King Arthur Movie Tristan

title: The Jilting of Jane

author: H.G. Wells

genre: short story fiction


source: http://www.americanliterature.com/



published: 1894

first line: As I sit writing in my study, I can hear our Jane bumping her way downstairs with a brush and dust-pan.



In this short story by H.G. Wells a man named George tells the story of his housemaid Jane who is in love and engaged to be married to a man named William.

Jane has a low self esteem and thinks William is above her status.
She confides in Euphemia, George's wife, about her love.


When she brings William to the house to meet her employers, they notice that he is well dressed. Jane tells them that he was promoted at work.


William winds up leaving Jane for a wealthy older woman. Jane sees them in the street hand in hand and when she confronts them, they ignore her. Jane actually attends their wedding and throws a boot, yes a boot, at William.



George comments on how young Jane still is and how eventually she will get over the heartache.

We all have our sorrows, but I do not believe very much in the existence of sorrows that never heal.

George and his wife also comment on how this experience has opened Jane's eyes and made her wiser.

"I don't care," she said. "I don't care a rap. He will find out his mistake yet. It serves me right. I was stuck up about him. I ought not to have looked so high. And I am glad things are as things are."

Moral of the story? Time heals all wounds? You live and you learn?

I always enjoy H.G. Wells storytelling and find it impressive that although he was best known for science fiction stories, he still wrote short stories like this one.












About the author:







Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books. Together with Jules Verne and Hugo Gernsback, Wells has been referred to as "The Father of Science Fiction".


quoted from wiki

title: The Door in The Wall

author: H.G. Wells


genre: short story/science fiction/fantasy/classic

source: http://www.americanliterature.com/

published: 1911

first line: One confidential evening, not three months ago, Lionel Wallace told me this story of the Door in the Wall.




In this short story by H.G. Wells, the narrator is a man named Redmond. He is telling the story of his friend Wallace's obsession with a door in a wall that leads to a beautiful otherworldly garden. Wallace discovered the door when he was a lonely five year old, out walking in West Kensington, London.
While he was there, he played with children and even spent time with an angel-like woman, a mother figure.

After spending time within the enchanted garden, he came back home to the real world where his governess raised him since his father was a busy lawyer. He told to his father about the garden behind the wall, but Wallace received a spanking for telling lies. Wallace wanted to go back to the garden, often dreaming about it.



Years pass, and a forty year old Wallace still obsesses with the door. He is now a successful politician. Wallace actually sees the door a few times throughout his life, but he never goes through it again, only contemplates it.

You may think me superstitious, if you will, and foolish; but, indeed, I am more than half convinced that he had, in truth, an abnormal gift, and a sense, something - I know not what - that in the guise of a wall and door offered him an outlet, a secret and peculiar passage of escape into another and altogether more beautiful world.

I always enjoy reading Wells stories. Here is a man who was ahead of his time. I love his imagination and the way he spins a story, to make it almost believable.
In this story, poor Wallace was neglected by his busy father and ends up finding this paradise-like world behind a door. It's no wonder he often thought about it for the rest of his life. As a reader, you do wonder whether the door actually existed or if it was his way of compensating for the neglect he suffered. He never went through the door again even though he saw it a few more times.

I became in a moment a very glad and wonder-happy little boy - in another world. It was a world with a different quality, a warmer, more penetrating, and mellower light, with a faint clear gladness in its air, and wisps of sun-touched cloud in the blueness of its sky.

About the author:




H.G. Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books. Together with Jules Verne, Wells has been referred to as "The Father of Science Fiction".




This has been a part of Once Upon a Time

title: A Moonlight Fable

genre: short story/classic

author: H.G. Wells

first line: There was once a little man whose mother made him a beautiful suit of clothes.

source: http://www.americanliterature.com





In this short story by H.G. Wells, a young man loves a suit that his mother sews for him. He loves this suit so much, he wants to wear it all the time. His mother however insists he keep the suit safely packed away until his wedding day.

It was green and gold and woven so that I cannot describe how delicate and fine it was, and there was a tie of orange fluffiness that tied up under his chin. And the buttons in their newness shone like stars. He was proud and pleased by his suit beyond measure, and stood before the long looking-glass when first he put it on, so astonished and delighted with it that he could hardly turn himself away.

The boy loved his suit so much that he dreamt about it. He would often take the suit out of it's storage and admire it. He is mother allowed him to wear the suit on Sundays to church, but with tissue covering the buttons so they wouldn't tarnish and tacked on protective guards on the elbows and cuffs so they wouldn't tear. Whenever the boy would peek at the buttons under the tissue wrap, he would notice they were becoming duller and duller, and this would cause him anxiety.


One night he sees the moonlight shining into his bedroom and he gets out of bed with an urge to put the suit on. He makes up his mind to tear off the protective tissue and guards off the suit.

Thought joined on to thought like things that whisper warmly in the shadows. Then he sat up in his little bed suddenly, very alert, with his heart beating very fast and a quiver in his body from top to toe. He had made up his mind. He knew now that he was going to wear his suit as it should be worn. He had no doubt in the matter. He was afraid, terribly afraid, but glad, glad.

He hurries quietly out of the house and to his mothers garden wearing his suit.
He starts to run with his arms out wide, tearing his suit on thorns along the way, but he doesn't care. All that matters is that he is wearing his beautiful suit.
He even runs into a duck pond and begins to swim around.


After swimming through the pond and coming out on the other side, he comes along a road. As he is running along, he sees a moth. The moth circles his head and brushes his lips. He is running straight toward a deep pit and does not notice. The next morning he is found dead at the bottom of the pit.




A Moonlight Fable threw me for a loop with its morbid ending. I really didn't expect the boy to die. Was Well's trying to prove a point here? Since the boy didn't listen to his mother and insisted on wearing the suit and then running around at night in it, he wound up suffering the ultimate price?



While reading, I assumed the boy was young since his mother was saving the suit for his wedding day. But wouldn't he outgrow it by then? Unless by 'little man' Wells meant a young adult.







The single thing I did like was the descriptive writing in this story.

There was no darkness in the world, but only warm, mysterious shadows; and all the leaves and spikes were edged and lined with iridescent jewels of dew. The night was warmer than any night had ever been, the heavens by some miracle at once vaster and nearer, and spite of the great ivory-tinted moon that ruled the world, the sky was full of stars.

About the author:



H.G. Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books. Together with Jules Verne, Wells has been referred to as "The Father of Science Fiction".




You can read A Moonlight Fable online here.