It is a cool September morning. We are almost done with the trimester. As I rush for my creative writing class scheduled at the unholy time that is 8:30 AM, I can’t help but reflect on the time gone by.
As an aspiring literature major, I had expected to find myself with my nose buried in a novel every other week. Instead, I was so engaged with other things that my reading was largely neglected. I didn’t even have the time to watch movies or TV shows.
As the familiar feeling of burnout hit me once the trimester picked up, I would often find myself staring at the laptop screen, searching for pieces of media to revive that creative energy. While it is common to find book or movie recommendations, I realised that I need something a bit more compact to get me going. Enter short stories – acting like a camera, they allow a ‘zoom in’ into the lives of characters, a brief encounter into a culture and a time period. They explore a bunch of themes, come in a lot of styles. Some will be light-hearted, and others will leave you shocked and devastated. And what I like the most about them is that they will leave us dissatisfied and with more questions. They stay etched in our memory.
As I came across a lot of recommendations from my literature professors, courses, and from my own research, I shortlisted three short stories everyone should read:
- Toba Tek Singh – Saadat Hassan Manto
Saadat Hasan Manto was an influential Indo-Pakistani journalist, short story writer, and script writer, who is best known for his grounded approach to stories that explored the dark underbelly of humanity. Ruthlessly honest, he was unafraid to explore taboo topics such as sexuality and societal double standards.
Toba Tek Singh is a powerful satire on the partition of India and Pakistan, commenting on the absurdity of borders and the trauma of displacement. Set in a mental asylum in Pakistan, the story revolves around the inmates who struggle to understand the division of their land. Among them, the character of Bhisham Singh wrestles with the unanswered question of where his village, Toba Tek Singh, had fallen – into India or Pakistan. Through his confusion and defiance, we get to see a humanisation of the impact of trauma and the loss of identity.
As displacement, migration, deportation, and identity conflicts ravage us due to the rise of more right-leaning governments in the world, Toba Tek Singh continues to resonate the way it did 70 years ago. Manto forces us to remember the real human cost behind political decisions, and encourages us to reevaluate our thoughts on nationhood and humanity.
- A Kitchen in the Corner of the House – Ambai
C.S. Lakshmi, better known by her pen name Ambai, is a Tamil feminist writer, cultural anthropologist, and researcher of women’s studies. Her short stories often revolve around women’s experiences of gender, identity, and relationships. She is also the founder of SPARROW (Sound & Picture Archives for Research on Women), an organization dedicated to preserving women’s creative works.
Ambai’s A Kitchen in the Corner of the House criticises the distribution of domestic labour and women’s roles in patriarchal households. Set within a traditional joint family in Ajmer, the narrative explores how women are almost chained to the kitchen in the name of duty. This is romanticized to hide the fact that their everyday job in the household serves as a site of constraint. This empowerment offered by the kitchen is an illusion—real power rests in autonomy and choice, both of which are taken away from them. Ambai uses the kitchen as a symbol of how patriarchy turns labour and dedication into instruments of domination. Women receive neither appreciation nor control.
Even now, the tale resonates with how undervalued domestic labour is. In revealing this dynamic, Ambai forces us to look beyond the façade of respect that patriarchy accords to women, and to recognize the structural disparities that define their day-to-day lives.
- Malbe ka Maalik (Owner of the wreck) – Mohan Rakesh
Mohan Rakesh was one of the pioneers of the Nayi Kahani (New Story) movement of Hindi literature, which departed from the conventional writing style of writers like Premchand. His stories were modern and objective, mainly focused on the Indian middle class.
The story, Malbe Ka Maalik, translates to Owner of the Wreck, is set after the events of the India-Pakistan partition in Amritsar. The story centers around Abdul Ghani, a man who returns to Amritsar from Lahore to visit his old home, which he abandoned during the partition riots. While he finds some comfort in the familiar sights and people of the city, he finds that his house has been reduced to rubble. The story aptly captures the raw grief felt by the old man, as we learn that he lost more than just his home. We see the cost of communal violence, the futility of ownership, and the fragility of human connections amidst societal upheaval.
In present times, we need to raise our voices more than ever. This story is a reminder of the aftermath of riots and what happens when we choose to become silent voyeurs and leave the victims to face the brunt of violence.
These three short stories are windows into diverse human experiences, cultures, and social realities. They invite us readers to confront uncomfortable truths and remind us that literature is not separate from our reality. Engaging with these stories will surely refresh the literary spirit by offering glimpses into struggles and experiences that resonate regardless of time and place, making them must-reads for not only those who wish to read literature but also those who wish to experience its transformative power.