$2.66
Taxes may apply at checkout.
Saki - A Short Story Collection
The Reticence of Lady Anne, The Open Window, A Bread and Butter Miss, The Story of St Vespaluus, Esme, Laura, Filboid Studge - the Story of a Mouse That Helped, The Mouse, The Easter Egg, The Bull, The She-Wolf & The Interlopers
Hector Hugh Munro
Hector Hugh Munro, more familiarly known by his pen-name ‘Saki’, was born in what was then Akyab in British Burma on 18th December 1870. His father was an Inspector General for the Indian Imperial Police, and his mother the daughter of a Rear Admiral.
Early Life
When he was 2, his mother died and he and his siblings were sent back to England to be raised by their grandmother and paternal maiden aunts in a strict, puritanical household near Barnstaple, Devon. Educated by governesses, Saki used many of these women as character models for his later writing.
Education and Travels
At 17, his father retired and returned to England, then embarked on a series of European travels with Saki and his siblings.
Career Beginnings
After a short stint working in Burma with the Indian Imperial Police, Saki decided to move to London to make a living as a writer. Initially, he wrote as a journalist for a number of newspapers and magazines before attempting an historical study, ‘The Rise of the Russian Empire’, whose real value lay in directing him to writing short stories instead. The first of these, ‘Dogged’, was published in 1899.
Writing and Journalism
From here, it was a short step to writing political satire before in 1902 he became the foreign correspondent for The Morning Post, first in the Balkans, then Russia, Paris, and back to London in 1908, where “the agreeable life of a man of letters with a brilliant reputation awaited him.”
Literary Works
Collections of his short stories, full of witty, mischievous, and often macabre stories that satirized Edwardian society, along with two novels, appeared in the years up to the Great War. At its outbreak, he was 43 but managed to join as an ordinary trooper. More than once, he returned to the battlefield when officially too sick or injured.
Death
On 14th November 1916, Hector Hugh Munro was sheltering in a crater during the Battle of the Ancre when he was shot and killed by a German sniper. According to several sources, his last words were "Put that bloody cigarette out!"
