BOOKBROODER

Ah ! what a delicious cup of tea I just consumed this morning. A ravishing beverage offered to me by the pen of captivating Katherine Mansfield! It’s chilly winter outside. Fog. My windowpanes are still soaked in early morning dew. And this cup of tea! Delicious! My decision to pick up one short story in the early morning hour pays well. I must thank Ms.Rosemary for such a treat.

“Ms.Rosemary is young, brilliant, extremely modern, exquisitely well dressed, amazingly well-read in the newest of the new books and her parties were the most delicious mixture of the really important people”

She had been married 2 years and she had a duck of a boy. One winter afternoon she had been buying something in an antique shop in Curzon Street. While coming back she met a small girl with enormous eyes, who pinched her in the elbow from behind and begged her, in a stammering voice, like a sigh,

“M-madam, Would you let me have the price of a cup of tea?”

And a thought comes in her mind, like something out of a novel of Dostoevsky. Supposing she took her home? Supposing she did do the things she has read in the novels? It would be thrilling. She thought and she took the little girl home. Allowing her to sit in her car then treating her like the most respectable of the guests at home, and so on. The little girl was startled by whatever was happening with her as she had never experienced such a privilege.

While all this was happening, there turns the knob of the door and comes in Philip.
He objects to Ms. Rosemary for bringing the little girl home. “Are you mad ?” he asks.
And Rosemary says, be nice to her, treat her well, look how pretty is she. We will take care of her.

And the story takes turns, it finishes in style.

I have read Katherine Mansfield and she has always impressed me. This story too is written in a very enchanting language. The emotions of the characters are so much visible and she sets the seal on the story in her remarkable style. Playing with the emotions of sympathy, compassion, and feminine jealousy in her exotic short story skills. I loved this story. Thanks, Katherine once again!

What a lovely ghost story this was!
This turned out to be the cutest ghost story for me lately. I have read Wilde the novelist, this time his story also made a mark. When an American minister bought Canterville Chase ( A British Mansion), everyone said it was a foolish decision because the place was haunted and there was no doubt in it. But the American minister believed and said that there was no such thing, as a ghost, and I guess the laws of nature are not going to be suspended for the British aristocracy.
Listening to it the owner of the Canterville replied, “If you don’t mind a ghost in the house, It is all right. Only you must remember I warned you.”

A few weeks after, the purchase was concluded and the family of the American minister shifted to the Canterville Chase. Then there begins the holy terror of a ghost. There appears a red bloodstain in the sitting room which comes again and again, even after wiping it multiple times. An old man of terrible aspect, his eyes as red burning coal, long gray hair fell over his shoulder in a matted coil, soiled and ragged garments with antique cut, wrists, and ankles hung with heavy manacles and rusty gyves, appears and terrorizes the minister’s family.

Many fearful things happened but I was not affrighted as a reader. In fact, I enjoyed Ghost’s terrorizing the family. There was an obvious reason behind it. The most charming thing about this story is the wit and humor that is wonderfully incorporated by Wilde in this ghostly plot.
Not only this family faces new experiences in this mansion, but this strange ghost also faces some odd but very curious experiences with this family that he had never faced, in a brilliant and uninterrupted career of three hundred years.

This was a refreshing treat, as a quick read. A delightful story, written in a very witty way. The most delightful and colorful character of the story is the Ghost itself and you can surely fall in love with him.

Have a cup of tea with Katherine Mansfield this morning!

What a sweet ghost!