Pale Horse, Pale Rider
- ISBN13: 9780151707553
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
First published in 1939, these three short novels secured the author’s reputation as a master of short fiction.
... More >>
Related Reading:
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.








previously read first part of this book and it was great..Second part also excellent. Mr Helton, the farmer’s dilemna, the stranger were all rendered cleanly…thought ending dragged wee bit on 2nd part, but still a strong one..I wondered what would happen to the people while reading it without being jerked by the writer to feel by dishonest means this way or that. (You know, some writers want sadness so throw a dead puppy or a crippled child into the mix w/out creating a real character. just for the sake of wringing a feeling out of us by this foul means.) Porter never resorted to a trick in this story except that its overlong ending may have detracted just a bit. Just a bit.
The 3rd story felt dishonest. I admit it’s hard to portray illness dramatically…well, ok the russians did it with one day in the life of what’s-his-name. But porter doesn’t do it here. And while she did give us this and that metaphor to give our senses something to react to and make it all less abstract..the way she piled one top of another hurt the overall story. It made it seem dishonest. It smelled of ‘how do i make this story longer?’ desperation. A shorter illness of miranda would’ve helped. The fin de siecle feeling of a war..she evoked it, but then seemed unsure of where to go from there. As a short story it might’ve been better.
POrter is a good writer..but you can skip the third part of the book and leave liking her better for it.
Rating: 2 / 5
Have just finished Old MOrtality portion of this book. The way porter goes @ language, a bull w/ her head, hooking @ hoping to gore us something…It is admirable. Also a Texan & have not heard of her. Even if you’ve never been to the state, she is that rich link to the region and to humanity in general that many of the southern writers are. When you read Eudora Welty, you get distinct pictures of humans and what it is they do and think and feel during their days. Porter does it, too. She doesn’t go for hard contrasts like Flannery O’Connor, but has a simple workmens’ ethic to her language. (John Gardner is recalled by this.) I can care less about the topic of the first story…it’s just that porter makes you want to know because she nails down for us a real world inhabited by real people. Amen, folks.
Rating: 5 / 5
This item was advertised as new, but, when I received it, there were notes written all inside it. Other than that, the book was in good condition. It should have been posted as “like new” instead of “new”.
Rating: 3 / 5
This item was as advertised. It is a used book and the condition was as described. Exactly what I wanted.
Rating: 4 / 5
this beautiful book impressed me greatly. it alone securely establishes katherine anne porter as one of the very best american prose writers of our century, in the company of faulkner, hemingway, o’connor, fitzgerald, west, and pynchon. this is american LITERATURE
Rating: 5 / 5