Unloading: The early ESL stories

by Thomas Leverett

This volume has fourteen short stories, written 1994-2005, many of which were originally intended for an ESL audience and did years of service as reading exercises in ESL classrooms. They are good for ESL in that they have blunt, active prose, free of difficult cultural nuance or convoluted structure, yet they don't look down on the reader as some reading materials do. They provide dilemmas to consider and reflect on. The stories are the Unloading (2005), Choke and Cell (2005), Abstract and Concrete (2004), Three Friends (200), Passion and Circumstance (2000), Schoolhouse (2000), Reflection (2000), Ruffi (2000), Faith and the Crocodile (2000), Superstition (2000), Rebecca (1998), Alice (1998), Education of Ivan (1997), and Hideo (1994). Several are meant to be read in pairs. All are classics, and were originally printed in paper and cardstock, though those copies are rare today. Their reputation and popularity spread widely, especially in the ESL world, where good stories are hard to find.

44 pages, Paperback

Published May 15, 2015

Reviews

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another look at slices of American life by Thomas Leverett, this time stories couched in uncomplicated ways to facilitate the learning of the English language by the ESL students whom he taught during his long career at a teacher.

‘Unloading’ is probably the longest, dealing with the observation of what amounts to a multi-car pile-up in small town America, while ‘Faith of the Crocodile’ is the shortest, dealing with the struggles of a Turkish ESL student. ‘Schoolhouse’ and ‘Reflection’ contrast the experience of students at a small school in a farming community in Nebraska with that of students at a large high school in Buffalo; it is easy to see which group has the best schooling experience. My personal favourite was ‘Choke and Cell’, where a hitchhiker tells a story to the man giving him a lift; a story which I might very well quote elsewhere; it sounds like it should be a fable by Aesop, but I can’t find it, so will give credit to the author of this book.

Overall, a small but perfectly-formed and thought-provoking collection.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved the first story of the traffic accident. It was so human and deliciously described that I felt like I was also sitting on the bench watching. My favorite was the the one involving beijg stuck in an elevator which is crazy because that would be my worse fear. Really this collection of short stories was highly entertaining and I enjoyed reading them. Leverett has a way with taking human moments and making them deep and thought provoking.