The writings of Robert M. Coates are unknown to the average reader these days. The last time I taught from a high school anthology of literature that contained one of his stories was in 1977 — a harrowing tale about a middle-aged married couple harassed by a gang of teenage thugs.

The writings of Robert M. Coates are unknown to the average reader these days. The last time I taught from a high school anthology of literature that contained one of his stories was in 1977 — a harrowing tale about a middle-aged married couple harassed by a gang of teenage thugs.

Like John Greenleaf Whittier before him, Robert Frost is often thought of as a bard of cozy evenings by a fire, an impression created by poems such as “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,”  “After Apple Picking,” “Mending Wall,” and “The Road Not Taken,” anthologized in middle- and high-school textbooks in this country for generation

One of the fascinating things about reading older science-fiction stories is discovering that their authors predicted often years or even decades in advance things that came to be: Jules Verne’s lunar travel vehicles, Czech writer Karel Capek’s robots, Arthur C. Clarke’s communication satellites.

A common plot in British and American literature is the tempestuous romance that erupts between a beautiful, wealthy, cultivated woman and a handsome proletarian dude with no money or life prospects whatsoever.

Author’s note:  For years, I have been telling my English classes that someday I wanted to edit an annotated anthology titled “Short Stories I Wish I Had Written.”  I do not have any publishers beating down my door to get such a volume into print, but since we are all stuck in our homes these days, this seemed a good time to share some