(If you're wondering about Short Stories on Wednesdays and Reading Shakespeare, please scroll down toward the end of this post.)

Time is of the essence. And I find I waste most of it at the computer, especially in the blogosphere. As a result, I really haven’t done much reading in the last few weeks, and I have neglected to do much else that I would like to do. Seriously, for me the computer is an addiction. And I’m beginning to feel bogged down by it. This is something I cannot afford, especially with my wanting to have a home-school routine with my two-year old son so that I can prepare him for kindergarten next year, wanting to thoroughly learn my mother tongue, wanting to read (yes, this really is something I’ve been neglecting inspite of my ‘book’ blog), exercise, bake, write, etc.. I figured, if I just stopped blogging I would be able to attend to all these things if I planned my days right!

So. I’ve made up my mind.

If you’re wondering about Short Stories on Wednesdays and Reading Shakespeare, please continue reading.

Short Stories on Wednesdays:
I shall continue to host this here at Breadcrumb Reads for as long as I am able to stick to this. Though the number of participants does not amount to more that 12 or 15, I know that each and everyone of you love that you can at least read short stories for an event and share them with others. I also love this event, and hope it continues. Just in case, IF there is anyone willing to take over and host this, I would be very grateful. Should you be interested please contact me at breadcrumbreads(at)yahoo(dot)com.

Reading Shakespeare: (click this link to go to the site)
This I definitely intend to continue hosting through 2012. It’s just one play a month with one post at the end of the month. So, those of you taking part in this monthly event, don’t worry, this isn’t going to be cancelled. I most certainly want to finish as much Shakespeare as I can!

To all my readers and fellow bloggers, I want to thank you for the fun time I’ve had discussing books and stories with you. I have read so much that I would never have otherwise touched because of your reviews, encouragement and enthusiasm. I’ve loved reading various perspective on the same story or theme. I’ve enjoyed discovering new writers, and even fellow bloggers who write. Thank you all for making this blogging experience a lovely one.

P.S. — I will continue to be active on Goodreads, so if would like to see what I’m reading and any brief thoughts I might have through the course of reading then do hop on over to my Goodreads page.

Welcome to the 2012 edition of Short Stories on Wednesdays!

Short Stories on Wednesdays is a weekly event intended to encourage folk to read short stories, a much neglected literary form. Every Wednesday you are encouraged to share what you’ve read with us in the comment section. You can even post links to any review of short stories you have made through the course of the week. Every second Wednesday we have a guest poster and/or a short story giveaway. Every fourth Wednesday we have a theme round which we try to choose a story to read. This, of course, is not compulsory.

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Hello everyone! I’m really excited to introduce this week’s guest poster, Joel Allyn (a.k.a Th3 Scribbl3r). I came across Joel’s blog a few months ago while exploring WordPress and discovered that he wrote short stories. It was curiosity that started me on one. And I’ve found that I’m always ‘curious’ about his stories. I don’t think his stories have a fixed theme since personally, I’ve always been surprised. I like that I have been able to react pretty strongly to all of the stories I’ve read so far. I have to admit, I have as yet to read everything he has posted on his site, but I can assure you reading even one of them is an experience. I won’t go on any further as I think it best that you ‘read’ for yourself and see if you don’t like his style, because Joel is very kindly allowing me to post his latest story on Breadcrumb Reads.

Hope you enjoy it! And if you find this story to you liking I would encourage to hop on over to his site and see what else you can find. I would highly recommend “The Gardener”, “Nostalgia” and “Breathing Shadows”.

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SISYPHUS by Joel Allyn

As always, the boulder rolled down the hill and once more, after a short reprieve, Sisyphus descended and attempted to roll the stone to the top again. He no longer wept when the inevitable came.

It was hot. His clothes had all withered away thousands of years before and so he was naked, and still it was so hot. It felt as though his flesh was on fire and yet, as he looked around he saw that the hill he pushed the boulder up was covered in lush tall grass and nestled in endless spring. There were purple and red flowers in bloom, swaying in a gentle breeze. He felt no breeze, and could smell nothing. He was drenched in sweat and his hands were more blisters than flesh.

