Perspectives

In what follows we encourage you to look at the literary context in which the short story was published, similar works and references to pop culture, in order to gain a broader perspective on “Sredni Vashtar” by Saki.

Literary period

Saki lived and wrote during Victorian and Edwardian eras of the British Empire.

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Works with the same theme

For the theme of imagination/fantasy versus reality, we also encourage you to read “The Boogeyman” by Stephen King, a short story in which a man comes to believe the bedtime story monster is real and has killed his children.

Also, in “The Signal-Man” by Charles Dickens, a first-person narrator comes to question reality when a railway signalman who appears to be seeing ghosts is found dead.

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Works by the same author

A very similar work in terms of themes and context by the same author is “The Lumber Room” (1914).

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References to pop culture

“Sredni Vashtar” has been adapted into a TV series episode in the “Great Ghost Tales” in 1961, but also into a...

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