Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

The Hand by Guy de Maupassant is our May 2022 Short Story/Novella Read.

This discussion will open on May 1

Beware Short Story Discussions will have Spoilers

This one is very different from The Necklace that we read a few months back. The author tricked us into a bizarre story with no definite conclusion. He says it's not supernatural but the explanation the judge gives doesn't satisfy the reader just as he predicted.

This is the first Guy de Maupassant I've read. I like really like the short story format, and I liked the writing style of this one very much. But I found the ending disappointing and not as interesting as I'd hoped.

Still, it was a fun read and I have now put a number of short story collections by Guy de Maupassant on my to-read list.

Thanks to those who nominated and voted for it. It's gotten me to finally read this author I had heard about for years.

The story can be read online or downloaded from Project Gutenberg:
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3090/...

Yes, very different from The Necklace. This one is harder to read.

What is the point of the story?

Is it a ghost story? Or a mystery-story? Or is the point that it doesn't satisfy - as the judge warned. So it is a bit of a meta-story. Or are we supposed to figure it out for ourselfs?

Or is the point that the reader is expecting a point, and should be surprised about the lack of point?

Is there anything to figure out?
The only point I noticed was "The two watch dogs had not been aroused from their sleep." So the murder must have been known by the dogs or very, very quite. Could it had been the judge himself?

No, not much to go on.


I would not mind reading a few more Guy de Maupassant short stories. He is often called “one of the fathers of the modern short story“.

J_BlueFlower wrote: "The story can be read online or downloaded from Project Gutenberg:
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3090/..."
I read it online from here.

J_BlueFlower wrote: "Yes, very different from The Necklace. This one is harder to read.

What is the point of the story?

Is it a ghost story? Or a mystery-story? Or is the point that it doesn't satisfy - as the judge..."
I think the author intended to displease the readers just for fun. In the last sentence, it feels like the judge is speaking for the author when he says that the explanation he gives won't satisfy the audience. Maybe the climax is open-ended for the readers to derive their own conclusions. But it definitely left me discontent.

I thought it was quite an easy read. However, as most of you all said, the story left me with more questions than it answered. I thought it was interesting that we are not told whose hand it is, but we know it's gruesome because Rowell says he hunted human beings too.

Did anyone else wish for more detail? I wished the story was told from Rowell's point of view so that we could see how he descends to insanity over the Hand. Or maybe if the judge had gotten closer to the Englishman, we could have a better look at the state of his mind. It kind of felt like the end came before I could even get to know the characters.

I said this in my review too, but The Hand reminded me of The Monkey's Paw. Reread this one by W.W. Jacobs immediately after I finished The Hand and realised that the only reason I even link the two stories was that both have "hands" that cause havoc. I loved the atmospheric elements of The Monkey's Paw. I felt that was a bit missing here.

Sneha wrote: "I thought it was quite an easy read. However, as most of you all said, the story left me with more questions than it answered. I thought it was interesting that we are not told whose hand it is, bu..."

I also thought the ending was abrupt.

I've not read The Monkey's Paw but reading the description, it sounded just like an old Twilight Zone episode, and sure enough, it was an inspiration for that and several other TV show episodes.

Klowey wrote: "Sneha wrote: "I thought it was quite an easy read. However, as most of you all said, the story left me with more questions than it answered. I thought it was interesting that we are not told whose ..."

Oh, that's interesting! I had no idea that The Monkey's Paw was adapted for a Twilight zone episode.

Guy de Maupassant is one om my favourite authors. I would love to recommend the novel Bel-Ami. I've read a lot of his other short stories so I was quite surprised to read this which was a novel with a gothic theme, I haven't read any in this genre by him before. I liked it a lot but it ended with some sort of a cliffhanger and as far as I know there isn't an episode two! I can only allow my own fantasy to create the solution I want.

This was my first Guy de Maupassant read, I loved the story, especially the women's reaction to it. I'll be excited to read more by this author in the future.

I agree with Sneha, that I wanted more detail. I also liked The Monkey's Paw better. But also, like Gem, I enjoyed the women's reactions, and thought the ending was clever.

The point of this one for me was the open-endedness, and how now I just may have a nightmare like the narrator's, of a hand running over curtains an walls like a spider. *Shudder*

A poor story. I need an explanation!

I recommend "By Schopenhauer 's corpse" as a more satisfying story.

Excuse me while I hit that spider, no hand, that's on the curtain. Yikes, Guy is trying to creep us up a little. If this is your first story by Guy de Maupassant, please read another; this isn't typical of him.

Pharmacdon wrote: "Excuse me while I hit that spider, no hand, that's on the curtain. Yikes, Guy is trying to creep us up a little. If this is your first story by Guy de Maupassant, please read anothe..."

It is my first but I am hooked on his writing style. I just added all of his short stories to my to-read bookshelf list.

Agree this story was disappointing.

Which are your favorite GdM short stories?

Klowey wrote: "Pharmacdon wrote: "Excuse me while I hit that spider, no hand, that's on the curtain. Yikes, Guy is trying to creep us up a little. If this is your first story by Guy de Maupassant,..."
The Necklace

La Mère Sauvage: Mother Savage (don’t read the goodreads synopsis, it tells the story)

The Horla

Klowey wrote: “It is my first but I am hooked on his writing style. I just added all of his short stories to my to-read bookshelf list.”

Since he wrote about 300 stories, you’ll have some good reading ahead of you. I’ve read about 40 so far of the 200 in my collection. A few I’ve liked not previously mentioned include:

— A Dead Woman’s Secret
— Belhomme’s Beast (funny!)
— The Adopted Son
— The Prisoners (woman power!)
— A Coup d’Etat
— Boule de Suif (“Dumpling”)

Heather L wrote: "Klowey wrote: “It is my first but I am hooked on his writing style. I just added all of his short stories to my to-read bookshelf list.”

Since he wrote about 300 stories, you’ll have some good rea..."

Thank you Heather, Janelle, and Pharmacdon. This is going to be fun!