A Comparative Study of O. Henry and Pannalal Patel’s Selected Short Stories

Abstract

It is known that the English language mostly becomes the way of communication and sometimes the only medium to deliver your ideas when the speaker and the listener do not speak and understand each other’s native tongue. Hence understanding of it can be of great use. Realizing its importance, people have started learning the English language and the number of English language learners is increasing every day. Some find it to be a fun learning experience and easy and others think of it to be a complicated and difficult language. Learning English can become challenging because of its heterogeneous nature. Also when learners do not see any similarities or connection with their own language it becomes difficult to understand it. But teachers around the world have been bringing in innovative techniques to make the learning experience easy and interesting. The learning of any language or concept becomes easier when the learners feel the relevance and can connect to what is being taught and so is the case with English Language teaching. Learners appreciate and follow when recognizing the connection and similarities between their native language and English. The present research paper will study the similarities between the selected short stories of celebrated short story writer William Sydney Porter and a noted and acclaimed Gujarati writer Pannalal Patel. The paper will make note of the similarities in the themes, characters, and other aspects of the stories while bringing out the contrastive elements of them. It will also try to study how this comparison helps to give a better understanding of the themes, cultures, and language.