Review of “The Open Window” by Saki

Plot:

Mr. Nuttel’s doctors have recommended that he get rest for his nerves. With letters of introduction from his sister, he visits people she knows better than he does. He stops one day at the Sappleton residence. Mrs. Sappleton is late in meeting him, so her “very self-possessed” fifteen-year-old niece speaks to him, letting him know the window is open in observance of the anniversary of a tragedy.

Thoughts:

In this short-short, the reader’s perspective shifts 180 degrees in just a few lines. It is cute, but the tale is more like a joke than a story. Nevertheless, it is effective. The change that is supposed to come to the characters comes to the reader and is one of understanding rather than insight or a shift in worldview.

Nevertheless, this is cute. It involves people talking past each other, and people yanking other people’s chains with a straight face.



Bio: H. H. Munro (1870-1916), better known by his pen name “Saki,” was a British author and journalist now best remembered for his epigrammatic short stories, often satirizing British society’s upper crust. Many of his stories dealt with talking animals, and few of them ended happily. Munro was gay at a time when same-sex relations were considered a crime. Though he was overage, he enlisted for service in WWI and died in 1916 at the Battle of Ancre. According to the story, his last words were, “Put that bloody cigarette out!”


This story can be read and listened to here: (1:08)


Title: “The Open Window”
Author: Saki (legal name Hector Hugh Munro) (1870-1916)
First published: The Westminster Gazette, November 18, 1911
Length: short short