Every time he pushed the massive boulder upward, slow step by slower step, he thought over his life. Things done and things left undone. Things which would have been better left undone. He wished he could remember the good things and that which brought him pleasure and joy. More than once he tried to steer his thoughts, to reminisce of childhood or his first love or even a sunset but succeeded only briefly. The focal point of his thoughts seemed to dwell around the negative acts he had committed and the virtuous ones he had not. No other thoughts were permitted. His memory was his tormentor, his apt mind his foe.

About a third of the way up, he hit a moist patch and lost his footing. The boulder rolled back slightly and when he attempted to push it, the sweat caused his palms to slip on the stone and the boulder almost rolled over him. Dropping to one knee he forced his shoulder into the rolling stone, halting its descent. He resembled Atlas, his broad shoulders alone supporting the weight of the world. Slowly, with great strain and care, he stood back up and after catching his breath, continued pushing the boulder up the hill.

As always, the memories came in droves, like a swarm of angry bees, and they stung. The pain was a familiar one, and yet each scar was opened anew and with each laceration he swore he had never experienced such agony.

Once, an eternity ago, he passed a beggar in the marketplace whose face looked familiar to him and even as the man called out his brother’s name, Sisyphus did not turn. Instead he quickened his pace and went on through the crowd until he came to a dark alley shielded from the light, where he fell to his knees and wept. The tears darkened the earth beneath him.

When his first wife lay dying of a painful illness, the thought came to him more than once to hasten her end. Not as a mercy, but in order that he may at last be rid of her and be free to welcome his mistress into the house. He saw his wife die a thousand gasping deaths on that hill, and each time was the first time.

Every time he at last moved beyond the image of his wife’s face, the visage of his first-mistress-turned-second-wife appeared. With a cruel clarity he saw her cold body dangling, with dripping wrists and broken neck, swaying from the rafters. Beside her his new mistress, their cook, who she had murdered. One of his second wife’s sandals had fallen to the floor to rest alongside his new mistress’ bare feet. He took both of them, before taking them both and burying them in secret atop a grassy hill. His shame was such a weight, that it seemed a second hunk of granite bound to his neck.

The boulder’s weight increased exponentially as he pushed it closer and closer to the top. To the end. Time was not an issue and all questions were ripped from his mind before he had time to understand their query. There were still many jagged edges upon the massive rock which had refused to be smoothed over by the wheel of time. As Sisyphus pushed ever upward, his palms raw, the points dug in hard and would pop the blisters. He kept on, leaving wet splotches of white and red on the grey stone. His shoulders howled for him to stop and his arms and legs had already begun to shake, much earlier than normal.

More than anger and less than hope welled in him and a fire was sparked. Instead of stepping aside and letting the stone roll away as he had done countless times before, he felt a new sense of determination and struggled on. Though Sisyphus had long ago abandoned his naïve hopes for redemption, he was possessed by a strange certainty that this was it. Then and there he knew he would not give in, no matter the pain or duress or if it broke all that he was. He was already a splintered man and was amazed to think that despite the outcome, this could be the last time.

I cannot say he did it without flinching, but nonetheless he faced the memories which came next with his head up and his feet firmly on the ground.

There was a child, a girl, with the first mistress, the second wife. He never cared for children but decided to do right by the wife he wronged and, as he saw it, killed. For seven months he raised the girl, stumbling along but managing to make his way, pushing on, convincing himself that what he felt for her was love. However, his inexperience was his undoing.

One day while fetching water he placed the child in the shallow basin to play and turned his attention from her, for only the briefest of moments he swore to all who would listen, and louder to those who would not. The briefest moment was enough time to snuff out the child’s fragile flame.

Awful as all this was, far worse was that not a week after he’d buried the girl, beside her mother atop the grassy hill, he found himself glad she was gone. He remembered this sickening realization over and over with a concentrated disdain. Each time he recalled cradling his wet, still warm yet still dead daughter, he felt the same helplessness, the pang of guilt and sorrow. Then he remembered how he refused to speak her name and turned her into ‘the dead girl’, then later just ‘the girl’ and then even later, dismissed as nothing, less than a whisper.

