O. Henry (1862 – 1910)
His real name is William Sydney Porter; O. Henry is his pseudonym.
He is still considered one of the best American story’ tellers. He lived the life of adventure; he also spent some time traveling. He was also in prison. He was collecting his experiences and wrote about them. He wrote hundred of story. He didn’t publish them in any collection; he was sending them to all kinds of magazines. Later, after his death, his stories were collected in individual works. In this way they were also translated in Czech.
- Henry thought that the most extraordinary things were happening in our everyday lives. His scheme is a quite a short story and very unexpected ending or turn. Very often they capture the irony of destiny. He was always interested in very ordinary people, poor people, rascals (scoundrels). Awe can feel some affection for these characters. Probably the weakness of his way of writing is that he feels the necessity to explain his ideas to the readers. In some cases it is very clumsy, because the reader knows, especially contemporary readers.
“The Gift of the Magi”
The main characters are a young couple – Della and Jim. They are very poor, but they love each other very much. They’ve two very precious things: Della’s beautiful long hair and Jim’s gold watch after his father.
Christmas is drawing near and they don’t have any money. In the end they both sacrifice their most valuable things to buy for the other one the present they long for. In Della’s case it’s a beautiful comb and in Jim’s case it’s chain for his gold watch. They value their mutual love much more than the things themselves.
“The Last Leaf”
The main characters are two women painters – Sue and Johnsy. The story is set in Greenwich Village in Manhattan in NY. It’s the area where there live painters and artists. These two women are quiet poor as many other people in the neighbourhood. Suddenly there appears a very serious disease among people – pneumonia. Unfortunately many people die of pneumonia. This disease hits also Johnsy. Johnsy give up her fight for her life. She watches the tree and the leaves, which are falling down. And she is persuaded that she will go with the last leaf. She can’t be talked out of her decision. Sue, her friend, ask another painter, old Mr. Behrman, for help. He is an old man and he always want to paint his masterpiece, but he never succeeded. The weather is very windy for a day and a night, but in the morning there still can be seen one leaf on the tree. It looks like a miracle after such horrible night, this encourages Johnsy and she realizes how stupid she was when she wanted to die. She is on the mend, but unexpected old Behrman falls ill with pneumonia. Nobody knows where he was, where he got wet. Because he is so old, he can’t be saved and he dies within a few days. Then people find in the yard the painting utensils, they realize that the old Behrman managed to paint his masterpiece he has always wanted. He saved a life.
“After Twenty Years”
Two friends decide to meet after twenty years in NY, because one of them leaves NY for the West. So after 20 years the man from the West comes back and waits for his friend at a place they agreed on. After some time there comes a cob that is on the beat. He hears the story about friendship from the man who has come from the West. Suddenly there is coming through the dark street a tall man. After some time the man from the west realizes that it is not his friend and he finds out the truth. He has been arrested for some time because Chicago cobs are after him. He’s given a short message from his friend, which was the cob on the beat. The cob couldn’t arrest his friend, so he asked the other policeman to do this for him.