The story follows an unnamed boss who receives a visit from his old friend Woodifield. Woodifield shares that his daughters recently visited the graves of the boss's son and Woodifield's son, who both died in World War I. After Woodifield leaves, the boss is overcome with grief and dismisses his employee to be alone. He sees a fly in his inkwell and proceeds to torture it, dropping ink on it repeatedly until it dies. The boss is left feeling miserable but unable to recall what he had been thinking about prior to focusing on killing the fly. The story uses the fly's torture as a metaphor for the boss struggling with the meaningless of life after losing his son.

1. S A K A N I Y A N G A K L A T N A “ T H E S T U D Y O F
E N G L I S H L I T E R A T U R E ” ( 1 9 9 9 ) , M A S U S I N G
T I N A L A K A Y N I M A R G A R E T J A N I C E T U R N E R A N G
A P A T N A U R I N G M A I K L I N G K W E N T O , G A Y A N G
M G A S U M U S U N O D :
Mga Uri ng
Maikling Kwento

2. Tagpuan
Binibigyang-diin sa ganitong uri ang tagpuan o
ang pook at panahon na pinagganapan ng maikling
kwento. Kasama rito ang mga maikling kwento na
sadyang isinulat upang ilarawan lamang ang
pamumuhay,kaugalian,tradisyon,at iba pa ng mga
tiyak na bansa o bayan. Maaari ring ipakita nito na
ang mga tauhan ay bunga ng uri ng lugar na
kinaroroonan nila. Isang halimbawa nito ay “A
Sound of Thunder” ni Ray Bradbury, isang maikling
kwentong sci-fi na tumatalakay sa matinding
pinsalang dulot ng “butterfly effect.”

3. Banghay
Nakatuon ito sa banghay; kompleto ang maikling kwento sa iba
pang element,gaya ng tauhan,tagpuan,tema,at iba pa ngunit ang
tuon ay nasa takbo ng mga pangyayari. Mahalaga,samakatuwid,ang
tunggalian,suliranin,kasukdulan,pananabik,at resolusyon. Nilikha
ang mga tauhan upang bumagay lamang sa inihandang takbo ng
mga pangyayari,naglagay lamang ng tagpuan upang mas
maintindihan ang pinanggagalingan ng mga tauhan, at nagbigay
lamang ng tema upang may paksain ang maikling kwento sa
pangkalahatan ngunit ang ganda nito ay nasa takbo pa rin ng mga
pangyayari. Dapat ay magkaroon ng maigting na kasukdulan sa
pagpapataas ng suspense at maaari ring magkaroon ng hindi
inaasahang pagwawakas ang istorya. Isang halimbawa nito ang
“The Necklace” ni Guy de Maupassant tungkol sa isang babaeng
nakawala ng hiniram niyang kuwintas at kung paano ito nagbunga
ng kanyang katandaan at paghihirap. Sa huli, isang kagulat-gulat na
pangyayari ang kanyang natuklasan.

4. Halimbawa:
The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant
At the beginning of the story, we meet Mathilde Loisel, a middle-class girl
who desperately wishes she were wealthy. She’s got looks and charm, but had the
bad luck to be born into a family of clerks, who marry her to another clerk (M.
Loisel) in the Department of Education. Mathilde is so convinced she’s meant to be
rich that she detests her real life and spends all day dreaming and despairing about
the fabulous life she’s not having. She envisions footmen, feasts, fancy furniture, and
strings of rich young men to seduce.
One day M. Loisel comes home with an invitation to a fancy ball thrown by
his boss, the Minister of Education. M. Loisel has gone to a lot of trouble to get the
invitation, but Mathilde’s first reaction is to throw a fit. She doesn’t have anything
nice to wear, and can’t possibly go! How dare her husband be so insensitive? M.
Loisel doesn’t know what to do, and offers to buy his wife a dress, so long as it’s not
too expensive. Mathilde asks for 400 francs, and he agrees. It’s not too long before
Mathilde throws another fit, though, this time because she has no jewels. So M.
Loisel suggests she go see her friend Mme. Forestier, a rich woman who can
probably lend her something. Mathilde goes to see Mme. Forestier, and she is in
luck. Mathilde is able to borrow a gorgeous diamond necklace. With the necklace,
she’s sure to be a stunner.

