This is a writing blog not a reading blog but in Obabakoak by Bernardo Atxaga, which I'm reading now, there's a section called 'in search of the last word' in which the narrator remembers an episode in his childhood but delays the ending by including lots of other stories, some of which he finishes and others he leaves hanging. It's a bit like If on a winter's night. At one stage the narrator and his doctor friend drive to a story writing meeting and on the way they swap their favourite tales and dwell on the nature of short stories. They refer to a manual by Foster Harris whose theory of the the short story is that it is an 'arithmetical operation': The story of Abraham and Isaac is pity plus filial love. The story of Eve, love of God minus love of the world. Additions bring happy endings subtractions tragic endings.
Michael
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