Readathon

Readathon

Présentée par : Hana Anis

Présentée a : Miss.Omneya

Ecole Oasis Internationale

Anglais

201-2012

 -Death by scrabble:  by Charlie Fish

summary :

On day , a man was playing with his wife Scrabble; for him it’s something boring and he said that if his wife wasn’t present he would do something interesting. This man hates his wife completely ( he said that he will immediately kill her if the letter that he got during the game will spell out KILL ; also when he found bees outside the window , he remembered his cousin -who was dead after swallowing a bee- and wished that these bees would fly into his wife’s throat.

The man declared that he hates his wife for many reasons one of which is that she turns on the kettle when it’s the hottest day on earth.

Despite the fact that the man felt a terrible rage inside him, he continued the game with his wife. While the woman was getting her tea cup, her husband stole a letter from her and threw it, but when she came and asked him if he cheated on her, he denied.

The husband think about his wife as reprehensible, and he started criticizing her by saying that she’s a sleepy person, who can sleep anywhere in anytime.

While playing the game, the man noticed that the words that he found are being a reality, and it was like a dream came true. (He remembered that he used the word CHEATING before taking the letter from his wife; he used EXPLODES , and the air conditioning unit fails; he used ZAP  and his wife got the electric shock; he used FLY  and he found an insect flying in front of his head. ) At this moment, he thought that all this can just be “Luck”    and decided that he has to find a murderous & terminal word. He used QUAKE and after him his wife played DEATH. And immediately the man found himself on the ground, as the room starts to shake. ( But his wife was just sitting there watching him ).

Theme :

The theme of this short story is : Death

Characters :

A man and his wife

Message :

Personally , I think that the message of this short story is that we should never wish something bad to happen to anyone  and that we should treat others as we want to be treated.

 -Return to Paradise: by Eliza Riley 

summary :

Walking on the Caribbean sea , Lisa  wasn’t able to get free from the anxiety she felt , when she remembered the last time she was there.

This is the place where she wore the white dress ,and got married to James three years ago. This day , they saw their life , that was imbued with happiness and joy; they planned their children ,where they would live, and the traveling they would do together. This seemed to be long time ago; but heartache can change many things. They returned today for one of the popular quickie divorces.

Filled with pain and regret , Lisa was getting repaired for her new life and her new dreams. How could this Caribbean island of the Dominican republic with its beautiful places, its lush green coastline , eternity of azure blue sea and endless sand be a place for the grief she felt.!

Attracted by her loneliness , the man stood watching her from behind the palm trees while she was gazing out to sea , she was extremely beautiful. « with her slim figure dressed in a loose flowing cotton dress, her crazy hair and bright blue eyes not far off the color of the sea itself »[1].  Feeling calm that she was observed , Lisa looked at him and felt an odd connections that she experienced once before. He approached her , and it seemed like meeting an old friend. 

Sitting at one of the bars, Lisa opened the bag of his pain and talked about the reason that led her to be back to this place , where she had had her unforgettable moments , with the man she believed that he was the best.

She said that One of the things that affected her , is the loss of  her baby . She was six months pregnant , and as James was working out of town , Lisa stayed with her mother; and this is why she hated him. The lady refused to recover the pain she felt , but this was a betrayal of her son. Grievously, Lisa declined to stand next to her husband in the funeral.

At this time and for the first time , she can see her pain reflected in the man’s eyes as they were full of tears, and she thought that after all maybe  this could be a new beginning.

Talking about their divorce , Lisa stood up and took the mans from his hand , taking him to the place where they had made their vows three years ago. This ended by canceling the divorce the next day , and renewing their promises .

 theme :

the theme of this story is : love

characters :

Lisa and her husband.

Message :

I think that this story has three messages : the first one is that love is stronger than anything; the second one is that we shouldn’t take quick reactions on other people ; and the third one is that we should forgive people. 

-There's a Man in the Habit of Hitting Me on the Head with an Umbrella:  by Fernando sorrentino

Translated by Clark M. Zlotchew

For five years, I’m being hit by a man on my head with his umbrella. At the beginning, I was surprised but now I’m habituated. 

Five years ago , when I was in Palermo park I felt something touching me head , and it was the first time to meet him. He’s also the same person who is hitting me now with his umbrella while writing. Until now , his name is undiscovered. Innumerable repetition of this scene had been made.

Cool as a cucumber , he was not about to change his attitude even when I threatened to call a policeman; so I punched him. Even this punch had no effect on him , and he began again to hit me with his umbrella; but I condoled him as his nose was bleeding. It’s true that he was not causing any pain by hitting me , but it’s the feeling of annoyance that controlled and surrounded me.

