Customer Reviews

Short Shorts

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1 star:		(3)

 

 

"Short Shorts: An Anthology of the Shortest Stories" is edited by Irving Howe and Ilana Wiener Howe. With a copyright date of 1982, this is, I believe, one of the granddaddies of all the short short anthologies. This book brings together 38 stories that range in length from barely 2 to 8 pages. It's truly international in scope, with authors from Russia, Germany, Switzerland, the U.S., Zimbabwe, Guatemala, and other countries. The stories chosen also span the 19th and 20th centuries, and cover a wide range of topics: religion, war, family, crime, magic, death, censorship, and more. A number of Nobel Prize winners are included among the chosen authors.

In the Introduction, Irving Howe discusses the short short story, speculating that it is "a separate literary genre, or subgenre." He discusses differences between the short story and the short short. My only complaint is that Howe commits what I consider the cardinal sin of anthology introductions: he reveals too much about the content of some of the tales, thus threatening to spoil the readers' enjoyment. Perhaps he should have divided his material into an introduction and an afterword.

I'd like to mention some of the many highlights in this fine anthology. "The Three Hermits," by Leo Tolstoy: a fable-like story with a theological aspect. "The Third Bank of the River," by Joao Guimaraes Rosa: a haunting father/son tale about a family affected by one member's bizarre behavior. "The Bathhouse," by Mikhail Zoschenko: a humorous vignette that focuses on little indignities and annoyances of life. "The Use of Force," by William Carlos Williams: a vividly written story about a house call that taxes a doctor's bedside manner. "The Blue Bouquet," by Octavio Paz: a truly disturbing horror story. And "The Laugher," by Heinrich Boll: a first person narrative by a man employed as a professional laugher.

This powerful and fascinating anthology successfully champions the short short as a vital, flexible, and intriguing literary genre. The stories show a great variety in tone and setting. I highly recommend this book for both literature courses and for individual reading.

Less is more in this anthology of short stories edited by Irving Howe and Ilana Wiener Howe. In this book the couple of editors gave more attention to the size of the texts rather than its content. While on one hand it is an interesting attempt, on the other is to reductionism to pick great writers' works only because of its size.

There are stories from writers everywhere, some very very famous, others not so much, but all texts are no longer than ten pages, some are really short. Using such device, the editors managed to get an interesting sample of every writer -- which may tease the reader to search for more long and complex texts from an author s/he liked.

Like Mr. Howe states in the introduction, "the usual short stories cannot have a complex plot". And this is the rule for the selected texts in this volume. However it doesn't mean that the shorts are simplistic or even easy. Some of them, like Jorge Luis Borges's, Joyce's, Tolstoy's, Guimarăes Rosa's among others are more complex and difficult to read than a whole novel by another writer.

But while we have great texts to discover, there are also some flops --or minor works from great writers -- that are grouped in this book only to make the book longer --at least this was the feeling I got after reading all of them. Not that this strategy is a problem, but not all the shorts keep up the same high level.

All in all, this is a good beginning to find `new' writers, to discover styles and to see how one great author can gamble with the size and format of his/her text --and most of them still win. Not many people are able to do that.

I have purchased a number of short story anthologies over the years and usually find a number of great treasures within their pages. Unfortunately,this collection leaves one rather unsatiated.Too many stories translated from other languages?Perhaps.The editors appear to be husband and wife, which may account for the rather repetitive themes of these tales.I would have to say that "Laughter" is about the best and rates a B plus, although true short story aficionados may enjoy this collection to some degree.

I had to buy this books for my literature class. the price is good, only seven dollars. Although I have not read all the stories in the book I am happy with what I have read so far, its interesting and it a good read that will challenge your mind. Its not an easy read like those twilight books. Worth the money. The only problem i had with this book was that it came with a couple of ripped pages. Six pages from the book were torn slightly. It doesnt affect the reading but If im gonna buy a new product i dont want torn pages in it.

One feels after finishing many of these 38 very short pieces that they are ultimately mystery stories, not as in, Whodunnit?, but as in "What the hell just happened?" The editors, Irving and Ilana Howe, have a special fondness for ambiguity. All of the authors are world class, but with occasional exception the stories are not so well-known. My favorite effort was Doris Lessing's Homage for Isaac Babel, so I was disappointed to find that the actual Isaac Babel story in the collection--The Death of Dolgushov--didn't do much for me. Overall, a few hits, a few misses, and a lot of head-scratchers.

It's not often that I find a book that would make me want to strangle someone for a waste of time, but this one and Briefing for a Descent Into Hell do that for me. I will admit it: I have no taste for modern literature that is supposed to be just "setting a tone" or whatever narcissistic excuse for self indulgence is currently popular. I want stories with a beginning, a middle and an end. Just because these are ultra short, doesn't mean you have to give those up. Too often, the scene is set and then goes nowhere, an absolute frustration for me. Maybe some people see it as art, but I don't.

I order a book and I got it it was not good. all over the book was writing by pen most of the page are ripped.it was horrible.

Some good stuff in here but a lot of translations with too much focus, I thought, on Eastern European authors and works from the early 1900's. I was expecting better selections or more modern selections.

Disappointing since 1/3 of the book is dedicated to foreign authors' translated versions. In the sense of making an anthology of super-short, the selection might come directly from original English instead of any translated, seemingly storytelling-only stories since the brightness of diction is far more important than a "short-short" story itself.