The Best Short Stories of 1917, and the Yearbook of the American Short Story

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Edward Joseph Harrington O'Brien. The Best Short Stories of 1917, and the Yearbook of the American Short Story

INTRODUCTION

THE BEST SHORT STORIES OF 1917

THE EXCURSION1

ONNIE2

A CUP OF TEA3

LONELY PLACES4

BOYS WILL BE BOYS5

LAUGHTER6

THE EMPEROR OF ELAM7

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

THE GAY OLD DOG8

THE KNIGHT'S MOVE9

I

II

III

IV

A JURY OF HER PEERS10

THE BUNKER MOUSE11

RAINBOW PETE12

GET READY THE WREATHS13

THE STRANGE-LOOKING MAN14

THE CALLER IN THE NIGHT15

THE INTERVAL16

"A CERTAIN RICH MAN–"17

THE PATH OF GLORY18

II

III

IV

V

CHING, CHING, CHINAMAN19

NONE SO BLIND20

THE YEARBOOK OF THE AMERICAN SHORT STORY FOR 1917. ADDRESSES OF AMERICAN MAGAZINES PUBLISHING SHORT STORIES

THE BIOGRAPHICAL ROLL OF HONOR OF AMERICAN SHORT STORIES FOR 1917

THE ROLL OF HONOR OF FOREIGN SHORT STORIES IN AMERICAN MAGAZINES FOR 1917

THE BEST BOOKS OF SHORT STORIES OF 1917: A CRITICAL ANALYSIS

VOLUMES OF SHORT STORIES PUBLISHED DURING 1917

THE BEST SIXTY-THREE AMERICAN SHORT STORIES OF 1917

MAGAZINE AVERAGES FOR 1917

INDEX OF SHORT STORIES FOR 1917

Отрывок из книги

A year ago, in the introduction to "The Best Short Stories of 1916," I pointed out that the American short story cannot be reduced to a literary formula, because the art in which it finds its concrete embodiment is a growing art. The critic, when he approaches American literature, cannot regard it as he can regard any foreign literature. Setting aside the question of whether our cosmopolitan population, with its widely different kinds of racial heritage, is at an advantage or a disadvantage because of its conflicting traditions, we must accept the variety in substance and attempt to find in it a new kind of national unity, hitherto unknown in the history of the world. The message voiced in President Wilson's words on several occasions during the past year is a true reflection of the message implicit in American literature. Various in substance, it finds its unity in the new freedom of democracy, and English and French, German and Slav, Italian and Scandinavian bring to the common melting-pot ideals which are fused in a national unity of democratic utterance.

It is inevitable, therefore, that in this stage of our national literary development, our newly conscious speech lacks the sophisticated technique of older literatures. But, perhaps because of this very limitation, it is much more alert to the variety and life of the human substance with which it deals. It does not take the whole of life for granted and it often reveals the fresh naïveté of childhood in its discovery of life. When its sophistication is complete, it is the sophistication of English rather than of American literature, and is derivative rather than original, for the most part, in its criticism of life. I would specifically except, however, from this criticism the work of three writers, at least, whose sophistication is the embodiment of a new American technique. Katharine Fullerton Gerould, Wilbur Daniel Steele, and H. G. Dwight have each attained a distinction in our contemporary literature which places them at the head of their craft.

.....

Mrs. Tinneray, jaw set, eyes rolling, was able to intimate that she needed no lemon, but she drew her husband mysteriously aside. She fixed him with a foreboding glare, she said it was a wonder the Lord didn't sink the boat! Then she rapidly sketched the tragedy—Mrs. Tuttle serene and pampered on the deck, and Hetty Cronney desolate on the wharf! She pronounced verdict.

"It's terrible—that's what it is!"

.....