothers
Russia
Trees cannot talk and they stand as if riveted to the spot, but they are alive nonetheless.  They’re breathing. They keep growing for as long as they live. Even enormous old-man trees – they grow a...
Two Brothers
Evgeny Schwartz
23 min
The Door in the Wall
USA
One confidential evening, not three months ago, Lionel Wallace told me this story of the Door in the Wall. And at the time I thought that so far as he was concerned it was a true...
The Door in the Wall
H. G. Wells
27 min
Enter Mitchell
Australia
The Western train had just arrived at Redfern railway station with a lot of ordinary passengers and one swagman. He was short, and stout, and bow-legged, and freckled, and sandy. He had red hair and small,...
Enter Mitchell
Henry Lawson
2 min
The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids
USA
  The Paradise of Bachelors It lies not far from Temple-Bar. Going to it, by the usual way, is like stealing from a heated plain into some cool, deep glen, shady among harboring hills. Sick with...
The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids
Herman Melville
32 min
A Mighty Nice Man
USA
The child Charlotte sat on the narrow curbstone, her cheek against one knee, drawing idly in the dust with a stick. She sniffed at the flesh of her leg, smelt the dust and the sweat on...
A Mighty Nice Man
Patricia Highsmith
8 min
A Novel in Nine Letters
Russia
I (From Pyotr Ivanitch To Ivan Petrovitch) Dear Sir and Most Precious Friend, Ivan Petrovitch, For the last two days I have been, I may say, in pursuit of you, my friend, having to talk over...
A Novel in Nine Letters
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
14 min
The Nightingale and the Rose
UK
“She promised she’d dance with me if I brought her a red rose,” cried a young heart-broken student. “But there’s not one in this whole garden.” From her nest in the oak tree, the Nightingale heard...
The Nightingale and the Rose
Oscar Wilde
5 min

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