Discovery

Set aboard a steamship sailing from Le Havre to Trouville, 'Discovery' is a short and funny story, with a moral tucked away in the dialogue. When the narrator meets his old friend, Henri Sidoine, the latter rants about the number of English people on board. With the kind of ire that Basil Fawlty (played by John Cleese) reserved for his guests, Sidoine gives full rein to his loathing of the English although, as it turns out, he fell in love with, and married, an Englishwoman. Is his argument genuinely about the self-proclaimed "lords of the sea", or is he revealing more about himself than he means to? An incisive tale with plenty of clever observations, 'Discovery' will delight fans of nautical short stories such as Ernest Hemingway's ´After the Storm´. Hailed as one of the pioneers of the modern short story, Henri Ren Albert Guy de Maupassant (1850 - 1893) was born in Dieppe, France. After his parents' divorce, Maupassant was cared for by his mother who had a passion for literature. During his secondary education, he was introduced to the acclaimed novelist, Gustave Flaubert, who was to play a prominent part in Maupassant's literary career. The Franco-Prussian War saw the author enlist in the Navy, and his experiences influenced many of his books, including 'Boule de Suif.' Flaubert was to take him under his wing after the war, introducing him to realist and naturalist authors, such as Émile Zola and Ivan Turgenev.