5. Halimbawa:
The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant
The night of the ball arrives, and Mathilde has the time of her life.
Everyone loves her (i.e., lusts after her) and she is absolutely thrilled. She
and her husband (who falls asleep off in a corner) don’t leave until 4am.
Mathilde suddenly dashes outside to avoid being seen in her shabby coat.
She and her husband catch a cab and head home. But once back at home,
Mathilde makes a horrifying discovery: the diamond necklace is gone.
M. Loisel spends all of the next day, and even the next week,
searching the city for the necklace, but finds nothing. It’s gone. So he and
Mathilde decide they have no choice but to buy Mme. Forestier a new
necklace. They visit one jewelry store after another until at last they find a
necklace that looks just the same as the one they lost. Unfortunately, it’s 36
thousand francs, which is exactly twice the amount of all the money M.
Loisel has to his name. So M. Loisel goes massively into debt and buys the
necklace, and Mathilde returns it to Mme. Forestier, who doesn’t notice the
substitution. Buying the necklace catapults the Loisels into poverty for the
next ten years. That’s right, ten years. They lose their house, their maid,
their comfortable lifestyle, and on top of it all Mathilde loses her good
looks.

6. Halimbawa:
The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant
After ten years, all the debts are finally paid, and
Mathilde is out for a jaunt on the Champs Elysées.
There she comes across Mme. Forestier, rich and
beautiful as ever. Now that all the debts are paid off,
Mathilde decides she wants to finally tell Mme.
Forestier the sad story of the necklace and her ten
years of poverty, and she does. At that point, Mme.
Forestier, aghast, reveals to Mathilde that the
necklace she lost was just a fake. It was worth only
five hundred francs.

7. Tauhan
Pinakamahalaga rito ang pag-unlad ng karakter ng
isang tauhan na nagbibigay-diin sa tiyak niyang mga
katangian. Sa pamamagitan ng mga detalye sa kaniyang
anyo, paraan ng pag-iisip, at pananalita ay lalong
nakikilala ang tauhan. Lalo ring naipapakilala ang
suliranin at sa paraan niya ng paglutas sa mga ito. May
tagpuan,banghay,at tema ang maikling kwento ngunit
kinakasangkapan lamang ang mga ito upang mabigyang-
diin ang gumagalaw na tauhan. Isang halimbawa nito
ang “A Good Man is Hard to Find” ni Flannery O’Connor
na kwento ng isang lola na gusting kontrolin ang lahat;
itinuturo ng kwento ang halaga ng pagharap ng isang tao
sa kung sino talaga siya.

8. Halimbawa: A Good Man is Hard to Find by
Flannery O’Connor
It’s time for a family trip of some kind, and there’s a
disagreement in the family about where to go. Bailey
wants to take his family, (i.e., his wife, baby, and two
kids, John Wesley and June Star), to Florida. His
mother, called simply “the grandmother,” doesn’t want to
go there. To make her case, she mentions that there’s a
dangerous criminal named The Misfit on the loose, and
that he’s headed that way.
No one seems to take her seriously. The next
morning, it’s off to Florida they go. Everyone piles in the
car, including the grandmother, who seems to have
acquired some enthusiasm for the trip. (She’s also
secretly stowed away her cat, Pitty Sing.) They hit the
road and begin the trip from Georgia to Florida.

9. Halimbawa: A Good Man is Hard to Find by
Flannery O’Connor
During the trip the grandmother plays games and
tells stories to the kids. They stop at a restaurant to eat,
and converse a bit with the owner, Red Sammy, and his
wife. The grandmother talks with the couple about how
hard it is to trust people and find “good men” these days.
She also talks a bit about The Misfit.
Back on the road, the grandmother gets the kids all
excited by telling them about an old plantation she once
visited that’s located nearby. The kids convince the
reluctant Bailey to take them all to see it. He turns onto a
dirt road, which, the grandmother assures him, leads to
the plantation.

