Does any one know any 20th century short stories based on the theme of insanity?

Question

I'm doing a project for English and i just need some short stories that deal with insanity because i can't seem to find any.

umm i also need one poem on this subject. and it CAN deal with depression as well. Thank You

Answer 1

See How They Run by Robert Bloch
Ward No. 6 by Anton Chekov

Answer 2

The "Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman that was quoted earlier is a good one, but may be outside your century. You should try searching an online library or resource. You could always call a librarian and ask...I am certain they could point you in the right direction.

Also, try a Google or Yahoo search on "insanity short story". Here are a couple that might work:

Bartleby, the Scrivener by Herman Melville

The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allen Poe

Who Is Andrea Yates? A Short Story About Insanity by Deborah W. Denno

The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allen Poe

Answer 3

Check out the book "Rendevouz in Black: Rediscoveries in the 20th Century" by Richard Woolrich (2004). Also, read anything by Alfred Hitchcock.

For an added bonus, you might be able to tie the "insanity theme" in this book to the Naturalism Movement of the 18th Century, where authors like Edgar Allen Poe (of the early 19th Century) rebelled against the Classical Movement of England during the same period. (That's only if you want an A+, but ask your instructor about this first).

If you are in college, check out your local libray and see if they have the EBSCO Database that will allow you to check the book out online. That way you won't have to worry about buying a book you probably won't read after the class is over.

Good luck!

B

Answer 4

Can you use a short novel? The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath is a good one. Tim O'Brien has also written about the "insanity" of war- The Things They Carried. You might want to change "insanity" to a slightly more specific theme- depression, suicide, PTSD etc.

Answer 5

Book version of One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest

Answer 6

There's "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner. That's a 20th century story too.

Answer 7

Check out some of the Peter Straub/Stephen King works - I know there is short story somewhere in there about insanity....

Answer 8

Well, there was this sci-fi short story by Roger Zelazny a long time ago entitled "He Who Shapes" (1965) Its about a psychoanalyst who enters the dreams of his patients to help them resolve their issues. I know he becomes crazy at the end.

Googling gave me the following titles:

Silent Snow, Secret Snow and it is a short story written by Conrad Aiken in 1934. It is about a young boy's descent into madness.


Best American Short Stories 1992:
Synopsis:
Edited by Stone ( Outerbridge Reach ), this collection of 20 skillful stories (nine originated in the New Yorker ) strikes many melancholy chords. Amy Bloom's tortured schizophrenic commits suicide; Tim Gautreaux limns a Depression-era pump repairman who is wooed and ultimately mugged and robbed by a widow who murdered her husband; and in a story by Reynolds Price, a white man's adulterous affair with a black woman in 1940s North Carolina shatters his family and endangers his lover's life. Rick Bass depicts the depravity of two developers of a Montana valley; Joyce Carol Oates conveys the viciousness of a suburban community; Robert Olen Butler imagines an aged Vietnamese living in New Orleans who fears his son-in-law and grandson are involved in the murderous deeds of an anti-Communist group; and Marshall Klimasewiski's Korean emigre suffers guilt over her miscarriage and her self-imposed exile. Three highlights here are Christopher Tilghman's evocation of an ex-Wall Streeter who abandons his family; Alice Munro's story of a small-town Canadian librarian who never gets over being jilted in the wake of WW I by a beau she has never met; and Mavis Gallant's tale--which adds a welcome note of irony and whimsy--about a headstrong Parisian who throws a monkey wrench into her wedding plans.

Answer 9

Check the Yellow Wallpaper although that was written in the 1800s I think so no go.