Collected Short Stories of Saki [antikvár]

INTRODUCTION 'There is no greater compliment to be paid to the right kind of friend than to hand liiin Saki without comment.' This remark by Christopher Morley in 1930 is as true today as when it was made. So, to some extent, an introduction to Saki's short stories is superfluous. The best introduction is to read them. It matters Utde where one starts, but perhaps the quickest way to acquire a taste for Saki's sardonic humour is to read of the activities of the outrageous Reginald, or of the refined cruelty of the epicene Clovis Sangrail. Alas, one will never know the answer to Reginald's ambiguoxis question, 'What did the Caspian Sea?', but at the end of The Unrest Cure the reader is left with ajHsson of pleasure at Clovis's political incorrectitude. Saki's short stories of urbane malice are like a fine dessert wine - they should be sipped, and savoured slowly; so intense are they that to read them at one sitting may induce a kind of literary dyspepsia. However, they are so beautifully crafted that one can return to them again and again with enhanced pleasure Perhaps one of the most remarkable aspects of Saki's writing is his sympathy with the oppressed, in particular with children. He recognises the terrible hegemony that adults Avield over the yoimg, who, however intelligent or articulate, are essentially powerless. Without doubt this stems from the author's own xmhappy childhood. It is seen at its best in Sredni Vashtar which is one of the finest stories in the English language. Said was himself something of an outsider, for his suppressed homosexuality lent him an intellectual fastidiousness that despised cant and hypocrisy. This is at its most cutting in Tobermory, the sly story of a cat that leams to speak Other animals are used to expose the foibles and frailties of upper-class Edwardian society with devastating effect, Gabriel-Ernest and Laura being two of the most chilling. With the exception of The East Wing, a story discovered in 1946, all Saki's short stories are included in this volume. Saki also wrote two novels, The Unbearable Bassington (1912) and When William Came (1913), as well as The Westminster Alice (see below) and three short