The rage he felt with himself helped muster the strength to push the weight of eternity on and on, and as sweat streamed from every pore he wept and screamed and went on. That fury fueled his ancient quivering muscles. For a brief stretch he felt like a god, and somehow managed to get almost to a slow walk when the boulder struck something and came to a dead stop.

At first, poor Sisyphus dreamed that somehow he’d finally reached the end of his torment, his justice. That the top had been crested and that the rock had come to a rest, but as he removed his hand the stone still rolled back towards him. Now that the rush of adrenaline had passed, the great burden nearly crushed him. When they hit each other like sumo wrestlers he stumbled back a few steps, surprised at how much heavier it was, and then dug his toes deep into the soft earth and attempted to hold the weight back with his outstretched arms.

The rock’s momentum, small though it was, was enough to get past his weakened limbs, but not quite enough to knock him over. He again dropped down upon the grass, but not on his knees. Instead he leaned so far forward that he was almost lying on his belly in the grass. He pushed off hard, digging in and kicking mounds of wet earth aside and then rammed his shoulder against the stone, leaving nasty gashes where several of the small points dug in and rubbed the faded flesh raw.

Sweating, crying and bleeding, Sisyphus pushed on.

When he struck the object which stopped him before, he grunted, held his breath, and then shoved harder and harder, reclaiming his upright position in slight degrees, he forced the boulder up over the small obstacle. Something gave beneath the weight of the massive rock and he heard a crunch. Looking down, he saw white pieces of bone scattered through the grass and knew it was the skull of a small animal. He knew what kind of animal it was too, but that memory was far below him now and he would not dwell upon it any longer. He faced it before he faced his wife, before his mistress and the mistress after, before the terrible atrocities he’d committed during his young adulthood, but after the minor misdeeds of his youth. That was where that skull belonged, that was its place and he had moved beyond it. Part of the skull fragments pierced his bare feet, and instead of flinch or attempt to extract them he pressed his foot down harder. Compared to the memories the pain was a relief.

Upward, ever upward, more and more weight piled on with each step, and still he kept on.

The hill gets steeper nearer to the top, and finally he sensed the ground’s angle begin to shift under him until it felt like he was pushing the rock up a wall. A desperate shadow of a smile crossed his face as he pleaded that this time, he may get there, and rest. More than that, he hoped he could just reach the top without reaching the memory he knew awaited him before it.

He never reached the memory before. The stone always rolled back down before then. Still, he knew.

A vile defeating thought infected his mind. Letting go was still an option. There was still the chance to just back away from the weight and give up. Yet he knew better, knew that even as it rested at the bottom of the hill he still felt the boulder’s crushing weight. Sisyphus, with skin raw and shredded, with blistered hands sticky with blood and puss, having stared into eternity for twice as long, pushed beyond anywhere he had dared before and weary as he was, continued upward.

When it hit him, it was worse than all the others put together and the torture was indescribable. Physical pain was but a mercy. He would have much rather been flayed and made to push a boulder ten times larger and covered in needles and broken glass, and been grateful for it. If only to avoid facing the thing he had buried away even from himself. It lay in a hollow mute cesspool flooded with impenetrable darkness, where all light is devoured and all sound is drowned.

He was a monster staring into the abyss, and the abyss also stared into him.

His eyes closed and for the first time, he remembered.

Their father told the boys that she was making them leave. He told Sisyphus and his younger brother that the only way for them to keep their home and their friends and indeed their lives, was for her to lose hers.

She was in the field, tied to a tree atop a hill where their father had left her. While the children saw to his wife, the father went into town to be seen, and to guarantee as many as possible saw him, he was in his cups. When the boys reached her and she saw their eyes and the object her oldest held, she began to weep and plead and curse their father. She rambled on about what the boys assumed was nonsense regarding their father’s affairs and her plan of taking them away to be safe from him. Something was said about him touching them and Sisyphus couldn’t stand anymore and so, filled with the rage and recklessness of youth he struck her hard with the club and what had been her jaw went slack and crooked.

The shock of seeing what he did, what he was capable of doing, left him frozen him in place and as his mother howled and bled he remained still, and silent. He wanted to take it back, he believed her, loved her, and needed her. He failed her, but he did not kill her.

