Our Collection | The Short Story Project

Netherlands

The low sun, the brass bands, the President’s face blazing with self-confidence. Everyone over thirty can still bring the images to mind. The President, who was on an official visit to Afrasia, a turbulent and largely...

Interview With an Assassin

Daan Heerma van Voss

9 min

USA

“ wuz one season” said Uncle Remus, pulling thoughtfully at his whiskers, “w’en Brer Fox say to hisse’f dat he speck he better whirl in en plant a goober-patch, en in dem days, mon, hit wuz tech...

Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Bear

Joel Chandler Harris

3 min

Israel

Who is Hoomit? What happened to her, and how did it all come to be? Here, listen. Every Friday, Zeevi and Father used to walk to the train station. And once, while they were on...

The Tales of Hoomit

S. Yizhar

11 min

UK

“Halloa! Below there!” When he heard a voice thus calling to him, he was standing at the door of his box, with a flag in his hand, furled round its short pole. One would have...

The Signal-Man

Charles Dickens

20 min

Mexico

When I was a little girl my mother had a fungus on one of her toenails. On her left pinkie toe to be exact. From the moment she discovered it she tried everything to get rid...

Fungus

Guadalupe Nettel

16 min

Israel

Night has descended on the military headquarters. Darkness veiling the barracks like a dewy tarpaulin. A man’s shadow stretches from the top floor of the Ministry of Defense’s office like a large bird, then vanishes, leaving...

Meningitis

Yitzhak Laor

24 min

Palestine

(From Letters to the Editor) We chose this letter amongst hundreds of letters that the newspaper receives. The reader preferred to sign his letter with R.A.; he asked for it to be published in the...

R.A. Looks for his Eyes

Sheikha Hussein Helawy

3 min

Isis – The Story of The Goddess of Magic and Sorcery in Egyptian Mythology

Israel

The Goddess Isis was almost as strong as her grandfather the Sun God, the most powerful of all the gods in the universe. His name was Ra, but he had a few other names as well....

Isis – The Story of The Goddess of Magic and Sorcery in Egyptian Mythology

Shoham Smith

10 min

Israel

We Weren’t actually at starvation’s door, although even that depends on how you look at it – the house was in ruins, windows missing, the living-room armchair shot to pieces, a crack in the wall, the...

A Thousand Shekels A Story

Orly Castel-Bloom

5 min

UK

“In the year 17__, having for some time determined on a journey through countries not hitherto much frequented by travellers, I set out, accompanied by a friend, whom I shall designate by the name of Augustus...

Fragment of a Novel

Lord Byron

7 min

Israel

1. AZIZ Our small room in Motel 6 smells like depressing sex that someone tried to scrub off with lots bleach. Gershon and I sit on the bed and start scribbling calculations on a napkin....

Three Men in America

Julia Fermentto

30 min

USA

On the third day of vacation, we woke in our rental cabins by the ocean to find half our flip‐flops were gone. One of the baby’s potato‐sized sandals was missing as well. By the door, out...

The Last Summer of Our Patriarch

Idra Novey

10 min

UK

Prison more like, said Madeleine. Come now, said Mr Kramer. If I run away they bring me back, said Madeleine. Yes but, said Mr Kramer. Mr Kramer often said, Yes but to Madeleine. Something...

Asylum

David Constantine

12 min

Argentina

Thursday, July 6 I’m sitting down to write because I finally have something to tell you. The boy from the newsstand didn’t bring me the paper today. I went to complain. On the way there...

Diary of a Newspaper Reader

Eduardo Berti

11 min

Germany

Franz Liszt died on the 31st of July in the year 1886; he could not recall the finer details. Now, however, he found himself, in full possession of his senses and mental faculties, walking purposefully along a...

The Waldstein Sonata

Hartmut Lange

16 min

Israel

When I think back on it, I feel like digging a hole in the ground and crawling right in. I want to crawl right in this minute, so I’m thinking back on it. Someone once gave...

Blue Pill

Orly Castel-Bloom

2 min

USA

In March I received an invitation to appear at IdiotFest, the second most prestigious event on the entire Idiot circuit. I called my mother. ─IdiotFest? ─Don’t you remember, Mom? It was in San Diego last year....

The Aspiring Idiot

Todd Hasak-Lowy

17 min

Russia

A little girl was ill. Each day the doctor, Mikhail Petrovich, whom she had known for a very, very long time, came to see her. Sometimes, there were two other doctors with him whom she did...

The Elephant

Alexander Kuprin

14 min

Ireland

When I think of Ireland, John-Paul Finnegan said as we stood on the deck of the ferry while it pulled out of Holyhead, I think of a limitless ignorance. And not just an ignorance, but a...

John-Paul Finnegan, Paltry Realist

Rob Doyle

15 min

USA

She was the lady in your neighborhood. You saw her at the supermarket, you saw her in line at the post office. She was like Monday, the day she brought her kid to school, Tuesday, the...

Séance with the Stasi

Sarah Khan

12 min

Israel

At the beginning of winter my father fell ill and took to his bed. He lay in bed for a long time with his bedroom door closed, and we would walk around the house on tiptoe...

After Arbor Day

Ruth Almog

5 min

It Would Be Better If Some Continents Had Never Been Discovered. Europe, For Instance, Has Never Been Anything But Trouble.

Germany

There often used to be two of us. Three of us. Four, five, or six. I had brothers, sisters, a tarantula. Parents, yes, them too. Plus there was my Uncle Nikolai and the guy from the...

It Would Be Better If Some Continents Had Never Been Discovered. Europe, For Instance, Has Never Been Anything But Trouble.

Michel Decar

8 min

Israel

In my other life I lived in a suburb of Ohio or Michigan with Paul-Marc, my husband, and the child. The houses were planted on manicured lawns that stretched as far as the eye could see,...

Buy Two Get One Free

Tal Nitzán

4 min

Russia

I – How to Survive with the Aid of Literature. Astride a Play to Tiflis. If someone asked me what I deserve, I would say in all honesty before God that I deserve hard labor....

Bohemia

Mikhail Bulgakov

9 min