Fiction_L Archives Short Story Inquiry Dates: 2/25/04,8:34 AM  through  2/25/04,8:46 AM  (2 postings) Search for: Select one or more indexes to search: 2011-current     2009-2010     2004-2008    1995-2003    (Matches from each index will be displayed separately in the results page.) Return to February 2004 thread menu   |   Fiction_L Archives Menu

FROM: [removed]@birchard.lib.oh.us
REC'D: 2/25/04, 8:34 AM

Dear Fellow Fiction_L Folks,

A patron is looking for a short story which he read in the 1950s and has the following plot:

A hangman comes to town (in the Old West? Beats me---the patron did not say) and builds a gallows. Hangman then begins exectuing individuals he has selected "from the fringes of society" ---viz. racial, ethnic, religious, political 'outsiders.' Narrator does nothing to stop the process and in the end, guess what?---The Hangman Comes for Him! (Oh, the irony!)

Sounds like an obvious allegory of McCarthyism to yours truly---HIGH NOON if Will Kane had been a wimp.

Anybody have an idea of the title/author of this Cold War gem?

Thanks!

Kevin

FROM: [removed]@birchard.lib.oh.us
REC'D: 2/25/04, 8:46 AM

Cease and desist racking thy brains for the Ironic Hangman "story!"

I found what the patron wanted, and it is a poem by Maurice Ogden called The Hangman.

Thanks, anyway!

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