I have asked other authors to share with me examples of compassion or lack of compassion from ther books. Here are four that I have received….
Barbara Boatright wrote a memoir entitled Impaled on the Horns of the Devil. She describes a scene where she undergoes an abusive marriage to a man named Floyd. He has just told her he felt sorry for a prostitute who struggled to raise her little girl by herself. So he kept her company at her house for two weeks. Floyd tells Barbara: “Don’t you have any compassion for people who are down and out?” And Barbara answers: “Don’t talk to me about ‘compassion’! What about your wife [meaning herself]? Did you already forget that you’re married?” With arrogance he said he saw nothing wrong with sleeping with another woman and didn’t know why I was so hurt. He said that what he really wanted was an open marriage anyway. This is a good example of the extreme indifference some people have about the feelings of others. Barbara’s blog is http://barbaraboatright.authorsxpress.com
The stories in Sandy Humphrey’s book Hot Issues, Cool Choices: Facing Bullies, Peer Pressure, Popularity, and Put-Downs are all based on actual bullying experiences students shared with me during my school visits, and my book is dedicated to a 12-year-old Minnesota boy who took his own life as a result of being bullied. This is an excerpt from my Author’s Note:
“The Golden Rule is an old rule, but it’s still a good rule to live by. My hope in writing this book is that it will help you to become a kinder, more compassionate human being and that you will treat others the way you want them to treat you.
Did you know that there are kids out there who don’t even want to get out of bed in the morning because they know what going to school means for them? It can mean being teased and taunted by other kids. It can mean being excluded and rejected by other kids. It can mean being afraid that you’re going to be physically assaulted and possibly hurt.And, unfortunately, sometimes it can even mean that you just can’t hang in there any longer, so you give up and take your own life.” Sandy’s website is: http://www.kidscandoit.com
Catherine Green, the author of Love Hurts, wonders whether her characters feel compassion for each other. Her heroine, Jessica Stone, believes herself to be an independent and compassionate woman. She does not show prejudice, she lives a good honest, hard working life, and she is friendly to everyone that she interacts with. But when she discovers that the man she loves is a vampire, and his brother is a werewolf, her morals go out of the window. In her confusion she experiences adultery, pain, heartbreak and terror.
Following her tumultuous experience after the revelations of the people she loves, Jessica is thrown into turmoil about her own feelings. Her friends and lover have betrayed her in the worst possible way. Will Jessica show compassion and remain faithful to her vampire Jack Mason? Or will she share herself with his werewolf brother Danny? [Tom Mach's observation: Oftentimes compassion is a decision, not a feeling.] Catherine’s website is: http://www.catherine-green.co.uk
In his short story collection, 200 Shorts, Salvatore Buttacia describes some characters who make the leap from self absorption to concern for others in the space of under 1,000 words. In his story “Georgie”, neighborhood boys poke fun at Georgie who has a cleft palate. They ostracize him from street games of stickball and laugh when he speaks. Then one late-autumn afternoon Georgie went skating on thin ice and drowned. Everyone turned out for the 14-year-old’s wake, even the 14-year-old Anthony Lanzetti who narrates the story and learns a lesson in compassion that he will take with him for a lifetime.
We stood up, made the sign of the cross, turned to
Mrs. Hogan, and my father said, “I’m Frank Lanzetti,
Anthony’s father. My boy was good friends with your
son. We’re gonna miss him.”
In “The Emperor’s Iron Rule,” we meet Sister Versalis, whom her fourth-graders call, behind her back, “Emperor.” Like the Ancient Roman despots, she doles out punishment by iron ruler at every opportunity. When Elizabeth Brillo raises her hand and tells Sister somebody stole her green pencil sharpener, the nun asks the thief to confess by raising his hand. No one does, which results in Sr. Versalis’ walking up and down the rows smashing her iron ruler down on the knuckles of every outstretched hand. Finally, Elizabeth is ecstatic. She’s found her eraser. It had fallen out of her pencil case.
Sister smiled. Why? Did that suddenly make everything
all right? The class had been knuckle-wrapped for no
reason and the Emperor was smiling, all the while tapping
her iron ruler down on the bent arm of her black habit.
Was she going to ask Brillo to extend her non-writing hand
now so the rest of us could feel some consolation?
“Take out your writing paper, boys and girls. And your
pencils too.”
Salvatore Buttacia’s blog is http://salbuttaci.blogspot.com
By the way, please let me know if you’d like me to email you a free copy of AN INNOCENT MURDERED if you are willing to give me a review on it when you’re finished. Just click on the “Contact Me” button near the top of my site to let me know.
Thank you, Tom, for including a mention of my book 200 Shorts.
You’re welcome. Hope this helps you sell a lot of copies of your book. I went back to my blog and I noticed there was no increase in the number of subscribers to my blog. When you hit the “subscribe” button, did you include your email address? Just wondering why it didn’t show up at all on my blog.
Yes, I typed in my e-mail address and clicked on “subscribe.” I’ll do it again.
I think my blog is a bit slow in responding. Yes, you did subscribe to my blogs. Thanks for getting back to me. By the way, I have a second blog you might want to take a look at. It’s a blog devoted to giving writers ideas and helful suggestions. It’s at http://tommach.tumblr.com I hope you sell a ton of books.
I tried it again and it told me I am already subscribed, Tom.