'Weekend' is a short story by the author Fay Weldon, and published by Penguin in 'Modern British Short Stories'. It originally appeared in 'Cosmopolitan' magazine in 1978.

About this BritLit Kit
'Weekend' concerns a middle class family from London with three children spending a weekend in their country cottage. Although the story deals with one particular weekend, in many ways it could be any weekend - what we are shown is a glimpse into the ordinary, the habitual, the norm; it appears that the family spend virtually every weekend at the cottage. The story examines the relationship between husband and wife Martin and Martha, and between Martha and Martin's friends as well as taking a tongue-in-cheek glance at what 'properly brought up' children are expected to be involved in.

The themes that can be drawn from this 5,000 word story include 'the Family', 'Personal relations' and aspects of sexism or sexist behaviour. Please note, the story is concerned with adult themes and may not be suitable for younger children.

This kit has been rewritten from the original 2003 version, which was much longer. This editing process has been the result of a continuing trend for shorter kits. Most of the original material which has been excluded from this version is still available in the ‘Supplementary Materials' file which can be accessed from the main BritLit page.

The materials in this BritLit Kit are avialable to download in the Attachments box below. To download pdf files and audio, right click on the file and save to your computer.

You can also listen to the audio from the kit streamed here on the site:

How to use this BritLit kit
In Weeken Pre-reading (pdf), as the title suggests, there are activities to prepare the student for reading. As the text has some culturally specific elements that require some explanation, various quotes from the text are used to introduce the reader to the two main characters. The activity then goes on to elicit a guided prediction of what the story might be about.

After Weekend Text (pdf) has been read - or the Weekend Audio (mp3) listened to - there are some activities in Weekend Context (pdf) which further explore the themes of relationships and attitudes concerning men and women, including an ‘Are You Sexist?' questionnaire. The story contains a lot of dialogue and as is usual in dialogue between English speaking people, phrasal verbs are common. An activity is introduced in the Weekend Wordwork (pdf) section to help students with this, and could be used before the story is read, or as homework. You can find answers to the different activities in Weekend Key (pdf).

You may download the audio and copy it to cassette, CD or other medium for personal and classroom use only. You may not distribute the audio or make it available to any other website or publisher. If you have any questions about permitted use of the audio, please write to: teachingenglish@britishcouncil.org

Written by Fay Weldon