The Medicine Man (story)
"The Medicine Man" is a humorous short story by Erskine Caldwell. It was included in ''We Are the Living'' (1933). It was also included in the ''Stories of Erskine Caldwell'', a collection of 96 stories first published in 1953 and re-issued in 1996 by the University of Georgia Pres Plot synopsis The story begins with the statement: "There was nobody in Rawley who believed that Effie Henderson would ever find a man to marry her, and Effie herself had just about given up hope. But that was before the traveling herb doctor came to town." There follows a description of the arrival of Professor Eaton, who comes to this town, as he has to countless others, to sell green bottles of Indian Root Tonic, touted as a panacea, "the one and only cure for all ailments," whose secret he claims to have been bequeathed at the deathbed of a western Indian chief. Townspeople crowd around to buy the bottles, sold for a dollar each (members of Rawley's Black community stand aside, frustrated and envious ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Short Story
A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest types of literature and has existed in the form of legends, mythic tales, folk tales, fairy tales, tall tales, fables and anecdotes in various ancient communities around the world. The modern short story developed in the early 19th century. Definition The short story is a crafted form in its own right. Short stories make use of plot, resonance, and other dynamic components as in a novel, but typically to a lesser degree. While the short story is largely distinct from the novel or novella/short novel, authors generally draw from a common pool of literary techniques. The short story is sometimes referred to as a genre. Determining what exactly defines a short story has been recurrently problematic. A classic definition of a short story ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Erskine Caldwell
Erskine Preston Caldwell (December 17, 1903 – April 11, 1987) was an American novelist and short story writer. His writings about poverty, racism and social problems in his native Southern United States, in novels such as '' Tobacco Road'' (1932) and ''God's Little Acre'' (1933) won him critical acclaim. Early years Caldwell was born on December 17, 1903, in the small town of White Oak, Coweta County, Georgia. He was the only child of Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church minister Ira Sylvester Caldwell and his wife Caroline Preston (née Bell) Caldwell, a schoolteacher. Rev. Caldwell's ministry required moving the family often, to places including Florida, Virginia, Tennessee, South Carolina and North Carolina. When he was 15 years old, his family settled in Wrens, Georgia. His mother Caroline was from Virginia. Her ancestry included English nobility which held large land grants in eastern Virginia. Both her English ancestors and Scots-Irish ancestors fought in the Ame ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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We Are The Living
''We Are the Living'' is a 1933 collection of short stories by Erskine Caldwell, comprising some of his earlier works. Background Viking Press published the collection in September 1933. 16 of its 20 stories were previously published in various magazines, while four -- "The Medicine Man," "Meddlesome Jack," "The Grass Fire," and "A Woman in the House" -- were new. Some stories in the collection are humorous or satirical, while others are lyrical, romantic and/or tragic. Several of them are laid against the background of the lives of ordinary people in the contemporary US South, the social milieu most familiar to the author; some are specifically located in his home state of Georgia. Contents The stories in the book include: * " Warm River" * " We Are Looking at You, Agnes" * " The People's Choice" * "Indian Summer" * "Rachel" * " The Medicine Man" * " Picking Cotton" * " Meddlesome Jack" * " The Picture" * " Yellow Girl" * " August Afternoon" * " Mama's Little Girl" * " The Fi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Panacea
In Greek mythology, Panacea (Greek ''Πανάκεια'', Panakeia), a goddess of universal remedy, was the daughter of Asclepius and Epione. Panacea and her four sisters each performed a facet of Apollo's art: * Panacea (the goddess of universal health) * Hygieia ("Hygiene", the goddess/personification of health, cleanliness, and sanitation) * Iaso (the goddess of recuperation from illness) * Aceso (the goddess of the healing process) * Aglæa/Ægle (the goddess of beauty, splendor, glory, magnificence, and adornment) Panacea also had four brothers: * Podaleirus, one of the two kings of Tricca, who was skilled in diagnostics * Machaon, the other king of Tricca, who was a master surgeon (these two took part in the Trojan War until Machaon was killed by Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons) * Telesphoros, who devoted his life to serving Asclepius * Aratus, Panacea's half-brother, a Greek hero and the patron/liberator of Sicyon However, portrayals of the family were not always c ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Badger Game
The badger game is an extortion scheme or confidence trick in which the victims are tricked into compromising positions in order to make them vulnerable to blackmail. Its name is derived from the practice of badger baiting. The trick was particularly effective in the 19th and earlier 20th century when social attitudes toward adultery were much harsher. A famous person known to have fallen victim of the scheme was the first United States Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, whose adulterous affair with Maria Reynolds was used by her husband to extort money and information from him. The badger game has been featured as a plot device in numerous books, movies and television shows. Description In its simplest form, the badger game proceeds thus: A married man begins an extramarital affair. Another man, posing as the other woman's husband or brother, then "discovers" the affair; he then demands money from the man to keep the affair secret. Unknown to the man having the af ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Patent Medicine
A patent medicine, sometimes called a proprietary medicine, is an over-the-counter (nonprescription) medicine or medicinal preparation that is typically protected and advertised by a trademark and trade name (and sometimes a patent) and claimed to be effective against minor disorders and symptoms. Its contents are typically incompletely disclosed. Antiseptics, analgesics, some sedatives, laxatives, and antacids, cold and cough medicines, and various skin preparations are included in the group. The safety and effectiveness of patent medicines and their sale is controlled and regulated by the Food and Drug Administration in the United States and corresponding authorities in other countries.https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/patent%20medicine The term is sometimes still used to describe quack remedies of unproven effectiveness and questionable safety sold especially by peddlers in past centuries, who often also called them elixirs, tonics, or liniments. Current examples o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1933 Short Stories
Events January * January 11 – Sir Charles Kingsford Smith makes the first commercial flight between Australia and New Zealand. * January 17 – The United States Congress votes in favour of Philippines independence, against the wishes of U.S. President Herbert Hoover. * January 28 – "Pakistan Declaration": Choudhry Rahmat Ali publishes (in Cambridge, UK) a pamphlet entitled ''Now or Never; Are We to Live or Perish Forever?'', in which he calls for the creation of a Muslim state in northwest India that he calls " Pakstan"; this influences the Pakistan Movement. * January 30 ** National Socialist German Workers Party leader Adolf Hitler is appointed Chancellor of Germany by President of Germany Paul von Hindenburg. ** Édouard Daladier forms a government in France in succession to Joseph Paul-Boncour. He is succeeded on October 26 by Albert Sarraut and on November 26 by Camille Chautemps. February * February 1 – Adolf Hitler gives his "Proclamation to the Germ ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |