Mamacita says: I love a good short story, but exactly what is a short story? Is it a short story because it’s always short?
Surprisingly, no.
It’s a short story because it has only one main plotline and set of characters.
However, most short stories are pretty short. One of my college professors told us that one should be able to begin and finish a really good short story while sitting on the toilet. I think I agree. Sometimes there’s a fine line between a novella and a few paragraphs, but the right length of a proper short story is somewhere in between: just the right length for a beginning, middle, and ending, giving you plenty of time to finish your business without getting hemorhoids from sitting too long. We keep a lot of our books in the big bathroom and many of them are collections of short stories.
I’m reminded of the scene in “The Big Chill” wherein Jeff Goldblum laments that most of his writing is read on the toilet, and when someone comments that one can read “War and Peace” on the toilet, Goldblum counters with “Yes, but you can’t finish it.”
But with a short story, you can.
Stop laughing. Where else, and when else, in our busy lives do we have a few minutes to ourselves?
Occasionally, I come across a short story that haunts me, makes me obsessed, changes me, affects me, and not always in a positive way. When I say, ‘not positive’ I don’t mean ‘negative.’ I really don’t know how to explain what I mean, either. That doesn’t mean I don’t know, it just means there are no words for it. I don’t count short stories that were poorly written or that I personally just simply disliked for whatever reason. I mean, a well-written short story that knocked me flat on the ground. Right flat, on my back gazing up at the ceiling with a look of dumbstruck amazement, or joy, or sadness, or whatever as long as it was well-thought-out and beautifully written.
Arthur C. Clarke’s short story “The Star” is one that knocked me flat and wouldn’t let me back up again for a long, long time.
How long? I’m still on the ground from it.
I first read it when I was in the fifth grade and it fascinated me, and frightened me, and made me ask questions that were not always appreciated by my elders, but isn’t that what a good story is supposed to do to us? I came to the conclusion back then, and I still hold to it, that elders who are suspicious of, and do not encourage, sincere questions about any subject, are themselves not secure in their beliefs and are, on some occasions, downright ignorant.
This story absolutely blew me away. I adore it. I am afraid of it. I always approach the ending with trepidation, hoping somehow that it has changed from the last time I read it. It never does.
It will make you think. It will make you question. It will make you glad to be alive. It will make you wonder about the future, and about the past.
Many pastors have forbidden their congregations to read it. It’s been removed from most textbooks for fear of offending someone. But it still exists. And since most bloggers are intelligent, open-minded, and not easily offended, please click on the link below and read this short story. It’s the right time of year for wondering and pondering.
See what you think.
Arthur C. Clarke’s “The Star.”
Love it. It does not scare me at all. But it does make me
me think.
Love it. It does not scare me at all. But it does make me
me think.
Yes–beautiful and sad. I’m pretty sure I’ve read that one before. The scientist in me, of course, points out that a star big enough to produce a supernova is also the wrong sort of star to have a planet with life orbiting it*. Possibly I encourage this to counteract the sadness of the story. The poet in me just loves the balance and beauty of the story.
*A star has to star out very big for you to get a supernova out of it. This means it produces a lot of radiation at the blue end of the spectrum, which is the sort of radiation that messes up the chemical bonds you need for life–the sort of stuff the ozone layer and earth’s magnetic field shields us from mostly, so that means almost certainly no life as we know it, and by life as we know it, I don’t mean recognizable animals and plants, just the carbon based stuff.
Yes–beautiful and sad. I’m pretty sure I’ve read that one before. The scientist in me, of course, points out that a star big enough to produce a supernova is also the wrong sort of star to have a planet with life orbiting it*. Possibly I encourage this to counteract the sadness of the story. The poet in me just loves the balance and beauty of the story.
*A star has to star out very big for you to get a supernova out of it. This means it produces a lot of radiation at the blue end of the spectrum, which is the sort of radiation that messes up the chemical bonds you need for life–the sort of stuff the ozone layer and earth’s magnetic field shields us from mostly, so that means almost certainly no life as we know it, and by life as we know it, I don’t mean recognizable animals and plants, just the carbon based stuff.
The Star has scaredme to death for 20 years. I have nightmares about it. Talk about a life-shaking thing! This time of year, it’s good to be reminded about this connection; after all, most stars do have planets, inhabited or not, as we’re discovering with Hubble, etc, and who’s to say which star gave its life and took its inhabited satellites along with it, to create the nova that was the Bethlehem star? thanks for the reminder.
–Pam
P.S. I love your blog more than any book I ever read or any class I ever took. It’s just simply wonderful.
The Star has scaredme to death for 20 years. I have nightmares about it. Talk about a life-shaking thing! This time of year, it’s good to be reminded about this connection; after all, most stars do have planets, inhabited or not, as we’re discovering with Hubble, etc, and who’s to say which star gave its life and took its inhabited satellites along with it, to create the nova that was the Bethlehem star? thanks for the reminder.
–Pam
P.S. I love your blog more than any book I ever read or any class I ever took. It’s just simply wonderful.