27 pages • 54 minutes read
Saki, H. H. MunroThe Storyteller
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1914A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Background
Authorial Context: Hector Hugh Munro
Munro was born in 1870 in British Burma, at the time a part of British-controlled India. His father was the inspector general of the Indian Imperial Police, and his mother was the daughter of a rear admiral in the British Navy. When Munro was two years old, his mother died after being charged by a runaway cow. His father then sent Munro and his two older siblings back to England to be raised by his grandmother and paternal aunts. This household was strict and puritanical. Munro’s sister Ethel, who wrote a brief biography of him later in life, states that their aunts were the model for several similar aunts and caretakers that appear in his short stories.
In 1893, Munro followed in his father’s footsteps and joined the Indian Imperial Police, returning to his birthplace in British-controlled Burma, present-day Myanmar. However, long bouts of illness forced him to return to England only 15 months later. He went to London and began his writing career as a journalist for the Westminster Gazette and the Daily Express, as well as several other newspapers. These newspapers became the first places to publish his comedic short stories.
Munro began to publish his stories under the pseudonym Saki, which is a reference to the cupbearer in the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (a collection of Persian poetry by Omar Khayyam, as translated to English by Edward FitzGerald). This association was confirmed by both Munro’s sister, Ethel, in her biography of him, and by Rothay Reynolds, a friend of Munro’s and fellow journalist.
In 1916, after enlisting as a regular trooper during World War I despite being overage for the requirement, Munro was killed by a German sniper during the Battle of the Ancre. His last words were reportedly “Put that bloody cigarette out!” (Reynolds, Rothay. “A Memoir of H. H. Munro.” The Toys of Peace and Other Stories. Project Gutenberg. 1919, 2014).
Sociohistorical Context: Edwardian England
Munro’s writing career took place during a period in England called the Edwardian era, named after King Edward VII, who reigned from 1901 until he died in 1910. However, the Edwardian era is often considered to stretch to the start of World War I. This period was full of contradictory attitudes, as it retained many of the Victorian era’s conservative attitudes while also inching closer to the kinds of social reform that would characterize the 1920s, after the war. The British Conservative Party was still in power until 1906, though the labor movement was beginning to gain strength.
Through suffragette and labor union activism, positive social change was beginning to emerge such as loosened rules for women’s behavior, and new liberal reforms were created to help the poor. However, class divides were still rigidly enforced. The rich were celebrated for their conspicuous luxury, the working class had little political power, and women and children were usually placed in the same category: without agency, rights, money, or control of their own lives.
Furthermore, the trial and imprisonment of Oscar Wilde were still fresh in the memories of all, reinforcing the dangers of being openly gay in British society. A famous writer, Wilde had been put on trial for “sodomy and gross indecency” in 1895 and, when found guilty, was imprisoned for two years. After his release, he left England for the relative safety of France, where he died in 1900. The more liberal social conventions of the Edwardian era did nothing to lessen these dangers. There were complex rules for all levels of society. Failing to follow these rules was swiftly punished while adhering to them was rewarded. This narrowly defined concept of right and wrong is promoted by the aunt in “The Story-Teller” and subverted by the bachelor’s story when the well-behaved girl is eaten by a wolf. The children’s delight with the bachelor’s story hints at society’s brewing desire to break from these confines, which manifested in the 1920s.
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