The evolution of the theory of the American short story

• Main Author: McNiff, John Patrick, FSC
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 1983
• Subjects: Short stories, American.
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_doctoral/1319
• Institution: De La Salle University

This study has dual goals. One is to review major critical references to the short story chronologically in three core chapters : Beginnings : The Search for Form The Hardening of Formal Concepts and Reactionary Stirrings and Continuing Revolt and New Directions. These would roughly parallel the mutation of the short story in America through its romantic-realistic-naturalistic and modern phases. The second is to provide some theoretical reflections which enable the teacher or student to place and better understand American short stories and, consequently other short stories. The conclusion reviews the mutations of the short story in America since its inception in the last century and a half. It attempts to give some indication of the broad spectrum of the modern short story which has traditional elements as well as experimental and impressionistic dimensions. The modern short story is, in a sense, a reservoir and a fountainhead. Into it flow many undercurrents of the past from it branch out new tributaries. The periods of its development are discrete and have definite characteristics.