‘The Judge’s Wife’ by Isabel Allende

The Judge’s Wife by Isabel Allende, 1987

The magic trick:

Setting up a conflict built on a “three is a crowd” trio of characters

I’m very excited and fortunate to be preparing for a return to Chatauqua this week. It’s a wonderful place – essentially, summer camp for adults to like to learn stuff. For the second consecutive year, my wife has the chance to do some history programming there, and one of the perks is that she can bring her family. What a life.

Last year, I enjoyed a week of short story classes with an amazing group of readers led by the brilliant Mark Altshuler. Oh, and we got to hang out with George Saunders, no big deal.

I can only imagine how great this year’s trek will be.

In the meantime, for SSMT, I’m highlighting two of the stories that our class read last summer: “The Judge’s Wife” by Isabel Allende, and “Wild Swans” by Alice Munro. Up first, the Allende piece.

“The Judge’s Wife” sets up one of William Trevor’s favorite rule of threes. Three people always makes for conflict. Throw in – as we get here – some class warfare, social commentary, and a “one day, you will die at the hands of a woman” prophecy, and you can see this one is going to hold your interest.

And that’s quite a trick on Allende’s part.

The selection:

Nicolas Vidal always knew he would lose his head over a woman. So it was foretold on the day of his birth, and later confirmed by the Turkish woman in the corner store the one time he allowed her to read his fortune in the coffee grounds. Little did he imagine though that it would be on account of Casilda, Judge Hidalgo’s wife.

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