|
Hector Hugh Munro,
who endeared himself to the literary world with his
near-brutal brevity and macabre humor, was born in 1870
in Burma. Before he took the pseudonym “Saki,” Munro
briefly served the Burma police. Upon quitting it due to
ill health, he moved to London to become a journalist.
He published several anthologies, such as Reginald in
Russia (1910), The Chronicles of Clovis (1911) and
Beasts and Super-Beasts (1914). Two others, The Toys of
Peace (1923) and The Square Egg (1924), were published
posthumously. Saki also wrote two novels, The Unbearable
Bassington (1912) and When William Came (1913). Best
loved for his short stories, Saki is unsparing while
mocking at the smug complacency of the Edwardian
society. Both in the short-story collections, as well as
in Reginald (1904), a delightful compilation of
monothematic commentaries on the erstwhile social
values, he combined sardonic wit with dark comedy. His
lampooning of the boring stupidity of men and women, the
irrational oppressiveness of aunts or the fantastic
imagination of children and yarn-spinners still evokes
laughter each time a Saki story is read. Saki died in
1916.
The Best of Saki
Through his immortal short stories and other writings,
Saki has created some of the most loved stereotypes that
are almost caricaturesque in their droll exaggeration.
Aunts are the unfailing tyrants in their unreasonable
cruelty or downright imbecility. Families eat porridge,
believe in the weather forecast and have no sense of
humor. No one falls in love and if love does happen,
it's placid love between placidly lovable couples.
“Isms” are grotesque jokes with warped punch-lines;
patriotism ends up in Parisian frocks worn with an
English accent, and socialism is what can get one stuck
in the Turkish bath or with half-done coiffeur.
If there is a voice of protest against social
pretension, then it comes from derisive, incorrigible
romancers, were-wolves, truth-speaking cats, children
that resist oppressive adults, men that adopt the
manners of their pets, and pranksters that subvert the
education system. In Reginald and Clovis Saki creates
the irrepressible enfant-terrible of the Edwardian
society that gets the better of their mocking cynicism.
Although it's the Edwardian society that is at the
receiving end of Saki's merciless barbs, the readers
would find themselves in a milieu not completely alien
from their own. And that is the secret of Saki's magic
that recreates itself in this collection. In most of the
writings here, Saki will be seen sending shivers down
the spine of the reader through astonishing twists and
practical jokes. The devises he used as “unrest-cure”
for the conservative social scene of his times still
have the power to grab the modern readers by their
collar and shake them out of the torpid adjustments they
make with the society at large. |
