Читать книгу The Selected Works of Arnold Bennett: Essays, Personal Development Books & Articles - Arnold Bennett - Страница 57

Much nonsense has been talked about the short story. It has been asserted that Englishmen cannot write artistic short stories, that the short story does not come naturally to the Anglo-Saxon. Whereas the truth is that nearly all the finest short-story writers in the world to-day are Englishmen, and some of the most wonderful short stories ever written have been written by Englishmen within the last twenty years. It has also been stated that the short-story form is exceedingly difficult, and that “the art of the short story” is an art by itself. This is not so. No one has yet shown wherein the art of the short story differs from the art of the novel. And there can be no doubt in the mind of any expert who has succeeded equally well in the short story and the novel that a short story is a simpler achievement than a novel. It may be easier to write a bad novel than a good short story, but it is manifestly absurd to argue that a good novel is easier to accomplish than a good short story. One might as usefully assert, in the art of music, that it was easier to compose a symphony than an “album-leaf,” because in the symphony there was no restriction of space. Similar powers of observation, invention, imagination, and description are needed in the novel and in the short story. But the constructive power and the sustained strength required for a good novel far exceed those required for a good short story. The short story is the simplest form of fiction, and the shorter it is the simpler it is. The beginner should therefore begin with very short stories.