Henry James (15 April 1843 –28 February 1916) believed that an author must be granted his donnée, or central idea, and then be judged on the execution of his material. James’s stories are about members of high society. The characters… Read More ›
Short Story
Analysis of Shirley Jackson’s Stories
Shirley Jackson’s (December 14, 1916 – August 8, 1965) stories seem to center on a single concern: Almost every story is about a protagonist’s discovering or failing to discover or successfully ignoring an alternate way of perceiving a set of… Read More ›
Analysis of Washington Irving’s Stories
Washington Irving’s (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) masterpiece, The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., has a historical importance few American books can match. No previous American book achieved a really significant popular and critical success in England,… Read More ›
Analysis of Zora Neale Hurston’s Stories
The bulk of Zora Neale Hurston’s (1891 –1960) short fiction is set in her native Florida, as are most of her novels. Even when the setting is not Florida, however, the stories are informed by the life, habits, beliefs, and… Read More ›
Analysis of Langston Hughes’s Stories
Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) records in The Big Sea: An Autobiography (1940) his feelings upon first seeing Africa: “when I saw the dust-green hills in the sunlight, something took hold of me inside. My Africa,… Read More ›
Analysis of O. Henry’s Stories
O. Henry’s (September 11, 1862 – June 5, 1910) widely varied background provided not only plots for his tales but also characters drawn from all walks of life. Ham in “The Hiding of Black Chief,” Caesar in “A Municipal Report,”… Read More ›
Analysis of Amy Hempel’s Stories
Amy Hempel (born December 14, 1951) is one of the original short-story writers upon whom the term “minimalist” was conferred but, as several critics have noted, “miniaturist” may be a more accurate term. Some of her stories are very short… Read More ›
Analysis of Bret Harte’s Stories
In any discussion of Bret Harte (August 25, 1836 – May 5, 1902), one must begin by making a clear distinction between importance and quality, that is, between the influence of an author’s work and its intrinsic value. That Harte… Read More ›
Analysis of Nadine Gordimer’s Stories
Nadine Gordimer (20 November 1923 – 13 July 2014) is a distinguished novelist and short-story writer. About Selected Stories, drawn from her earlier volumes of stories, a reviewer said that the stories “are marked by the courage of moral vision… Read More ›
Analysis of Hamlin Garland’s Stories
Hamlin Garland’s (September 14, 1860 – March 4, 1940) most enduring short stories are those dealing with the Middle Border (the prairie lands of Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Nebraska, and the Dakotas). Collected for the most part in four books, they… Read More ›
Analysis of Gabriel García Márquez’s Stories
Gabriel García Márquez’s (1927 – 2014) fiction is characterized by a thread of common themes, events, and characters that seem to link his work together into one multifaceted portrayal of the experiences of Latin American life. From the influences of his… Read More ›
Analysis of Mavis Gallant’s Stories
The often somber tone of Mavis Gallant’s (11 August 1922 – 18 February 2014) work is strengthened by the combination of acute lucidness and understated stylistic richness. Gallant is a remarkable observer. She succeeds in creating worlds that are both… Read More ›
Analysis of E. M. Forster’s Stories
All of Forster’s best-known and most anthologized stories appeared first in two collections, The Celestial Omnibus and The Eternal Moment. The words “celestial” and “eternal” are especially significant because a typical E. M. Forster story features a protagonist who is… Read More ›
Analysis of Gustave Flaubert’s Stories
Gustave Flaubert’s (12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) Three Tales, published during the year 1877, when he was fifty-six years old, reflects the variety of styles of his literary production as a whole. “Un Coeur simple” (“A Simple Heart”)… Read More ›
Analysis of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Stories
F. Scott Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was a professional writer who was also a literary artist. In practical terms this meant that he had to support himself by writing short stories for popular magazines in order… Read More ›
Analysis of William Faulkner’s Stories
William Faulkner (1897-1962) has been credited with having the imagination to see, before other serious writers saw, the tremendous potential for drama, pathos, and sophisticated humor in the history and people of the South. In using this material and, in… Read More ›
Analysis of Louise Erdrich’s Stories
Just as fiction in general has opened up to a diverse ethnic spectrum of writers, so too has short fiction, and Louise Erdrich’s (born Karen Louise Erdrich, June 7, 1954) stories stand as excellent examples of contemporary Native American literature…. Read More ›
Analysis of Ralph Ellison’s Stories
Because most of Ralph Ellison’s (March 1, 1913 – April 16, 1994) short fiction was written before his career as a novelist began, his short stories are often analyzed biographically, as the training ground for the novelist he was to… Read More ›
Analysis of Stuart Dybek’s Stories
Chicago has a long tradition of producing fine writers who use the city as their literary landscape. Gwendolyn Brooks, Carl Sandburg, Upton Sinclair, and The odore Dreiser, among others, belong to this tradition. Stuart Dybek, while drawing heavily on the… Read More ›
Analysis of Andre Dubus’s Stories
Among American story writers of the twentieth century, the one to whom Andre Dubus is most often compared is Flannery O’Connor. Although Dubus’s works are not generally marked by the wry, ironic wit that permeates O’Connor’s work, both writers are… Read More ›
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