The Tales We Tell: Perspectives on the Short Story

(Hardback)

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The 1990s have seen a renaissance in short fiction studies. Today's short story writers are testing the boundaries of short fiction through minimalist works; extended short story cycles; narrative nonfiction forms, such as histories, memoirs and essays; and even stories created interactively with readers on the computer. Short story critics, in turn, are viewing the short story from the perspective of genre, history, cultural studies and even cognitive science. This volume brings together the opinions, theories and research of short story writers, theorists and critics. Contributors include some of the most widely read contemporary authors, such as Joyce Carol Oates, John Barth, Gay Talese, W.P. Kinsella, Robert Coover, Barry Hannah and Leslie Marmon Silko. The authors and scholars who have contributed to the volume provide an entertaining and informative exploration of modern short fiction. The volume traces the origins of the short story back to Chaucer, the joke, and the instinct for play, and follows the development of the form through today's "hyper-stories" created interactively in cyberspace. Along the way, it presents essays on minimalism in short fiction, on the transformation of short stories into films, and even on AIDS and the short story. The broad scope of the volume includes a wide variety of critical approaches brought to bear on literature from around the world, including short stories from Africa, Australia, Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States.

Reviews

Of most interest perhaps are the interchapter commentary provided by well-known short story writers....it clearly delineates opening onto future criticism of the short story.-Paradoxa
This exciting collection of materials on short story theory and its practitioners' perspectives is a must for present and future writers, teachers, and student of fiction.-Choice
"This exciting collection of materials on short story theory and its practitioners' perspectives is a must for present and future writers, teachers, and student of fiction."-Choice
"Of most interest perhaps are the interchapter commentary provided by well-known short story writers....it clearly delineates opening onto future criticism of the short story."-Paradoxa

Author Bio

BARBARA LOUNSBERRY is Professor of English and Distinguished Scholar at the University of Northern Iowa. Her books include The Art of Fact: Contemporary Artists of Nonfiction (Greenwood, 1990), The Writer in You (1992), and Writing Creative Nonfiction: The Literature of Reality (1996), edited with Gay Talese. SUSAN LOHAFER is Professor of English at the University of Iowa. Her books include Coming to Terms with the Short Story (1983) and the coedited volume Short Story Theory at a Crossroads (1989). She has published short stories of her own and was the first elected president of the Society for the Study of the Short Story. MARY ROHRBERGER is Professor of English in Residence at the University of New Orleans. She is the author or editor of a dozen books in the area of prose fiction, the majority on the short story. She is the founder and editor of the journal Short Story and the founder and Executive Director of the biannual International Conference on the Short Story in English. STEPHEN PETT is Associate Professor of English at Iowa State University. He is the author of Sirens (1990), a novel, and Pulpit of Bones (1984), a book of poems. His short stories have been published in a number of journals, cited in Best American Short Stories, and have been honored with numerous awards. He is the editor of Flyway, a literary review. R.C. FEDDERSEN is a doctoral candidate in literature at Oklahoma State University. He has long had special interest in the short story and has worked as Assistant Editor of Short Story as well as Assistant Coordinator for both the second and third International Conferences on the Short Story in English. His publications include an interview with W. P. Kinsella.