By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘In the Abyss’ is a short story by H. G. Wells (1866-1946), first published in Pearson’s Magazine in August 1896. The tale is one of Wells’s fabulous voyages, which sees an intrepid inventor travel down to the ocean bed to observe the marine creatures found living there.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Zero Hour’ is a 1949 short story by the American author Ray Bradbury (1920-2012), included in his 1953 collection The Illustrated Man. In the story, which is set in a future America, a young girl is befriended by an alien who needs her help to invade Earth and kill the adults.
You can read ‘Zero Hour’ here before proceeding to our summary and analysis of Bradbury’s story below. The story takes around fifteen minutes to read.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Story of the Late Mr Elvesham’ was first published in May 1896 in the Idler magazine. It’s one of the best stories of H. G. Wells (1866-1946), who left behind dozens of classic short tales which laid the foundations for modern science fiction.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Under the Knife’, which was first published in the New Review in January 1896, is a short story by H. G. Wells (1866-1946). In the story, the first-person narrator undergoes an operation (hence the title: he is ‘under the knife’), and is administered general anaesthetic beforehand.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Somerset Maugham’s short story ‘The Ant and the Grasshopper’ (1924) reinterprets a classic fable through the lens of two brothers, George and Tom. Unlike the fable’s clear-cut division of industriousness and idleness, George (the ‘ant’) works diligently but lacks joy, while Tom (the ‘grasshopper’) lives carefree and spends lavishly.