A year ago, in the introduction to "The Best Short Stories of 1916," I
pointed out that the American short story cannot be reduced to a
literary formula, because the art in which it finds its concrete
embodiment is a growing art. The critic, when he approaches American
literature, cannot regard it as he can regard any foreign literature.
Setting aside the question of whether our cosmopolitan population, with
its widely different kinds of racial heritage, is at an advantage or a
disadvantage because of its conflicting traditions, we must accept the
variety in substance and attempt to find in it a new kind of national
unity, hitherto unknown in the history of the world. The message voiced
in President Wilson's words on several occasions during the past year is
a true reflection of the message implicit in American literature.
Various in substance, it finds its unity in the new freedom of
democracy, and English and French, German and Slav, Italian and
Scandinavian bring to the common melting-pot ideals which are fused in a
national unity of democratic utterance.
It is inevitable, therefore, that in this stage of our national literary
development, our newly conscious speech lacks the sophisticated
technique of older literatures. But, perhaps because of this very
limitation, it is much more alert to the variety and life of the human
substance with which it deals. It does not take the whole of life for
granted and it often reveals the fresh naïveté of childhood in its
discovery of life. When its sophistication is complete, it is the
sophistication of English rather than of American literature, and is
derivative rather than original, for the most part, in its criticism of
life. I would specifically except, however, from this criticism the
work of three writers, at least, whose sophistication is the embodiment
of a new American technique. Katharine Fullerton Gerould, Wilbur Daniel
Steele, and H. G. Dwight have each attained a distinction in our
contemporary literature which places them at the head of their craft.
During the past year there has been much pessimistic criticism of the
American short story, some of it by Americans, and some by Europeans who
are now residing in our midst. To the European mind, trained in a
tradition where technique in story-writing is paramount, it is natural
that the American short story should seem to reveal grave deficiencies.
I am by no means disposed to minimize the weakness of American
craftsmanship, but I feel that at the present stage of our literary
development, discouragement will prove a very easy and fatal thing. The
typical point of view of the European critic, when justified, is
adequately reflected in an article by Mary M. Colum, which was published
in the Dial last spring: "Those of us who take an interest in literary
history will remember how particular literary forms at times seize hold
of a country: in Elizabethan England, it was the verse drama; in the
eighteenth century, it was the essay; in Scandinavia of a generation
ago, it was the drama again. At present America is in the grip of the
short story--so thoroughly in its grip indeed that, in addition to all
the important writers, nearly all the literate population who are not
writing movie scenarios are writing or are about to write short stories.
One reason for this is the general belief that this highly sophisticated
and subtle art is a means for making money in spare time, and so one
finds everybody, from the man who solicits insurance to the barber who
sells hair-tonics, engaged in writing, or in taking courses in the
writing, of short stories. Judging from what appears in the magazines,
one imagines that they get their efforts accepted. There is no doubt
that the butcher, the baker, and the candle-stick maker are easily
capable of producing the current short stories with the aids now
afforded."
Now this is the heart of the matter with which criticism has to deal. It
is regrettable that the American magazine editor is not more mindful of
his high calling, but the tremendous advertising development of the
American magazine has bound American literature in the chains of
commercialism, and before a permanent literary criticism of the American
short story can be established, we must fight to break these bonds. I
conceive it to be my essential function to begin at the bottom and
record the first signs of grace, rather than to limit myself to the top
and write critically about work which will endure with or without
criticism. If American critics would devote their attention for ten
years to this spade work, they might not win so much honor, but we
should find the atmosphere clearer at the end of that period for the
true exercise of literary criticism.
Nevertheless I contend that there is much fine work being accomplished
at present, which is buried in the ruck of the interminable commonplace.
I regard it as my duty to chronicle this work, and thus render it
accessible for others to discuss.
Mrs. Colum continues: "Apart from the interesting experiments in free
verse or polyphonic prose, the short story in America is at a low ebb.
Magazine editors will probably say the blame rests with their readers.
This may be so, but do people really read the long, dreary stories of
from five to nine thousand words which the average American magazine
editor publishes? Why a vivid people like the American should be so
dusty and dull in their short stories is a lasting puzzle to the
European, who knows that America has produced a large proportion of the
great short stories of the world."
I deny that the American short story is at a low ebb, and I offer the
present volume as a revelation of the best that is now being done in
this field. I agree with Mrs. Colum that the best stories are only to be
found after a laborious dusty search, but this is the proof rather than
the refutation of my position.
Despite the touch of paradox, Mrs. Colum makes two admirable suggestions
to remedy this condition of affairs. "A few magazine editors could do a
great deal to raise the level of the American short story. They could at
once eradicate two of the things that cause a part of the evil--the
wordiness and the commercial standardization of the story. By declining
short stories over three thousand words long, and by refusing to pay
more than a hundred dollars for any short story, they could create a new
standard and raise both the prestige of the short story and of their
magazines. They would then get the imaginative writers, and not the
exploiters of a commercial article."
I am not sure that the average American editor wishes to welcome the
imaginative writer, but assuming this to be true, I would modify Mrs.
Colum's suggestions and propose that, except in an unusual instance, the
short story should be limited to five thousand words, and that the
compensation for it should not exceed three hundred dollars.
To repeat what I have said in previous volumes of this series, for the
benefit of the reader as yet unacquainted with my standards and
principles of selection, I shall point out that I have set myself the
task of disengaging the essential human qualities in our contemporary
fiction which, when chronicled conscientiously by our literary artists,
may fairly be called a criticism of life. I am not at all interested in
formulas, and organized criticism at its best would be nothing more than
dead criticism, as all dogmatic interpretation of life is always dead.
What has interested me, to the exclusion of other things, is the fresh
living current which flows through the best of our work, and the
psychological and imaginative reality which our writers have conferred
upon it.
No substance is of importance in fiction, unless it is organic
substance, that is to say, substance in which the pulse of life is
beating. Inorganic fiction has been our curse in the past, and bids fair
to remain so, unless we exercise much greater artistic discrimination
than we display at present.
During the past year I have sought to select from the stories published
in American magazines those which have rendered life imaginatively in
organic substance and artistic form. As the most adequate means to this
end, I have taken each short story by itself, and examined it
impartially. I have done my best to surrender myself to the writer's
point of view, and granting his choice of material and personal
interpretation of its value, have sought to test it by the double
standard of substance and form. Substance is something achieved by the
artist in every act of creation, rather than something already present,
and accordingly a fact or group of facts in a story only obtain
substantial embodiment when the artist's power of compelling imaginative
persuasion transforms them into a living truth. The first test of a
short story, therefore, in any qualitative analysis is to report upon
how vitally compelling the writer makes his selected facts or incidents.
This test may be known as the test of substance.
But a second test is necessary if a story is to take high rank above
other stories. The true artist will seek to shape this living substance
into the most beautiful and satisfying form, by skilful selection and
arrangement of his material, and by the most direct and appealing
presentation of it in portrayal and characterization.
The short stories which I have examined in this study, as in previous
years, have fallen naturally into four groups. The first group consists
of those stories which fail, in my opinion, to survive either the test
of substance or the test of form. These stories are listed in the
year-book without comment or a qualifying asterisk. The second group
consists of those stories which may fairly claim that they survive
either the test of substance or the test of form. Each of these stories
may claim to possess either distinction of technique alone, or more
frequently, I am glad to say, a persuasive sense of life in them to
which a reader responds with some part of his own experience. Stories
included in this group are indicated in the year-book index by a single
asterisk prefixed to the title. The third group, which is composed of
stories of still greater distinction, includes such narratives as may
lay convincing claim to a second reading, because each of them has
survived both tests, the test of substance and the test of form. Stories
included in this group are indicated in the year-book index by two
asterisks prefixed to the title.
Finally, I have recorded the names of a small group of stories which
possess, I believe, an even finer distinction--the distinction of
uniting genuine substance and artistic form in a closely woven pattern
with such sincerity that these stories may fairly claim a position in
our literature. If all of these stories by American authors were
republished, they would not occupy more space than six average novels.
My selection of them does not imply the critical belief that they are
great stories. It is simply to be taken as meaning that I have found the
equivalent of six volumes worthy of republication among all the stories
published during 1917. These stories are indicated in the year-book
index by three asterisks prefixed to the title, and are listed in the
special "Rolls of Honor." In compiling these lists, I have permitted no
personal preference or prejudice to influence my judgment consciously
for or against a story. To the titles of certain stories, however, in
the American "Roll of Honor," an asterisk is prefixed, and this
asterisk, I must confess, reveals in some measure a personal preference.
It is from this final short list that the stories reprinted in this
volume have been selected.
It has been a point of honor with me not to republish an English story,
nor a translation from a foreign author. I have also made it a rule not
to include more than one story by an individual author in the volume.
The general and particular results of my study will be found explained
and carefully detailed in the supplementary part of the volume.
The Yearbook for 1917 contains three new features. The Roll of Honor of
American Short Stories includes a short biographical sketch of each
author; a selection from the volumes of short stories published during
the past year is reviewed at some length; and, in response to numerous
requests, a list of American magazines publishing short stories, with
their editorial addresses, has been compiled.
