The Necklace

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  “SHE WAS one of those pretty, charming young ladies, born, as if through an error of destiny, into a family of clerks. She had no dowry, no hopes, no means of becoming known, appreciated, loved, and married by a man either rich or distinguished; and she allowed herself to marry a petty clerk in the office of the Board of Education. . . .  She had neither frocks nor jewels, nothing. And she loved only those things. She felt that she was made for them. She had such a desire to please, to be sought after, to be clever, and courted.” —THE NECKLACE Guy de Maupassant    France, 1884 (pic by Grok) Read this short story here:  https://americanliterature.com/author/guy-de-maupassant/short-story/the-necklace

Americans: Natural-born Hunters?

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"We have inherited many attitudes from our recent ancestors who wrestled this continent as Jacob wrestled the angel, and the pioneers won. From them we take a belief that every American is a natural-born hunter. And every fall a great number of men set out to prove that without talent, training, knowledge, or practice they are dead shots with rifle or shotgun. The results are horrid . . . .

If I were hungry, I would happily hunt anything that runs or crawls or flies, even relatives, and tear them down with my teeth. But it isn't hunger that drives millions of armed American males into forests and hills every autumn . . . . Somehow the hunting process has to do with masculinity, but I don't quite know how. I know there are any number of good and efficient hunters who know what they are doing; but many more are overweight gentlemen, primed with whiskey and armed with high-powered rifles. They shoot at anything that moves or looks like it might, and their success in killing one another may well prevent a population explosion . . . .

A farmer in upstate New York painted the word cow in big black letters on both sides of his white bossy but the hunters shot it anyway." (Steinbeck, "Travels With Charley", pp. 56-57)

photo credit: factoid news

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