After his yelling did nothing, his brother grabbed the hardwood club from his loose grip and did what Sisyphus could not. Still, he’d struck the first blow, the one that sealed her fate, and theirs.

Bawling like a baby and feeling as though he were moving Mt Olympus itself, Sisyphus summoned all that was left in him. The entirety of all that he was and had ever been, every ounce of love, hate, sweat, blood, memories, regrets, fears and fantasies. Screaming to the stars, he channeled it all and gave a final mighty shove, releasing everything he had, everything he was. The boulder rolled from his fingers, over one final hump, then it was still.

He let go of the weight. It did not fall back upon him.

He kept his hand hovering, shaking, over the face of the stone for a time, certain the second he believed it was truly motionless it would roll again. His legs gave out and he fell to the ground shaking. Sisyphus crawled around the stone to see what waited, half expecting there to be another hill atop this one or some other cruel joke. There atop the grassy hill, were several graves marked only with worn sticks surrounded by various sized piles of white stones. One grave, marked with a short pristine stick had only a small pile of pebbles. He knew his three lovers rested below, beside his daughter and mother. Beside their graves was a twisted and splintered branch stuck at the head of a place open for him, marked now with the great boulder.

Sisyphus pulled himself toward the end. Despite his weariness, it was not so hard to do. There was no weight to drag along through the grass that now felt cool on his skin. He felt the soft breeze too, and carried on the wind was the scent of flowers. He smiled.

Rest came, at long last.

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What Joel has to say besides the story:

It can feel like a lonely world for those who love a good short story, and an even lonelier one for those who write them. After finishing a great story you want – or at least I want – to discuss it and contemplate it and sit with it for a while. Then I move on and find another but the discussion can often become the highlight of the whole experience and I have found myself many a times having unforgettable conversations about forgettable tales.

     ’Short Stories on Wednesdays’  has become something I look forward to (along with the PRI ‘Selected Shorts’ series) each week as a guaranteed source of inspiration and entertainment. I have discovered new authors through Risa’s and others suggestions and am always rejuvenated each Wednesday when I am reminded that no matter what it feels like sometimes, there are still a plethora of readers out there who appreciate and love a story for the story, no matter the length. Ernest Hemingway said the best thing he ever wrote was a six word short that went, ‘For sale: baby shoes, never worn’. A handful of the right words in the right order can stay with us forever.

     Thank you all for taking the time to read and share what you find, and thank you Risa for giving us a place like Breadcrumbs to do it. I believe stories are our way of knowing ourselves and I am honored and humbled to be featured in a weekly tradition I have come to cherish.

Joel Allyn

Welcome to the 2012 edition of Short Stories on Wednesdays!

Short Stories on Wednesdays is a weekly event intended to encourage folk to read short stories, a much neglected literary form. Every Wednesday you are encouraged to share what you’ve read with us in the comment section. You can even post links to any review of short stories you have made through the course of the week. Every second Wednesday we have a guest poster and/or a short story giveaway. Every fourth Wednesday we have a theme round which we try to choose a story to read. This, of course, is not compulsory.

Note: Next week we welcome Joel Allyn, Th3 Scribbl3r, as our guest poster.

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As I mentioned before, I’m in the midst of one of Willa Cather’s short story collections. In fact, I nearly done with it. However, I’m afraid, I won’t be able to finish it today as I had hoped. I’ve been feeling as sick as a dog, and all I’ve been wanting to do all day is sleep (which I shall do the moment I hit the publish button to this post.) I can say that I’ve really been enjoying my tryst with Cather, and am hoping to start on O Pioneers! sometime later this month.

But, please don’t mind my lack of a review this week. What have you guys been reading?

Anyway, this is just to be a quick review.

