The Longman Masters of Short Fiction [Paperback]

Dana Gioia (Author), R. S. Gwynn (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0321089006 | ISBN-13: 978-0321089007 | Publication Date: December 16, 2001 | Edition: 1

Providing a survey of the short story in-depth, the anthology encompasses a rich global and historical mix of the masterpieces of short fiction and presents them in a way readers find accessible, engaging, and relevant. "Author Perspectives" -- short lively statements from 52 authors that discuss the writing process and refer to specific stories in the anthology. This unique feature provides readers with critical reflections and insight into the stories they are reading. "Critical Approaches to Fiction" -- introduces readers to 10 leading schools of critical theory in an accessible way. The Glossary of Literary Terms is the most complete glossary in a short fiction book on the market. For those interested in the short fiction genre.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Providing a survey of the short story in-depth, the anthology encompasses a rich global and historical mix of the masterpieces of short fiction and presents them in a way readers find accessible, engaging, and relevant. "Author Perspectives" -- short lively statements from 52 authors that discuss the writing process and refer to specific stories in the anthology. This unique feature provides readers with critical reflections and insight into the stories they are reading. "Critical Approaches to Fiction" -- introduces readers to 10 leading schools of critical theory in an accessible way. The Glossary of Literary Terms is the most complete glossary in a short fiction book on the market. For those interested in the short fiction genre.

About the Author

Dana Gioia is a poet, critic, and teacher. Born in Los Angeles, he attended Stanford and Harvard before taking a detour into business. ("Not many poets have a Stanford M.B.A., thank goodness!") After years of writing and reading late in the evenings after work, he quit a vice presidency to write and teach. He has published three collections of poetry: Daily Horoscope (1986); The Gods of Winter (1991); Interrogations at Noon (2001), winner of the 2001 American Book Award; an opera libretto, Nosferatu (2002); several anthologies; and an influential study of poetry¿s place in contemporary America, Can Poetry Matter? (1992). Gioia has taught at Johns Hopkins, Sarah Lawrence, Wesleyan (Connecticut), Mercer, and Colorado College. He is also the co-founder of the summer poetry conference at West Chester University in Pennsylvania and a frequent commentator on literature for the British Broadcasting Corporation. He currently lives in Santa Rosa, California, with his wife, Mary, two sons, and an ever growing number of cats.

(The surname Gioia is pronounced JOY-A. As some of you may have already guessed, gioia is the Italian word for joy.)

Product Details

• Paperback: 944 pages
• Publisher: Longman; 1 edition (December 16, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0321089006
• ISBN-13: 978-0321089007
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #593,685 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Collection Covers Major Themes, June 8, 2002

By 

M. JEFFREY MCMAHON "herculodge" (Torrance, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Longman Masters of Short Fiction (Paperback)

This book has a great collection of stories and profound themes. One way to use this book is to pair up the stories. For example, one can look at "The Misfit's Misguided Quest for Love" by studying "Bartleby" by Melville and "The Overcoat" by Gogol.

Another good pairing is to study "Lost Love and Alcohol" by looking at "Babylon Revisted" by Fitzgerald and "The Swimmer" by John Cheever. In both stories the characters lose free will as their self-destructiveness reaches a point of no return.

The power of empathy to remove blindness can be found by looking at Raymond Carver's "A Small, Good Thing" and "Cathedral." Another great story about the power of empathy is Richard Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues."

Also take a look at "Gimpel the Fool" by Singer and Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" to study the love and widsom of fools.

The dangers of intellectual pride are dramatized in Flanner O'Conner's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" and Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown."

Yet another fine pairing can be found by studying the conflict between romantic, personal love and public responsibility in Chekhov's "The Lady with the Dog" and John Updike's "Separating."

One of my favorite pairings is to study "The Love of the Tribe over the Love of Humanity" by studying "Those Who Walked Away from Omelas" and "The Lottery."

There are even far more stories than the ones I've mentioned. But these pairings give you an idea of how many themes you can study in a collection as rich as this one.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect choice for Intro to Lit. Class, December 27, 2010

By 

Julia Reineman (LA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Longman Masters of Short Fiction (Paperback)

I chose this text from a variety of anthologies for an introductory class. It has a good selection of short story masters (including Kafka, Borges, and others in translation), but the main selling points for me were the section explaining the Elements of Short fiction (plot, characterization, etc.); the explanation of various Critical Approaches to Literature (complete with a short example essay specific to stories in the text), and after each story, there is an "Author's Perspective", sometimes related directly to the story just read, or about writing in general. Overall, an exceptional text for teaching.