A short
story, as described by Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49), is a prose narrative
of indeterminate length requiring anything from half an hour to one or
two hours to peruse, and is a story that concentrates on a unique or
single effect and one in which the totality of effect is the main
objective.
Over time the form has shown itself to be so flexible and susceptible of
so much variety that its possibilities seem almost endless. For
example, it may be concerned with a scene, an episode, an experience, an
action, the exhibition of a character or characters, the day's events, a
meeting, a conversation, a fantasy or anything else that is an event in
the mind of the writer.
When it comes to classification this is one of the most elusive forms.
How long (or short) is a short story? If we take the novella as a
'middle-distance' book/story, then the short story comes into the
100/200 metre class. A short story could have anything from about 1,600
words to 20, 000 words, but the vast majority fall somewhere between the
two.
Historically, we find many inset
stories or digressions in Classical literature which amount to short
stories. In the Bible the accounts of Cain and Abel, the Prodigal Son,
Ruth, Judith and Suzannah are all short stories. The forefathers of the
short story are myth, legend, parable, fairy tale, fable, anecdote,
exemplum, essay, character study and even the ballad. The yarn, the
sketch, the tale and the Russian 'skaz' are all short stories.
In the second half of the 18th century
the short story was being developed and established in Britain, partly
as a result of the popularity of the oriental tale and also the Gothic
novel. This new kind of the horror story was becoming increasing popular
and by the end of the 18th c. the German 'novella' was firmly
established as a term and genre of fiction, a trend which also saw the
'short story' evolve into a highly organized literary form. The
popularity of the genre at this stage was mainly due to ghost stories
dealing with the supernatural. In the English-speaking world two of the
most important pioneers were Sir Walter Scott (1771 - 1832) and the
Americans Washington Irving (1783 - 1859) and Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804 -
64).
The realistic short story became
highly developed in Russia. Alexander Pushkin was among the first to
exploit it in the 1830s with The Tales of Belkin (1830), the Queen of
Spade (1834) and The Captain's Daughter (1836). Gogol's stories were
published during the same period. He wrote about everyday things and
events and ordinary peoples. Among his most famous works are Nevsky
Prospekt (1835), Notes of a Madman (19=835), The Portrait (1835), and
Nose (1836) and The Overcoat (1842). Chekhov, who was to have a profound
an universal influence on the short story, published several
collections, including Motley Stories (1886) and In the Twilight (1888).
In France the short story was established in 1829-31 with the
publication of a dozen 'contes' by Prosper Merimee, Balzac and Gautier.
The outstanding French writer of short stories in the 19th c. was
unquestionably Guy de Maupassant, among whose main collections were La
Maison Tellier (1881), Mademoiselle Fifi (1882) and Yvette (1885).
Chekhov and Maupassant are generally accounted the masters of the genre
in this period. Their combined influence has been immeasurable.
By the middle of the 19th c. the ghost story and the horror story were
very well established. Many hundreds of short stories during the second
half of the century were one or the other, or both combined. There were
also hundreds of short stories with supernatural or supranormal themes;
often tales of suspense and mystery. This popularity was to continue in
the 20th century and beyond.
In America, during the second half of
the 19th c., eight writers made a considerable name for themselves in
the short story form: Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Bret Harte, Ambrose
Bierce, O. Henry, Stephen Crane, Jack London and Sherwood Anderson.Herman Melville's three most famous are Brtleby the Scrivener, Benito
Cereno and The Encantadas. These were published in his collection The
Piazza Tales (1856).
Twain's main collection is The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calveras
County and Other Sketches (1867). This is an example of the tall tale or
tall story, a kind of fiction which was popular in America in the 19th
century.
Francis Bret Harte was a prolific writer of short stories and helped to
popularize the Western. One of his best collections is The Luck of
Roaring Camp and Other Sketches (1870).
Ambrose Bierce is still well remembered for his collection Tales of Soldiers and Civilians (1891).
Stephen Crane published two distinguished collections - The open Boat
and Other Tales of Adventure (1898) and The Monster and Other Stories
(1899).
O. Henry, especially, was very prolific and, like many of his here
mentioned contemporaries, wrote tight, well-crafted stories, almost
slick in their adroit contrivance, and was a master of the surprise
ending or 'twist in the tail'. Among his main collections are Cabbage
and Kings (1904), The Four Million (1906), The Trimmed Lamp (1907), and
The Road of Destiny (1909).
Jack London was equally prolific. Two of his main collections are The
Son of the Wolf (1900) and Tales of the Far North (1900). His Two
Thousand Dozen is one of the best of all tall stories.
Sherwood Anderson's collections include The Triumph of the Egg (1921) and Horses and Men (1923).
