I have gone through most of my adult life thinking that the saddest short story ever written was "Araby" by James Joyce. That final line about "eyes burning with anguish" captures the essence of young male frustration. I rode back from the job site with my boss after a small construction gig, which thanks to the weather went ahead of schedule. We parked so that he could take care of business, and while I had a few free moments I read from the book in my knapsack. more...

The Saddest Story Ever Written continued...

It was an old anthology of writing (fiction, non-fiction and poetry) from many years ago, edited by a former instructor of mine from college.

What I read, in less than ten minutes, was the saddest short story I had ever read.

It was written in a clear, unaffected prose style. This story describes a woman embittered by the sudden break up of her marriage who lapses into a nihilistic depression and moves to a remote town to get away from people, and considers starving herself to death.

But then, a small stray cute kitten/cat accosts her in her garden, and approaching, purrs. She tries to chase her away, but the cat stays, purrs, eats her food and cuddles in bed, for the first good night's sleep in a long time. By the next page, the poor creature is mewling in agony. The protagonist digs a grave by the next paragraph.

I placed the book back in my knapsack. I said to my boss, "That was an incredibly sad story." He murmured, "There's a lot of sadness in the world." I didn't cry, but if I had, I do not think that my boss would have held it against me: he is as tolerant of my eccentricities as I am of his. But my eyes stung as we scraped concrete from the wheel barrow and moved blocks around.

I do not think of myself as a typical male, though like many of my genre, I make an effort to avoid shedding tears in public. I shed tears rarely. That which might make me choke up would be a sensation of being a total failure in life, except for the fact that this sensation is so familiar as to be virtually meaningless. What might make more sense in this context is watching the final scene in the movie La Strada by Fellini, or the final scene in Das Boot or the scene where the old lady is forced to abandon her pet fox in the disney animated movie The Fox and The Hound. (Tim Burton worked as an animator on this movie and he said that it was the darkest point in his life.) Let us not go into the little lost cat sequence in the Italian animated parody of Fantasia which went by the title of Allegro non Tropo. That little short story about that little kitty cat was a reflection of utter desolation, of final pathetic hope crushed inexorably...

When I walked home from work that day, the clouds hung laden with doom, the dark little bits drooping soddenly. But it did not rain. When I got home, I sat quietly in the back yard for few minutes. A little grey cat leapt out of the garden twilight, tentative. I whispered to it, but it was shy and more intent on hunting the mice or rats in our bracken.

I beckoned my girlfriend to the window. We had recently parted with two cats she had known for a long time. We briefly gazed at the feline statue in our yard. Then it leapt away.

Von Bark, "The Saddest Story Ever Written," first published in Grey Goo (Print Edition), Toronto, 2005
- sally mckay 5-25-2006 10:31 pm