Olga seems to be the perfect woman: plump, pretty and friendly, and those around her consider her to be a darling girl. However, as over the years and through several spouses, Olga’s true character be…
This is a very fine example of Leo Tolstoy's gift at telling good stories. This is an amazing short story about a merchant and how an unexpected event changes his life for the worse, but in a way, for…
One of Pushkin's most popular and chilling stories, 'The Queen of Spades' tells of a young man who develops a dangerous obsession in pursuit of the wealth he craves.
In Edgar Allan Poe's short story, "Ligeia," first published in 1838, the narrator, a self-professed opium addict, details his passion for his first wife, Ligeia, both intelligent and beautiful. When L…
The Overcoat which is generally acknowledged as the finest of Gogol's memorable Saint Petersburg stories, is a tale of the absurd and misplaced obsessions.
Suffused with rich satire, chaotic brilliance, verbal turbulence and wild humor, The Crying of Lot 49 opens as Oedipa Maas discovers that she has been made executrix of a former lover's estate. The pe…
