"The Portable Phonograph." Walter Van Tilburg Clark.

One-minute review: After the holocaust. All that remains of culture is the doctor’s collection of four books—Shakespeare, The Bible, Moby Dick and The Divine Comedy—and a portable phonograph and a few records. Now the few survivors realize the precious value of culture. However, after the others leave, the doctor hears in the empty world a cough not far away, so, in fear, he hides his books and phonograph and records.

Comment: This story was written in 1942, before the completion of the atomic bomb. Vivid depiction of the emptiness of the earth after it has been bombed into a wasteland. RayS.

Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Eds. Edgar V. Roberts and Henry E. Jacobs. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1989.