10. Halimbawa: A Good Man is Hard to Find by
Flannery O’Connor
After following the road for a while they don’t see anything.
Suddenly, the grandmother remembers that the plantation isn’t
here at all – it’s actually in Tennessee. She is so startled by this
realization (which she doesn’t tell anybody), that she jerks, letting
her cat out of the basket where she’s stowed it. The animal is
propelled onto Bailey’s shoulder. A dramatic accident follows, as the
car veers off the road and flips over. As June Star laments, however,
no one is killed.
The family waits for a car to come along, and sure enough, one
does. Only it’s not quite the help they were expecting. It turns out
that their “help” is none other than The Misfit and two of his
buddies. The grandmother recognizes The Misfit, and tries to
convince him he’s a good man who couldn’t possibly want to do
anything to harm them. The Misfit orders Bailey and John Wesley
into the woods, where his cronies shoot them. The mother, the baby,
and June Star soon follow.

11. Halimbawa: A Good Man is Hard to Find by
Flannery O’Connor
All the while, the grandmother, increasingly dizzy and in
shock, talks with The Misfit, still trying to convince him he’s a
good man, and telling him he should pray to Jesus. This gives
The Misfit the opportunity to tell a bit of his personal history
and offer some his ideas on Jesus, about whom he’s actually
done some thinking. The grandmother, detecting a moment of
vulnerability in him is suddenly moved to call him her child
and reaches out to touch him. The Misfit responds by
promptly shooting her three times in the chest.
The story ends with him telling his cronies, who’ve
returned from shooting the others, to dump her body with the
rest. “She would’ve been a good woman if it had been
somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life,” he says.

12. Tema
Ang tuon ng maikling kwento ay nasa
pangunahing kaisipan, aral, o pagpapahalagang nais
bigyang-diin. Ginagamit lamang ang tauhan,
tagpuan at banghay upang mapalutang ang isang
mahalagang tema na maaaring magamit upang
mabuhay o makakilos nang tama. Isang halimbawa
ng maikling kwento na nakadepende sa tema ay ang
mga pabula. Isang halimbawa ng ganitong maikling
kwento ang “The Fly” ni Katherine Mansfield, isang
maikling kwento na tumatalakay.

13. Halimbawa :
The Fly by Katherine Mansfield
“The Fly” is a story told primarily through the eyes of “the
boss,” the protagonist, who is described not by name but by
function. The story has two parts. In the first part, Mr. Woodifield
(whom the boss thinks of as “old Woodifield”), retired since his
stroke and woman-dominated, visits his friend the boss, who
though, five years older than Woodifield, is still in charge of the
firm. Woodifield and the boss have one experience in common:
Both lost sons in World War I.
The boss enjoys showing Woodifield his redecorated office and
benevolently offering him some whiskey. Then Woodifield, who has
momentarily forgotten what he meant to tell the boss, remembers.
His daughters have been in Belgium to see the grave of their
brother, Woodifield’s son, and they have also seen that of the boss’s
son. After Woodifield reports that the cemetery is well kept, he
leaves, and the first part of the story is concluded.

14. Halimbawa :
The Fly by Katherine Mansfield
Feeling that he must weep, the boss tells the cowed
messenger, Macey, to give him a half hour alone. He feels as if
he can see his son in the grave. However, although he muses
that his life has been meaningless since the death of his
promising only son, whom he was grooming to take over the
business, the boss cannot weep.
At this point, the boss sees a fly in the inkpot, pulls it out,
and puts it on a blotter, where he proceeds to torture it,
placing one drop of ink on it at a time and repeating the
operation every time the fly seems to have extricated itself and
gained hope. Even though he admires the fly and cheers it on,
the boss continues to drop ink on it until at last the fly dies.
He feels miserable, but he cannot remember what he was
thinking about before he began his experiment with the fly.