Short Stories About Family: 10 Classics Explained
Quick answer: Ten classic short stories about family, from The Metamorphosis and The Judgment to The Revolt of Mother and Bade Bhai Sahab, summarised and compared for readers and writers.
Family stories are the ones readers recognise before the second page, because every house has the same rooms: the one where decisions are announced, the one where someone is not spoken to, the one a child is sent to. The writers here knew that a family is a set of arrangements, and that the story begins when one arrangement breaks.
The order starts with parents and children in open conflict, moves to siblings, and ends with families who fail each other quietly, on a boat or in a railway station. Each title links to a page that summarises the story and explains its ending.
The stories
The Revolt of Mother by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman. Sarah Penn has waited forty years for the new house her husband promised, and watches him build a second barn instead. While he is away buying a horse she moves the family, furniture and all, into the barn.
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka. Gregor Samsa wakes as an enormous insect and his family, whom he has supported for years, must decide what he now is. His sister Grete feeds him; his father drives him back with apples, one of which lodges in his back.
The Judgment by Franz Kafka. Georg Bendemann writes to an old friend in Petersburg about his engagement, then goes to tell his bedridden father. The father rises in the bed and passes a sentence Georg carries out at once.
The Rocking-Horse Winner by D. H. Lawrence. In a house that whispers that there must be more money, young Paul rides his rocking horse into a trance until it tells him which real horse will win. He wins thousands for his mother and she stays unsatisfied.
The Home-coming by Rabindranath Tagore. Phatik, a village boy too wild for his mother, is taken to Calcutta by an uncle whose wife does not want him. He runs away in a fever, is brought back, and dies asking whether the holidays have come.
Bade Bhai Sahab by Premchand. A younger brother keeps passing his exams while playing all day, and his elder brother keeps failing while lecturing him about discipline. The final scene has the elder brother chasing a kite string.
My Uncle Jules by Guy de Maupassant. A Le Havre family lives on the promise that Uncle Jules will come back rich from America. On a boat to Jersey the father recognises the ragged oyster-seller, and the family spends the crossing avoiding him.
The Egg by Sherwood Anderson. A father gives up a failed chicken farm to run a restaurant, and one night tries to entertain a customer with egg tricks. The eggs will not cooperate, and the son watches him weep.
The Stationmaster by Alexander Pushkin. Samson Vyrin's daughter Dunya rides off with a passing hussar, and the old man walks to Petersburg to find her. He is thrown out of the officer's rooms; years later a lady in a fine carriage visits a grave.
The Daughters of the Late Colonel by Katherine Mansfield. Two middle-aged sisters, freed by their father's death, cannot decide about his watch, his wardrobe or the maid. Sunlight moves across a Buddha on the mantelpiece while they try to remember what they meant to say.
Reading them together
The collection's argument is that families are governed by unspoken contracts, and the story is what happens when someone reads the contract aloud. Sarah Penn reads hers with a wagon; Georg's father reads his from a bed; Phatik never gets to read his at all. Kafka's two stories are the extreme case, where the family's judgement becomes physical, while Anderson and Premchand show fathers and brothers failing in ways the child will spend a lifetime forgiving.
Set The Rocking-Horse Winner beside The Home-coming. Both children die to satisfy an adult's want, and in both the adult is a mother who cannot quite love the child in front of her.
If you want to write about family
What writers can take from this
- Start with Bade Bhai Sahab or My Uncle Jules; both are short and comic on the surface, which makes the hurt underneath easier to hear.
- Read The Judgment and The Metamorphosis together; Kafka wrote them within months of each other and they share a father.
- In The Revolt of Mother, mark the exact sentence where Sarah decides, and notice how little she says afterwards.
- Tagore's The Home-coming pairs with Lawrence's Rocking-Horse Winner for a hard lesson on how not to write a child's death sentimentally.
- Pushkin's story is often read for its picture of a father; read it once from Dunya's side.
Try it yourself
Write a story in which a family member returns after years away and the family, gathered in one room, decides without saying so who will speak first.
Questions
What is the best short story about family?
The Metamorphosis is the most discussed, though it is long. Among shorter classics, The Revolt of Mother and The Rocking-Horse Winner are the ones anthologists return to.
Which short stories about family are good for students?
Bade Bhai Sahab, The Home-coming, My Uncle Jules and The Egg are short and clear and give students a child's point of view to argue with. The Revolt of Mother suits discussions of gender and property.
Which classic family story is the shortest?
The Egg and My Uncle Jules are each around three thousand words. The Judgment is a little longer but reads in one sitting.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working writers. Updated September 2026.
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