Short Stories

Avendaño AliciaGómez AlanVerón MelinaLic. Mariana Mussetta - Literature IUniversidad Tecnológica NacionalFRVM

“It is a term given to fictional writing which self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as an artefact in order to post questions about the relationship between fiction and reality” (Waugh 2).

Metafiction

He was born in 1947 in New Jersey, USA. His parents were Jewish.

His writings deal with absurdism, existentialism, crime fiction, the search for identity and personal meaning,

writing and story telling (Metafiction).

Paul Auster

On the 25th December 1990, Paul Auster published “Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story” in the New York Times.

Paul Auster is the writer and narrator of the story. However, when Auggie tells his Christmas story, he becomes the narrator.

The reader can identify one story within the other.

“Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story”

Characters

Paul: a writer who is asked to write a short story for the New York Times that would appear on Christmas morning.Auggie: a man who works at a cigar store in Brooklyn. He considers himself an artist. He tells Paul his Christmas story. In this story Granny Ethel and Auggie are the main characters.

Plot The story is about a writer (Paul Auster), who starts a friendship with Auggie Wren, a man who works at a cigar store. One day, Auggie shows Paul his life’s work: a set of twelve identical photo albums containing more than four thousand photographs. This pictures have been taken on the corner of Atlantic Avenue and Clinton street, at seven o’clock every morning for twelve years. After observing them carefully, Paul realizes Auggie has been photographing time.

Then the writer is asked to write a short story for the New York Times, to be published on Christmas morning. As Paul finds difficult to write about this celebration, Auggie offers to tell him “the best Christmas story”. The story Auggie tells Paul reveals how he began his career as an artist.

The story reflects various metafictional features: - A story containing another work of fiction within itself: Auggie’s Christmas story. - A story where the narrator intentionally exposes him or herself as the author of the story: “I will tell you the best Christmas story you ever heard” (Auster 2). - An autobiographical fiction: in his real life, Paul Auster was asked to write a story for the newspaper.

He was born in 1914, in Brussels, Belgium. His parents were Argentinian, but they were living abroad. When he was 4, they came back to Argentina. Many of Cortázar's stories follow the logic of hallucinations and obsessions. Central themes are the quest for identity, the hidden reality behind the everyday lives of common people, and the existential angst. Cortázar died in 1984, in Paris, France.

Julio Cortázar

It was published in 1956 in Argentina. This story belongs to a book called Final

del Juego, which contains eighteen stories. These are divided into three levels of difficulty, which means that each level becomes more complex and harder for the reader to understand.

The book is considered to be a game for the reader’s mind as it mixes the limits between reality and fiction.

“Continuidad de los Parques”

Characters

- The man reading a novel. - Within the novel: A man A woman (lovers)

Plot The story is about a man who is reading a novel in his comfortable armchair. He is reading about two lovers who are planning to kill somebody. As he continues reading, the couple, mainly the man, is carrying out the plan as it has been arranged.

Do you think that the man who is reading the story realizes he is reading about himself?

The story reflects various metafictional features:

- A story containing another work of fiction within itself: the novel being read by the man. - An “insecurity about the relationship between fiction and reality” (Waugh 2): the reader of “Continuidad de los Parques” may not distinguish what is fiction from reality. - A reader reading a book: the man reading the novel.

She was born in 1936 in England. Her childhood was unhappy because of

her overprotective mother. Her son died at the age of 11 in a car

accident. In her stories, she mixes naturalism and realism with fantasy. She won the Booker Prize in 1990 for Possession.

Susan Byatt

Definition: “a baby that is believed to have been secretly exchanged for another baby by fairies.” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English)

It belongs to a book called Sugar and Other Stories, a collection of short fictions, published in 1987 in New York.

This story is written in third person singular and it includes dialogues between the characters.

“The Changeling”

Characters Josephine Piper: a writer whose main subject is fear. She helps Max with “lost boys” from the boarding school. Max McKinley: the headmaster of the boarding school. Henry Smee: one of the “lost boys” sent to Josephine’s house. Simon Vowle: main character of Josephine’s story The Boiler-Room.

PlotThe story is about a writer called

Josephine, who helps Max, the headmaster of a boarding school, with the “lost boys.”

One day, Max asks her to look after Henry Smee, “a brilliant boy, but not easy” (Byatt 147). Max thinks that Henry is quite similar to Simon Vowle, the fictional character in Josephine’s story The Boiler-Room.

While living together, she starts being afraid of Henry due to his strange behavior.

Henry starts reading her book, and identifies himself with the main character, Simon. When she finds out about this, she becomes uncomfortable and uneasy because “Simon was herself,”… “Simon was her own fear” (Byatt 156).

One night she finds Henry in her bedroom looking at her mirror. She gets really scared and shouts him to go away from her house.

After some time, Max tells her that Henry has committed suicide.

The story reflects various metafictional features: - A reader reading a book: Henry reading The boiler-Room. - A story within a story: The Boiler-Room within “The Changeling”.- An autobiographical fiction: Simon Vowle depicts Josephine’s life. - An “insecurity about the relationship between fiction and reality” (Waugh 2): Josephine – Simon.

Works Cited

Auster, Paul. “Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story”. Print.

Byatt, Susan. “The Changeling” in Sugar and Other Stories. New York: Vintage International, 1992. Print.

Campbell, Jane. A.S Byatt and the Heliotropic Imagination. Canada: Wildfrid Laurier University Press, 2004. Print.

Cortázar, Julio. “La Continuidad de los Parques” en El Final del Juego, 1956. Print.

Waugh, Patricia. Metafiction. London: Routledge, 1984. Print.

Barone, Dennis. Beyond the Red Notebook. United States: University of

Pennsylvania Press, 1995. Print.

Work Consulted