Welcome back to 1001 classic short stories and tales.

Today's story, The Lady or the Tiger, is a much anthologized short story written by Frank Stockton for publication in the magazine, The Century, in 1882.

The expression, The Lady or the Tiger, has entered the English language as an allegorical expression,

a shorthand indication or signifier, for a problem that is unsolvable.

The story takes place in a land ruled by a barbaric king with a knack for inventive trials,

with guilt or innocence decided by chance in a public arena.

A person accused of a crime is brought into the arena as they did in Rome and must choose one of two

doors. Behind one door is a lady whom the king has deemed an appropriate match for the accused.

Behind the other is a fierce, hungry tiger.

Both doors are heavily sound-proofed to prevent the accused from hearing what is behind each one.

If he chooses the door with a lady behind it, he is innocent and must immediately marry her.

But if he chooses the door with the tiger behind it, he is deemed guilty and is immediately attacked by it. The king learns that

his daughter has a lover, a handsome and brave youth who is of lower status than the princess,

and has him imprisoned to await trial. By the time that day comes,

the princess has used her influence to learn the positions of the lady and the tiger behind the two

doors. She has also discovered that the lady is someone whom she hates, thinking her to be a rival

for the affections of the accused.

When the action takes place and he looks to the princess for help,

she discreetly indicates the door on his right, which he opens.

The rest, I'll leave up to the story.

And now, The Lady or the Tiger, by Frank Stockton.

In the very old in time, there lived a semi-baric king, whose ideas, though somewhat polished and sharpened by the progressiveness of distant Latin neighbors, were still large, florid, and untrammeled,

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