Wilbur Daniel Steele and Katharine Fullerton Gerould are still at the
head of their craft. But during the past year the ten published stories
by Maxwell Struthers Burt and Charles Caldwell Dobie seem to promise a
future in our literature of equal importance to the later work of these
writers. Sherwood Anderson and Waldo Frank emerge as writers with a
great deal of importance to say, although they have not yet fully
mastered the art of saying it. The three new short story writers who
show most promise are Gertrude Nafe and Thomas Beer, whose first stories
appeared in the Century Magazine during 1917, and Elizabeth Stead Taber,
whose story, "The Scar," when it appeared in the Seven Arts, attracted
much favorable comment. Edwina Stanton Babcock and Lee Foster Hartman
have both published memorable stories, and "The Interval," which was
Vincent O'Sullivan's sole contribution to an American periodical during
1917, compels us to wonder why an artist, for whom men of such widely
different temperaments as Lionel Johnson, Remy de Gourmont, and Edward
Garnett had high critical esteem, finds the American public so
indifferent to his art.
Addison Lewis has published during the past year a series of stories in
Reedy's Mirror which have more of O. Henry's magic than the thousand
writers who have endeavored to imitate him to the everlasting injury of
American literature. Frederick Stuart Greene, in "The Bunker Mouse" and
"Molly McGuire, Fourteen," shows marked literary development, and
reinforces my belief that in him we have an important new story-teller.
I suppose the best war story of the year is "The Flying Teuton," by
Alice Brown, soon to be reprinted in book form.
I do not know whether it is an effect of the war or not, but during
1917, even more than during 1916, American magazines have been almost
absolutely devoid of humor. Save for Irvin S. Cobb, on whom the mantle
of Mark Twain has surely fallen, and for Seumas O'Brien, whom Mr. Dooley
must envy, I have found American fiction to be sufficiently solemn and
imperturbable.
I need not emphasize again the fine art of Fannie Hurst. Two years ago
Mr. Howells stated more truly than I can the significance of her work.
Comparing her with two other contemporaries, he wrote: "Miss Fannie
Hurst shows the same artistic quality, the same instinct for reality,
the same confident recognition of the superficial cheapness and
commonness of the stuff she handles; but in her stories she also attests
the right to be named with them for the gift of penetrating to the heart
of life. No one with the love of the grotesque which is the American
portion of the human tastes or passions, can fail of his joy in the play
of the obvious traits and motives of her Hebrew comedy, but he will fail
of something precious if he does not sound the depths of true and
beautiful feeling which underlies the comedy."
A similar distinction marks Edna Ferber's story entitled "The Gay Old
Dog."
Of the English short story writers who have published during the past
year in American periodicals, Mr. Galsworthy has presented the most
evenly distinguished work. Hardly second to his best are the six stories
by J. D. Beresford and D. H. Lawrence, both well known realists of the
younger generation. Stacy Aumonier has continued the promise of "The
Friends" with three new stories written in the same key. Although the
vein of his talent is a narrow one, it reveals pure gold. Good
Housekeeping has published three war stories by an Englishwoman, I. A.
R. Wylie, which I should have coveted for this book had they been by an
American author. But perhaps the best English short story of the year in
an American magazine was "The Coming of the Terror," by Arthur Machen,
since republished in book form.
Elsewhere I have discussed at some length the more important volumes of
short stories published during the year. "A Munster Twilight," by Daniel
Corkery is alone sufficient to mark a notable literary year. And "The
Echo of Voices," by Richard Curle is hardly second to it. Yet the year
has seen the publication of at least three other books by English
authors who are new to the reading public. Thomas Burke, Caradoc Evans,
and Arthur Machen have added permanent contributions to English
literature.
In "A Handbook on Story Writing," Dr. Blanche Colton Williams has
written the first definitive textbook on the subject. Its many
predecessors have either been content to deal with narrow branches in
the same field, or have exploited quite frankly and shamelessly the
commercial possibilities of story writing as a cheap trade. Dr.
Williams's book will not be in all likelihood superseded for many years
to come, and the effects of her work are already to be seen in the short
stories of many established writers.
In the death of Edward Thomas, England has lost a rare artist who, in
his particular field, was only rivalled by Richard Jefferies.
During the past year the Seven Arts and the Masses have ceased
publication. The Craftsman, which ceased publication a year ago, has
been succeeded by the Touchstone, which is already beginning to print
many interesting stories; and to the list of magazines which publish
short stories must now be welcomed the Bookman.
As it has been my happiness in past years to associate this annual with
the names of Benjamin Rosenblatt and Richard Matthews Hallet, whose
stories, "Zelig" and "Making Port," seemed to me respectively the best
short stories of 1915 and 1916, so it is my pleasure and honor this year
to dedicate the best that I have found in the American magazines as the
fruit of my labors to Wilbur Daniel Steele, who has contributed to
American literature, preëminently in "Ching, Ching, Chinaman," and
almost as finely in "White Hands" and "The Woman At Seven Brothers,"
three stories which take their place for finality, to the best of my
belief, in the great English line.