
The Edinburgh Companion to the Short Story in English
Edinburgh University Press
Published on 28. February 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
400 pages
978-1-3995-4677-5 (ISBN)
Description
New scholarly essays on the short story in English as a phenomenon of world literature
This collection explores the history and development of the anglophone short story since the beginning of the nineteenth century. Ranging across texts from different parts of the English-speaking world, it studies the form in its many guises and venues of publication. Why have writers of so many nationalities and dispositions found the short story amenable to experimentation and discovery? What is the history and origin of the modern short story, and what has been the role of the publishing business, of academic criticism, of the Creative Writing 'industry', and of the digital revolution in shaping and disseminating it over the past two centuries? This collection of innovative essays by new and established scholars explores these and other questions, addressing stories from around the world, and considering their relationship to place, identity, history and genre.
Key Features
New critical perspectives on the English-language short story by established scholars and new voicesProvides an international perspective on the formShowcases a wide range of critical approaches and perspectives, including Book History, genre criticism, postcolonial theory, queer studies, feminist criticism, war writing, disability studies, Creative Writing, and ecocriticism
This collection explores the history and development of the anglophone short story since the beginning of the nineteenth century. Ranging across texts from different parts of the English-speaking world, it studies the form in its many guises and venues of publication. Why have writers of so many nationalities and dispositions found the short story amenable to experimentation and discovery? What is the history and origin of the modern short story, and what has been the role of the publishing business, of academic criticism, of the Creative Writing 'industry', and of the digital revolution in shaping and disseminating it over the past two centuries? This collection of innovative essays by new and established scholars explores these and other questions, addressing stories from around the world, and considering their relationship to place, identity, history and genre.
Key Features
New critical perspectives on the English-language short story by established scholars and new voicesProvides an international perspective on the formShowcases a wide range of critical approaches and perspectives, including Book History, genre criticism, postcolonial theory, queer studies, feminist criticism, war writing, disability studies, Creative Writing, and ecocriticism
Reviews / Votes
This collection brilliantly reconciles the traditional text/context divide in short story criticism, showcasing a wide variety of approaches to a wide variety of material. You will find Edgar Allan Poe, D.H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf here, but also Jhumpa Lahiri, Sam Selvon and Benjamin Franklin; anthologies and little magazines, but also short-shorts and Kindle Singles; genre and institutional history, but also eco-criticism and disability studies. This rich and diverse collection of essays will be essential reading for anyone interested in the English-language short story. * Kasia Boddy, University of Cambridge *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Edinburgh
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 173 mm
Width: 224 mm
Thickness: 28 mm
Weight
638 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-3995-4677-5 (9781399546775)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Paul Delaney is Associate Professor in the School of English, Trinity College Dublin. He is author of Sean O'Faolain: Literature, Inheritance and the 1930s (2014), and editor of Reading Colm Toibin (2008) and William Trevor: Revaluations, with Michael Parker (2013). Adrian Hunter is Senior Lecturer in English Studies at the University of Stirling. He is author of The Cambridge Introduction to the Short Story in English (2007), and of several articles and chapters on British and North American short fiction. He is currently editing a volume of James Hogg's contributions to international periodicals for the definitive Stirling/South Carolina Research Edition of Hogg's work, also published by Edinburgh University Press.
Editor
Assistant Professor of EnglishTrinity College Dublin
University of Stirling
Content
Acknowledgments
Notes on Contributors
Introduction
Paul Delaney & Adrian Hunter
Part 1: Historicising the Short Story
Transnationalism and the Transatlantic Short Story
Michael J. Collins
The Short Story and the Professionalisation of English Studies
Adrian Hunter
Impressionism and the Short Story
Paul March-Russell
Writers on the Short Story: 1950-present
Ailsa Cox
Part 2: Publishing the Short Story
The Short Story and the 'Little Magazine'
Beryl Pong
Collections, Cycles, and Sequences
Jennifer J. Smith
The Short Story Anthology
Elke D'hoker
The Short Story and Digital Media
Laura Dietz
Part 3: Forms of the Short Story
Short-Short Fiction
Michael Basseler
The Weird Tale
Timothy Jones
The Horror Story
Darryl Jones
Experimental Short Stories
Jeremy Scott
The War Story
Adam Piette
Part 4: Placing the Short Story
Regionalism and the Short Story
Lucy Evans
The Short Story and the City
Philip Coleman
The Short Story in Suburbia
Joanna Price
The Short Story and the Environment
Deborah Lilley & Sam Solnick
Part 5: Identity and the Short Story
Gender and Genre in the Short Story
Ruth Robbins
Diaspora and the Short Story
Sam Naidu
The Queer Short Story
Brett Josef Grubisic
Disability and the Short Story
Alice Hall
?
Index
Notes on Contributors
Introduction
Paul Delaney & Adrian Hunter
Part 1: Historicising the Short Story
Transnationalism and the Transatlantic Short Story
Michael J. Collins
The Short Story and the Professionalisation of English Studies
Adrian Hunter
Impressionism and the Short Story
Paul March-Russell
Writers on the Short Story: 1950-present
Ailsa Cox
Part 2: Publishing the Short Story
The Short Story and the 'Little Magazine'
Beryl Pong
Collections, Cycles, and Sequences
Jennifer J. Smith
The Short Story Anthology
Elke D'hoker
The Short Story and Digital Media
Laura Dietz
Part 3: Forms of the Short Story
Short-Short Fiction
Michael Basseler
The Weird Tale
Timothy Jones
The Horror Story
Darryl Jones
Experimental Short Stories
Jeremy Scott
The War Story
Adam Piette
Part 4: Placing the Short Story
Regionalism and the Short Story
Lucy Evans
The Short Story and the City
Philip Coleman
The Short Story in Suburbia
Joanna Price
The Short Story and the Environment
Deborah Lilley & Sam Solnick
Part 5: Identity and the Short Story
Gender and Genre in the Short Story
Ruth Robbins
Diaspora and the Short Story
Sam Naidu
The Queer Short Story
Brett Josef Grubisic
Disability and the Short Story
Alice Hall
?
Index