No of books completed: 8

• No of non-fiction books: 3
  • Death by Petticoat by Mary Miley Theobald
  • Is Shakespeare Dead by Mark Twain
  • Answers to Tough Questions by Josh McDowell and Don Stewart
• No of fiction books: 2
  • The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C S Lewis
  • Candlewax by C Bailey Sims
• No of graphic books: 2
  • Crogan’s Loyalty by Chris Schweizer
  • Avalon Chronicles Vol 1: Once in a Blue Moon by Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir, Emma Vieceli
• No of plays: 1
  • A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare

Of these 8 books 5 were ebooks, 4 of which were from Netgalley. Save for the Shakespeare and Twain, I have yet to write reviews for what I’ve read. I’m hoping I’ll be able to have them up some time next week.

I’ve also got a few books that I’ve been reading now and then through January and am continuing with into February:

• Les Miserables (I’m 13 chapters into this huge volume, and am hoping to play catch-up in Feb for the read-along.)
• Roots (I’m done with 19 chapters and am deliberately taking this slow.)
• Pride and Prejudice (A delicious re-read. I picked it up only a couple of days ago and am enjoying myself!)
• Tolstoy on Shakespeare (I had hoped to finish this by the end of Jan. But, half way through the book, I decided I wanted to take this slow as well. It might be a few months before I finish this book. I’m hoping to be able to read a few more Shakespearean plays before I get back to this, so that I can form an argument in my head, should I disagree with Tolstoy’s opinions. )

Apart from these I’ve been reading short stories as well.

1. “The Mirror” by Haruki Murakami
2. “The Birthday Girl” by Haruki Murakami
3. “The Brothers” by Louisa May Alcott
4. “A Wife’s Letter” by Rabindranath Tagore
5. short stories from Youth and the Bright Medusa by Willa Cather (I’ve just two more to go before I finish this collection)

That’s it for now. If some of you are wondering why my posting has come down, it’s just that I’ve much to do in the house, and am usually too tired to string more than two words together, leave alone write up an entire post. I’m hoping to get settled into the routine soon, though.

Welcome to the 2012 edition of Short Stories on Wednesdays!

Short Stories on Wednesdays is a weekly event intended to encourage folk to read short stories, a much neglected literary form. Every Wednesday you are encouraged to share what you’ve read with us in the comment section. You can even post links to any review of short stories you have made through the course of the week. Every second Wednesday we have a guest poster and/or a short story giveaway. Every fourth Wednesday we have a theme round which we try to choose a story to read. This, of course, is not compulsory.

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This week’s theme is “a letter”.

“A Wife’s Letter” by Radindranath Tagore
So, I was googling up a short story that worked around this theme, and came across quite a few from some well-known writers. I finally decided to go for one written by Rabindranath Tagore. It’s a short story that was originally written in Bengali and later translated into English by Prasenjit Gupta.

The whole story is a letter from a “second wife” to her husband. She has left her husband and his family for the first time since she entered that household, on a pilgrimage. The letter is an outpouring of her thoughts and feelings regarding her status as a wife and woman in her husband’s household. The translation is very simple. There’s nothing dramatic about it. But I was quite taken up by Tagore’s views about the lives of Bengali women. I thought he portrayed them so brilliantly. Obviously, Tagore recognised that women were more than just pretty ornaments and home-makers. His protaganist is both beautiful and intelligent. However, he makes it clear that this woman did not feel beautiful, because, though her husband married her for her looks, he gave it no value. She was intelligent, though, and knew it so well, as did her in-laws. The latter were a bit afraid of her for that alone, and this, Mrinal, the protaganist, uses to help the helpless sister of her husband’s first wife. However, the lot of women in that time and place overwhelms both Mrinal and Bindu, and the latter succumbs to the fate of most women in her place.

As I’ve said before, the translation isn’t well done. I’m sure that in Bengali this story has a great deal more power and is beautifully written, especially as Bengali itself, is supposed to be a beautiful language. However, the theme of women’s plight in Bengal (and many other parts of India as well) comes through quite powerfully. I cannot say that I pitied anyone in the story. Mrinal is a strong woman, but Bindu represents thousands and thousands of women who go through the same thing in India. Tagore is representing facts. It moves you to think and ponder.

The short story can be found HERE.

Did you folk manage to find any other short stories revolving around a letter?

P.S. — the above isn’t the only short story I have read this week. I’ve been progressing further with Cather’s short story collection. But, I would like to talk of her short stories only once I complete this book.