Elementals was Byatt’s third collection of short stories to be published. It followed Sugar and Other Stories (1987), the Matisse Stories (1993), the Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye: Five Fairy Stories (1994), and preceded the Little Black Book of Stories which appeared in 2003.
Elementals contains six short stories and mixes the fantastic with the realistic in one volume, sometimes in the same story. “Crocodile Tears” starts the volume and features an apparently ordinary middle aged couple, Patricia and Tony Nimmo, who spend their weekends in art galleries. On the occasion recounted they have an unnecessary and unimportant argument over an installation, which …
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