A Short Take on Guy de Maupassant

by Suzan Abrams

Guy de Maupassant. One of the greatest writers of the short story.

In one of Maupassant's tales, called An Affair of State that describes the turn of revolutionary France into a Republic, this grandmaster of the short story, also conjures up his well-versed sardonic amusement at comic characters who pursue self-centered ambitions for power and the lower working classes who regularly mock them.

This paragraph was one of many that proved memorable with the author's jesting:

"On the morning of the fifth of September, in uniform, his revolver on the table, the doctor gave consultation to an old peasant couple. The husband had suffered with a varicose vein for seven years but had waited until his wife had one too, so that they might go and hunt up a physician together, guided by the postman when he should come with the newspaper."