Perspectives

This part of the study guide will help you with some points about current issues, literary period, and similar stories. These aspects will give you a broader perspective on “Clara’s Day” by Penelope Live…

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Current issues

“Clara’s Day” was written in 1986, over 30 years ago. However, the issues the stories touches upon are still relevant today. Parental neglect, teenage transformation, and teacher-student relationships are timeless topics.

Reflect, for example, that while social services can prevent or stop some forms of parental neglect or child abuse, parenta…

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Literary period

The short story is a postmodernist piece of fiction. Postmodernism includes a variety of different works and styles. However, postmodernist texts also have some common themes and characteristics.

A typical postmodernist feature of “Clara’s Day” is the fact that the story has rel…

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Works by the same author

If you want to get more familiar with Penelope Lively’s style of writing, we encourage you to also read her short story “The Happiest Days of Your Life” .

The story follows a young boy who goes to visit a prospective school with his parents. As the boy is le…

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Works with the same theme

In your analysis of “Clara’s Day”, you might also want to compare it to the short stories “Mid-Air” by Jennifer Allot, “Annie's Story” by Elisabeth Russell Taylor, and  “Son of Satan” by Charles Bukowski.

The story “Mid-Air” is similar to “Clara’s Day” because it also shows how divorce affects children. Not having a father makes Clara pay more attention to men and crave her mother’s attention. In “Mid-Air”, the protagonist is a small boy whose parents are divorced and who struggles to accept this new situation while he and his sister are out on a weekend wi…