I tried to escape , but he followed me with his umbrella , even running wasn’t a solution. And the man is still hitting me on my head. I thought about going to the police station , but of course they would look at as a stupid.

Taking the 67 bus going back home ( as it’s the best solution) , this stranger stood right beside and continued hitting me. All the passengers and the driver were staring at us , laughing , exchanging stupid smiles. I was burning with shame.

Walking along Santa Fe Avenue , everyone stupidly stared at us. Embarrassed  , I shouted : "What are you looking at, you idiots? Haven't you ever seen a man hit another man on the head with an umbrella?"  Then five little boys began following us. 

By seizing and pushing the door , the man was able to enter my house; and my plan ( I decided to slam the door in his face once I reach home) failed. All this time , he’s still hitting me.

  Disgusted , bored , annoyed , I found a single bullet. This was a dilemma ,should I kill him or kill myself , maybe when both of us are dead he won’t continue to hit me. In any case , I know that I won’t have the courage to do this. Finally , I found out that these blows helped me to sleep so soundly; and this was the only positive thing about these blows.

Theme :

The theme is humour

Characters :

A boy and a man with an umbrella.

Message :

The message of this story is that everything has a good , and a bad side. So we should look at the full part of the glass and not the empty one.

- the time-sweepers : by Ursula wills-Jones

Have you ever thought about the people you see , who are sweeping all the time ?  Those are the ones humiliated, who are called : the time-sweepers : the men who wear overalls and who has waited so long to propose to his girlfriend , and the women who  wear old fashioned skirts and scarves on their head .  They are present wherever : railway station , in doctors surgery,…

You don’t have to condole them for having a fawning work  , because they have good work conditions. They take holidays like banks ,  they have a week vacation at Christmas and new year ; but when they came back in January , they have so much work as they have to  collect and clean what had been done over the holiday. It takes probably three weeks to resume the normal service.   

For these time-sweepers , “ time enjoyed is never time wasted”. Which means that for us , we think that they are wasting their time cleaning here and there , but it’s an enjoyable moment for them. They relish to clean the man , next to the women who is reading a holiday catalogue , and under the young man that despite his illness is still enjoying every moment.

But what would they do after collecting all this? They move to the next step which is : Recycling. They collect , they pack in large containers , they move to Liverpool docks , they load onto a ship , going to India.  « The most toxic and poisoned time – the residues of failed peace negotiations, wrongful imprisonments and truly poisonous marriages, is skimmed off and buried in a tank underneath a disused army base. There, it will take two or three centuries to decay, and become harmless again.»[2]

The ones who are doing this job , aren’t doing it for profit , because all the money they get , they buy with it bin-bags , overalls and shipping .

At the end , the time-sweepers wish ,that one day people would think about the valuable commodity that they throw; but they don’t think that this will happen soon.

 « There isn't a moral to this story. It's just that if you are planning on throwing away your time, please remember -somebody has to pick it up .»[3]

theme :

this story’s theme is fiction

characters :

the time-sweepers and the narrator

message:

I think that the message of this story is that we shouldn’t belittle anyone’s job. As everyone enjoys his work.

My Friend Luke

Translated by Gustavo Artiles and Alex Patterson

Summary:

My friend Luke who’s 40 years old, has problem in his eyes; that he always walks sideways and if the gap is so limited ,he waits patiently. As cats and dogs panic him, he keeps on crossing from one side of the road to another ; when he talks , his words are inaudible. My friend’s wife is a thin ,choleric , and a nervous woman; who suffers from unlimited temper. After long time , Luke had succeeded in producing a son who’s called “ Juan Manuel”.

This wonderful husband works in a company that imports cloth ,whose owner is called don Aqueróntido. 

        

     Luke is the oldest and the least important employee of a dismal company that imports cloth. It operates out of a very dark building with black-stained wooden floors situated in Alsina street. The owner -- I know him personally -- is called don Aqueróntido -- I don't know whether that is his first name or his surname -- and he has a ferocious moustache, is bald and has a thunderous voice. He is also violent and greedy. My friend Luke goes to work dressed all in black, wearing a very old suit that shines from age. He only owns one shirt -- the one he wore for the first time on the day of his marriage -- and it has an anachronistic plastic collar. He also only owns one tie, so frayed and greasy that it looks more like a shoelace. Unable to bear the disapproving looks of don Aqueróntido, Luke, unlike his colleagues, does not dare work without his jacket on and in order to keep this jacket in good condition he wears a pair of grey sleeve-protectors. His salary is ludicrously low, but he still stays behind in the office every day and works for another three or four hours: the tasks don Aqueróntido gives him are so huge that he has no chance of accomplishing them within normal hours. Now, just after the don Aqueróntido cut his salary yet again, his wife has decided that Juan Manuel must not do his secondary studies in a state school. She has chosen to put his name down for a very costly institution in the Belgrano area. In view of the extortionate outlay this involves, Luke has stopped buying his newspaper and (an even greater sacrifice) The Reader's Digest, his two favourite publications. The last article he managed to read in the Reader's Digest explained how husbands should repress their own overwhelming personality in order to make room for the actualisation of the rest of the family group.

