‘Saboteur’, by Ha Jin Read it here in about 15 minutes. In relation to the 2022 Winter Olympics, thinking about how we can use literature to protest… Jin was born in China. He was studying his PhD in America when the Tiananmen massacre occurred, and, disillusioned, decided to remain in the US, where he nowContinue reading “A short protest story”
Tag Archives: irony
A short protest story
‘Condensed Milk’, by Varlam Shalamov (trans. John Glad) Read it here in 6 minutes. In relation to the 2022 Winter Olympics, thinking about how we can use literature to protest… Shalamov spent almost one-quarter of his life in Russian gulags (forced-labour camps), for being critical of, and protesting against, his own government. This story presumablyContinue reading “A short protest story”
A short protest story
‘Zimmer Land’, by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah Read it here in about 35 minutes. In relation to the 2022 Winter Olympics, thinking about how we can use literature to protest… Adjei-Brenyah uses satire and surrealism in a near-futuristic story to, ironically, paint what I think is probably a rather realistic picture of the experience of beingContinue reading “A short protest story”
A short story I recently read
‘Sleeping Beauty’ by Laura Demers Read it here in 18 minutes. Thinking about intertextuality… Intertextuality simply means there’s a link between one text and another. ‘Text’ here doesn’t just refer to literature; it could refer to any text, such as art or music or architecture. Some theorists argue all stories are intertextual, because every storyContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently re-read
‘Zombie’, by Chuck Palahniuk Read it here, in about half an hour. (Note: the story contains sexual elements, and mentions of suicide.) Thinking about themes and ideas… If you don’t know Palahniuk’s work, he writes fucked up, alienated characters in a dirty reality, with a big splash of irony. ‘Fight Club’ is a classic example; PalahniukContinue reading “A short story I recently re-read”
Mina Ma 