An additional word may be added on the principles which have governed
our choice. We have set ourselves 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. We are not at all interested in formulae, and
organised criticism at its best would be nothing more than dead
criticism, as all dogmatic interpretation of life is always dead. What
has interested us, to the exclusion of other things, is the fresh
living current which flows through the best British and Irish work, and
the psychological and imaginative reality which 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.
The present record covers the period from July, 1921, to June, 1922,
inclusive. During this period we have sought to select from the stories
published in British and American periodicals those stories by British
and Irish authors which have rendered life imaginatively in organic
substance and artistic form. Substance is something achieved by the
artist in every act of creation, rather than something already present,
and accordingly a fact or a group of facts in a story only attain
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 conveniently called the test of
substance.
But a second test is necessary if the story is to take rank above other
stories. The true artist will seek to shape this living substance into
the most beautiful and satisfying form, by skillful selection and
arrangement of his materials, and by the most direct and appealing
presentation of it in portrayal and characterization.
The short stories which we have examined in this study have fallen
naturally into three groups. The first consists of those stories which
fail, in our opinion, to survive both the test of substance and the
test of form. These we have not chronicled.
The second group includes such narratives as may lay convincing claim
to further consideration, because each of them has survived in a
measure both tests, the test of substance and the test of form. Stories
included in this group are chronicled in the list which immediately
follows the "Roll of Honour."
Finally we have recorded the names of a smaller group of stories which
possess, we believe, the distinction of uniting genuine substance and
artistic form in a closely woven pattern with such sincerity that they
are worthy of being reprinted. If all of these stories were
republished, they would not occupy more space than six or seven novels
of average length. Our selection of them does not imply the critical
belief that they are great stories. A year which produced one great
story would be an exceptional one. It is simply to be taken as meaning
that we have found the equivalent of six or seven volumes worthy of
republication among all the stories published during the period under
consideration. These stories are listed in the special "Roll of
Honour." In compiling these lists we have permitted no personal
preference or prejudice to consciously influence our judgement. The
general and particular results of our study will be found explained and
carefully detailed in the supplementary part of the volume. Mr. Cournos
has read the English periodicals, and I have read the American
periodicals. We have then compared our judgements.