Cerpen Terbaik Sepanjang Zaman: Pertemuan di Samarra

Kualiti sebuah cerita boleh dipandang dari pelbagai sudut. Ia boleh jadi gaya bahasa, ia boleh jadi kepintaran menyusun plot, pembinaan suasana yang mencengkam emosi, dan sebagainya. Kemudian kita ada cerita yang menikam tepat, ibarat mata tombak, pada kebenaran paling hakiki: kematian. Musuh sebuah cerita, atau bayang-bayangnya, ialah kematian, di mana penceritaan berhenti bergerak. Penceritaan yang berulang-ulang, setiap malam sebelum kita tidur, atau ketika kita bermimpi, ialah penangguhan sementara kepada pertemuan terakhir di kota Samarra. 

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Appointment in Samarra

Oleh W. Somerset Maugham 

There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling, and said, Master, just now when I was in the marketplace I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me.  She looked at me and made a threatening gesture,  now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate.  I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me.  The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went.  Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw me standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, Why did you make a threating getsture to my servant when you saw him this morning?  That was not a threatening gesture, I said, it was only a start of surprise.  I was astonished to see him in Bagdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.