Well, I continue to hear that the short story is dead. Can this be true? I believe that readers often don't select short stories because they conjecture that they are too short, not complete and don't have much substance. To this I would say: wrong, wrong, wrong. Of course, this is my (strong) opinion, but I would say if we each go out and check out short story collections and anthologies, we can give new life to this suffering breed of fiction - take a walk on a (good) short story side and you will find that - for the most part - they are surprisingly well-constructed: very briskly paced, challenging yet compact and overall, clever compelling and concise.
I love good short stories so I would like to take this time to introduce or familiarize readers with twelve terrific short story authors including the following: Don Chaon; Amanda Davis; Anthony Doerr; Ryan Harty; Stephen King; Jhumpa Lahiri; Steven Millhauser; Lorrie Moore; Alice Munro (practically the QUEEN of this form); Julie Orringer; Annie Proulx and Eric Puchner.
Don Chaon's Among the Missing, a splendid collection of tales in which the past haunts the future- this collection is riveting, puzzling and filled with wonder; Amanda Davis, who tragically perished in a plane accident near age 30 in 2003, focuses on the lives of (chiefly) female characters in the dark, lyrical, ferocious yet playful studies of vulnerability in her amazing Circling the Drain.
Anthony Doerr's The Shell Collector is complex and powerful in its depiction of the natural world and how its beauty and power move our lives; Ryan Harty, who happens to be married to Julie Orringer, another writer highlighted here, wrote Bring Me Your Saddest Arizona: a stark, subtle unsettling look at the Southwest and its denizens' love and loss.
Stephen King's Night Shift and or Skeleton Crew underline his abilities to remain in tone and theme yet stay simple and to the point - plus not all King is horror!; Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies elegantly, meticulously depicts both East Indians and Indian Americans, who experience culture conflicts and a constant curiousity about the human condition...this April should bring Lahiri's new short story collection!
Steven Millhauser's new collection of short stories, Dangerous Laughter, is a strange and magnetic invitation to his uncanny world of magical realism-this collection and his The Knife Thrower are remarkable in their depiction of amazing other-wordly paradoxes : his finesse in conjuring up the strange, mesmerizing worlds he creates is extraordinarily brilliant and we can see the influence of Poe, Kafka, Borges and Faust; Lorrie Moore has written stories filled with the unsettled of America, in Birds of America and Self-Help - Moore uses her trademark humor and fuels each story with pathos and empathy.
Alice Munro is known as the finest living short story writer-her tales of Ontario, Canada involve characters who confront conflict while adhering to tradition, experiencing the inabiltiy to delay life moving forward as evidenced in The Runaway, Friends of My Youth and Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage ; the incredible Julie Orringer has offered her debut collection How to Breathe Underwater which is a terrific in-depth study of various aged characters desperately trying to sustain viable realtionships.
All of Annie Proulx's bleak but whimsical collections, such as Bad Dirt, Close Range, That Old Ace in the Hole reflect forgotten places at a pace closely aligned with quieter days. And, finally,Eric Puchner's debut collection of short stories, Music through the Floor, highlight a group of cultural misfits attempting to navigate mainstream America - strikingly original, fiercely funny, and quietly heartbreaking.
So . . . please offer your analyses, beliefs, feelings, ideas, impressions, inspirations, investigations, observances, opinions, theories, thoughts and views on what makes a good short story and who some of your favorite short story authors are. Looking forward to you sharing your ideas. Yearning to hear of your choice in yarns and yarn-spinners.
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Hi Ana. You know how much I love short stories. Your writing is so concise and clear. I think it's great you can write such great commentary and criticism. I think you can write anything and I would read it. Please write more, I think you are brilliant and I agree with this short story article.
Like you, I praise the short story. However, I would say that the short story is dead, just not for the reasons commonly listed. People who say that it's because they're too short, well wrong: we have less time to read now anyway! But is it dead? I read all the posts about how it's dead, and pretty much have to agree. Let's dig it up!!
Almost forgot. My own theory, if you want to call it that, is simple. Nobody is asking for stories. Somewhere along the line, they were forgotten. So people look to TV, because they know it's there. They know the internets is there, but not stories. Stories you gotta seek out. Change that, and the story will be back alive!
Ana,
Thank you for spotlighting short stories! I agree with you 100%: most short stories are well-crafted, clever, compelling, and very much worth reading.
Unfortunately, as you say, many people are calling the genre dead. This is a shame. Some of the most haunting, humorous, and/or heart-rending fiction I've read have been short stories—some by the modern masters you mention (especially Millhauser, Munro, Lahiri, and Orringer); others by classic writers (e.g. Faulkner, Hemingway, Chopin, James, Twain, Chekhov, and Poe) whose works, I believe, are still relevant today. Other short story writers I recommend are: Amy Bloom, Elizabeth Berg, Jonathan Nolan, and Richard Bausch.
As to my theories about why people are not reading short stories:
1) Maelynn is right! People do not have much spare time to read these days, either because they are just too busy or because they are using what spare time they have to do other activities instead of reading (not that there’s anything wrong with that).
2) Also, I think that there are people who simply don’t like to read. I think that they are under the impression that if a story is good, it will be adapted into a movie or a TV program, so why bother to read it.
3) And then there are those who like to read, and who make time to read, but who don’t value short stories. I have heard people say things like: “if a story is good, it will be developed into a novel, not limited to a short story.” This line of thinking assumes that a short story is just a rough draft of something bigger and better. But, as you point out, this is wrong—it is more accurate to say that short stories are concise, not limited or underdeveloped.
So, here’s my praise: Quality storytelling has nothing to do with the size of the text. The proof of any piece of fiction’s quality is in the work's ability to inspire, disturb, console, and/or beguile its readers. With short story collections and anthologies you get quality and another bonus: variety. The stories often cover different topics, moods, and characters. If you don't like one story, you can easily turn to another. Plus, you can finish a short story in one sitting—while you wait in the parking lot for your kids to get out of class, or while you wait at the airport for your flight to arrive—how appealing!
I agree, let's not bury the short story--it deserves to be kept alive!
P. S. Thanks for all of your PLOTZ postings. You have well-informed opinions and you cover many interesting topics. I appreciate that the Corona Public Library offers a forum for people to write reviews of books they’ve read and to discuss literary issues. Keep it up!!!!
It is a real shame, for the reasons well articulated by Ana. Mr./Ms. Anonymous made a good point -- the short story used to be a form the greatest American writers would choose (Poe - James - Hemingway !!); while there are fine story writers working today, it's not a form many 'Important' writers believe to be prestigious enough.
One thing I thought of that has contributed to the short-story decline was the gradual purging of short fiction in magazines. Apart from the upmarket New Yorker, Harper's & Atlantic Monthly (in scaled back form), it's nowhere to be found. It's hard to believe the likes of Cosmopolitan, Mademoiselle & Esquire were winning O. Henry Awards decades ago. Mademoiselle published Faulkner, Capote, Bradbury. Harper's Bazaar, Steinbeck & Welty. Playboy takes the international prize with Nabokov, Marquez, Borges & Calvino.
Hard to imagine with the state of today's mass-market magazines (Britney, anyone?). As far as active readers, these things are cyclical -- so who knows. It'd be a shame to further marginalize such an essentially American literary form. Thanks for the recommendations, folks -- I'll have to check out the ones I'm unfamiliar with. A most interesting post.
Great comments. I agree.
Thank you. Thank you.
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