<  2  >

*

There is, however, one remarkable aspect to Luke: his behaviour as soon as he steps on a bus. Generally, this is what happens:

     He requests a ticket and begins to look for his money, slowly. He holds up one hand to ensure that the driver keeps waiting, unsure of what to do. Luke does not hurry. In fact, I would say that the driver's impatience gives him a certain amount of pleasure. Then he pays with the largest possible number of small coins, which he delivers a few at the time, in varying amounts and at irregular intervals. For some reason, this disturbs the driver, who, apart from having to pay attention to other cars, the traffic lights, other passengers getting on or off, and having to drive the bus itself, is forced to perform complicated arithmetic. Luke aggravates the problem by including in his payment an old Paraguayan coin that he keeps for the purpose and which is invariably returned to him. This way, mistakes are usually made in the accounts and an argument ensues. Then, in a serene but firm manner, Luke begins to defend his rights, employing arguments so contradictory that it is impossible to understand what point he is actually trying to make. Finally, the driver, at the end of the last tether of his sanity and in an act of final resignation, chooses to throw out the coins -- perhaps as a means of repressing his wish to throw out Luke or, indeed, himself.

     When winter comes, Luke always travels with the windows wide open. The first to suffer as a result of this is Luke himself: he has developed a chronic cough that often forces him to stay awake entire nights. During the summer, he closes his window and will not allow anyone to lower the shade that would protect him from the sun. More than once he has ended up with first-degree burns.

     Because of his weak lungs, Luke is not allowed to smoke and, in fact, he hates smoking. In spite of this, once inside the bus he cannot resist the temptation to light up a cheap, heavy cigar that clogs up his windpipe and makes him cough. After he gets off, he puts away his cigar in preparation for his next journey.

<  3  >

     Luke is a tiny, sedentary, squalid person and has never been interested in sports. But come Saturday evening, he switches on his portable radio and turns the volume up full in order to follow the boxing match. Sundays he dedicates to football and tortures the rest of the passengers with the noisy broadcasts.

     The back seat is for five passengers. In spite of his very small size, Luke sits so as to allow room for only four or even three people on the seat. If four are already seated and Luke is standing up, he demands permission, in an indignant and reproachful tone, to sit down -- which he then does, managing to take up an excessive amount of space. To this end, he puts his hands in his pockets so that his elbows will remain firmly embedded in his neighbours' ribs.

     Luke's resources are plentiful and diverse.

     When he has to travel standing up, he always keeps his jacket unbuttoned, carefully adjusting his posture so that the lower edge of his jacket hits the face or the eyes of those sitting down.

     If anyone is reading, they are easy prey for Luke. Watching him or her closely, Luke places his head near the light so as to throw a shadow on the victim's book. Every now and then he withdraws his head as if by chance. The reader will anxiously devour one or two words before Luke moves back into position.

     My friend Luke knows the times when the bus will be fully packed. On those occasions, he consumes a salami sandwich and a glass of red wine. Then, with breadcrumbs and threads of salami still between his teeth and pointing his mouth towards the other passenger's noses, he walks along the vehicle shouting loudly, 'Excuse me'.

     If he manages to take the front seat, he never gives it up to anyone. But should he find himself in one of the last rows, the moment he sees a woman with a child in her arms or a weak, elderly person climb on board he immediately stands up and calls very loudly to the front passenger to offer them his seat. Later he usually makes some recriminatory remark against those that kept their seats. His eloquence is always effective, and some mortally ashamed passenger gets off at the next stop. Instantly, Luke takes his place.

<  4  >

*

My friend Luke gets off the bus in a very good mood. Timidly, he walks home, staying out of the way of anyone he meets. He is not allowed a key, so he has to ring the bell. If anyone is home, they rarely refuse to open the door to him. But if neither his wife, his son nor don Aqueróntido are to be found, Luke sits on the doorstep until someone arrives.

---

[1]  From the story                                                                                    

[2]  http://www.short-stories.co.uk/

[3] http://www.short-stories.co.uk/





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