The girl from Samarcand

"The Girl from Samarcand" by E. Hoffmann Price is a captivating short story that mixes fantasy and romance from the early 1900s. It tells the tale of a man's strange bond with an enchanted rug from Samarcand, digging into the ideas of love, desire, and otherworldly events. The story's tone is filled with rich, exotic pictures and the fascination of the East, mirroring the desire to escape reality that was common in writings from that time. Hammersmith Clarke, a big fan of beautiful rugs, especially one that contains a link to his past and a stunning Yellow Girl woven into it, is the main character of the story. As Clarke becomes more obsessed with the rug, his relationship with his wife, Diane, gets worse, leading to stress and a conflict over the rug's hold on him. In the end, the rug turns into a magical door to Clarke's past, where he meets the Yellow Girl, his lost love, turning the story into a sad look at memory and the human need to bring back lost ties. The story concludes questioning the lines between the real and unreal and the giving up made for love.