With The Short Story: The Reality of Artifice, Charles E. May, a foremost authority on the genre, contributes a major effort to examine the history and characteristics of the short story from a critical perspective. Drawing on twenty-five years' experience studying the form, May argues that the development of the short story has always reflected "a tension between the traditional mythic origins of the form and the increasing pressures of modernism...

A comprehensive and up-to-date survey of the most often studied short story writers from around the world. The 146 authors, and 800 works covered in this set reflect the range and diversity of nineteenth and twentieth century short-story writing. More than half the authors covered are from the United States, reflecting the strength of the genre in its birthplace. The second largest national grouping is England, added to which are some of the great...

Volume of literary criticism concerning the works of essayist, short-story writer, and novelist Flannery O'Connor.