Where is the Short Story?
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Where is the Short Story?
Why did E.M. Forster Stop Writing Fiction?
The triumph of Matter over Spirit, two world wars, the postmodern machine society-all these seem to have shut “the door which leads to soul”. Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition aptly criticizes the modern age : “ It is quite inconceivable that the modern age-which began with such an unprecedented and promising outburst of human activity-may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.” The problem for the short-story writer in this milieu is how to write stories which have genuine emotional depth, and directness in the presentation of situations.
E. M. Forster had experienced this difficulty:
I think one of the reasons why I stopped writing novels is that the social aspect of the world changed so much. I had been accustomed to write about the old-fashioned world with its honor and its family life and its comparative peace. All that went, and though I can think about the new world I cannot put it into fiction.In spite of this candid observation made by Forster, we find that both novels and short stories are being written in an ever-increasing great number. This is quite evident from the several collections published recently, for example, M. Brooks’ Paradise Café and other Stories (1990), A. Chambers’ Out of Time (1985), Sook Nyul Choi’s Year of Impossible Goodbyes (1991), L. Crew’s Children of the River (1991), D. R. Gallo’s Sixteen (1984), Visions (1987), Connections (1989),Within Reach (1003), Join In (1993), Sherry Garland’s Shadow of a Dragon(1993), B. Girion’s A Very Brief Season ( 1984), A. Schwartz’s Scary Stories 3 (1991), etc. The chief reason for the tremendous popularity of the short story is its brevity, since it is ‘a single-sitting read’, and the readers have enough time to read it.
Moreover, to make their stories popular, the authors should use new and latest themes like Egyptian Revolution and Help to the Haiti victims. Another interesting trendy topic can be how Apple's third-generation iPad to be launched during fall 2011 will change our life style. The plot may concentrate around a financially tight teenager's all out efforts to buy the iPad.
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The triumph of Matter over Spirit, two world wars, the postmodern machine society-all these seem to have shut “the door which leads to soul”. Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition aptly criticizes the modern age : “ It is quite inconceivable that the modern age-which began with such an unprecedented and promising outburst of human activity-may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.” The problem for the short-story writer in this milieu is how to write stories which have genuine emotional depth, and directness in the presentation of situations.
E. M. Forster had experienced this difficulty:
I think one of the reasons why I stopped writing novels is that the social aspect of the world changed so much. I had been accustomed to write about the old-fashioned world with its honor and its family life and its comparative peace. All that went, and though I can think about the new world I cannot put it into fiction.In spite of this candid observation made by Forster, we find that both novels and short stories are being written in an ever-increasing great number. This is quite evident from the several collections published recently, for example, M. Brooks’ Paradise Café and other Stories (1990), A. Chambers’ Out of Time (1985), Sook Nyul Choi’s Year of Impossible Goodbyes (1991), L. Crew’s Children of the River (1991), D. R. Gallo’s Sixteen (1984), Visions (1987), Connections (1989),Within Reach (1003), Join In (1993), Sherry Garland’s Shadow of a Dragon(1993), B. Girion’s A Very Brief Season ( 1984), A. Schwartz’s Scary Stories 3 (1991), etc. The chief reason for the tremendous popularity of the short story is its brevity, since it is ‘a single-sitting read’, and the readers have enough time to read it.
Moreover, to make their stories popular, the authors should use new and latest themes like Egyptian Revolution and Help to the Haiti victims. Another interesting trendy topic can be how Apple's third-generation iPad to be launched during fall 2011 will change our life style. The plot may concentrate around a financially tight teenager's all out efforts to buy the iPad.
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Short Story as a genre is not worn out. Moreover, to make their stories popular, the authors should use new and latest themes like Egyptian Revolution and Help to the Haiti victims. Another interesting trendy topic can be how Apple's third-generation iPad to be launched during fall 2011 will change our life style. The plot may concentrate around a financially tight teenager's all out efforts to buy the
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