Hunters in the Snow

A short story from Tobias Wolff’s first collection, In the Garden of the North American Martyrs (1981) — issued in Britain the following year as a book under this story’s title. Three friends go deer hunting outside Spokane; one shoots another, and the drive to the hospital becomes the story, as the two uninjured men stop for coffee, trade confessions, and take a wrong turn while the wounded man lies in the truck bed. It is taught as a model of how cruelty, comedy and sympathy can occupy the same sentences, and of how much plot a writer can carry in dialogue alone.

Why it’s on the list: Assigned in UATX’s “Writing and the English Language” course, next to Richard Wright, Flannery O’Connor and Toni Morrison — the syllabus is short prose read by writers for craft, and Wolff is the contemporary American entry in it.

Where I saw it: The University of Austin’s Fall 2025 reading list, 65 Texts Our Students Are Reading, published November 13 2025 and saved to Kyle’s “Books To Read” Apple Note. The full 65-text curriculum is transcribed on UATX Fall Reading List.

Connections

• UATX Fall Reading List — the curriculum this is assigned in.
• Storytelling — the story is assigned as a demonstration of technique.
• Literature — part of the canon this list is built around.