Latest / The Best Short Stories of 1917 / The Best Sixty-three American Short Stories of 1917: A Critical Summary

Transcript

The Best Sixty-three American Short Stories of 1917: A Critical Summary · The Best Short Stories of 1917

0:00
Section thirty three of the Best Short Stories of nineteen seventeen. This is a
0:05
LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information
0:11
or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Read by Betty B.
0:16
The Best Short Stories of nineteen seventeen by various The Best sixty three American Short
0:24
Stories of nineteen seventeen, A critical summary. The sixty three short stories published
0:30
in the American magazines during nineteen seventeen which I shall discuss in this article are
0:36
chosen from a larger group of about one hundred and twenty five stories whose literary
0:41
excellence justified me in including them in my annual role of honor. The stories
0:47
which are included in this role of honor have been chosen from the stories published
0:51
in about sixty five American periodicals during nineteen seventeen. In selecting them, I
0:58
have sought to accept the author's point of view and manner of treatment, and
1:02
to measure simply the degree of success he had in doing what he set out
1:06
to achieve. But I must confess that it has been difficult to eliminate personal
1:11
admiration completely. In the further winnowing which has resulted in the selection of sixty
1:18
three stories. Below are set forth the particular qualities which have seemed to me
1:23
to justify in each case the inclusion of a story in this list. One
1:29
The Excursion by Edwena Stanton Babcock The Pictorial Review, is, in my belief,
1:34
one of the best five American short stories of the year. It is
1:38
significant because of its faithful and imaginative rendering of American folk life, because of
1:45
its subtle characterization, and the successful manner in which it reveals the essentially racy
1:51
humor of the American countryside with the utmost economy of means. The characterization is
1:57
achieved almost entirely through dialogue, and the portraiture of the characters is rendered inimitably
2:05
in a phrase or two. In this story, as well as in The
2:08
Band, Miss Babcock has earned the right to a place beside Francis Bazell as
2:15
a regional story writer fairly comparable to John Trevenna's renderings of Dartmoor. Two.
2:23
The Brothers by Thomas Beherr the Century Magazine will remind the reader in some respects
2:29
of Frederick Stuart Greene's story The Blackpool, published in the Grim thirteen. But
2:35
apart from a superficial resemblance in the substance with which both writers deal, the
2:40
two stories are more notable in their differences than in their resemblances. If The
2:46
Brothers is less inevitable than The black Pool, it is perhaps a more sophisticated
2:52
work of art, and I am not sure but that its conclusion and the
2:55
resolution of character that it involves is not more artistically convincing than the end of
3:02
the Blackpool. It is certainly a memorable first story by a new writer,
3:07
and would of itself be enough to make a reputation. Mister Beer is the
3:12
most original new talent that the Century Magazine has discovered since Stacy Ammonier three Annie
3:21
by Thomas Beer. The Century Magazine has a certain stark faithfulness which makes a
3:27
somewhat obvious material an extremely vivid and freshly felt rendering of life. There is
3:34
a certain quality of observation in the story, which we are accustomed to think
3:38
of as a Gallic rather than an American trait. I think that mister Beer
3:43
has slightly broadened his canvass, where a greater restraint and less cautious use of
3:47
suggestion would have better answered his purpose. But Annie is a better story than
3:53
The Brothers to my mind, and mister Beer by virtue of these two stories
3:59
is one of the two or three most interesting new talents of the year.
4:03
Four Ironstone by Phyllis Bottom, the Century Magazine. To those who have enjoyed
4:12
in recent years the admirable social comedy and deft handling of English character to which
4:17
Miss Botom has accustomed us, Ironstone must have come as a surprise in its
4:23
revelation of a new aspect in the author's talent, akin to the kind of
4:28
tale which is found at its best as a middle in the London Nation.
4:32
It compresses the emotion of a Greek drama into a space of perhaps four thousand
4:39
words. I find that the closing dialogue in the story is as certain in
4:44
its march as the closing pages of writers to the Seat and the Catharsis is
4:48
timeless in its final solution. Five from Hungary by John Breck. The Bookman
4:57
is perhaps not to be classified as a sh short story, but the academic
5:01
limitations of the short story have never interested me greatly, and in its own
5:06
field, this short fiction sketch is memorable. Its secret is the secret of
5:12
atmosphere rather than speech, but atmosphere here becomes human in its reality, and
5:17
the resultant effect is not unlike that of When Hannah var eight yar Old by
5:25
Miss Girling, which appeared in The Atlantic Monthly a few years ago. John
5:30
Breck or Elizabeth C. A. Smith to reveal her authorship, has found
5:35
complete embodiment for her conception in this story for the first time, and it
5:42
is a promise for a vivid and interesting future. Six The Flying Tuton by
5:47
Alice Brown Harper's Magazine is the best short story that has come out of this
5:53
war as yet in either English or American magazines. Accepting the old legend of
5:59
the flying dutch Man and Miss Brown has imagined it re embodied in a modern
6:02
setting, and out of the ironies of this situation, a most dramatic story
6:08
results with a sure and true message for the American people. It is,
6:13
in my opinion, one of the five best short stories of the year,
6:16
and I am happy to say that it will soon be accessible to the public
6:20
once more in book form. Seven Closed Doors and eight A Cup of Tea
6:27
by Maxwell Struthers Burt, both in Scribner's Magazine. In these two stories and
6:33
in the Glory of the Wild Green Earth, John O'May, and Le'panoche,
6:40
all of which appeared in Scribner's magazine during the past year. A place is
6:44
made for the author among American short story writers besides that of Missus Geroud Wilbur,
6:50
Daniel Steele, and H. G. Dwhite. Two years ago,
6:55
I had the pleasure of reprinting his first short story, The Waterhole, in
7:00
the Best Short Stories of nineteen fifteen. I thought at that time that mister
7:03
Burt would eventually do find things, but I never suspected that in the short
7:10
period of two years he would win for himself so important a place in contemporary
7:15
American letters. Mister Bird's technique is still a trifle over sophisticated, but I
7:20
suppose this is a fault on virtue side. A collection of mister Burt's short
7:26
stories in book form should be anxiously awaited by the American public. Nine Lonely
7:33
Places and ten The Long Vacation by Francis Bazell. The pictorial Review. The
7:41
attentive reader of American fiction must have already noted two memorable stories by Francis Bazell
7:46
published in previous years, Addie erb and Her Girl Lottie and Ma's Pritty's.
7:54
These two stories one from mister Bazell an important position as an American folk writer,
8:00
and this position is amply sustained by the two fine stories which he has
8:05
published during the past year. His imaginative realism weaves poignant beauty out of the
8:11
simplest and most dusty elements in life. And it is my belief that it
8:16
is along the lines of his method and that of Miss Babcock, that America
8:20
is most likely eventually to contribute something distinctively national to the world's literary culture.
8:28
Eleven The Mistress by Fleeta Campbell Harper's Bazaar is most highly polished and sharply outlined
8:37
story of the war. It makes an art out of coldness in narration,
8:41
which serves to emphasize and bring out, by contrast, the human warmth of
8:46
the story's substance. Twelve The Foundling by Gunnar Sedershold Collier's Weekly. Readers who
8:54
recall the fine series of stories by Alden Brooks published during the pa last two
9:00
years in Collier's Weekly and The Century Magazine will find in The Foundling a story
9:07
equally memorable as a ruthless portrayal of the effects of war. Whether one approves
9:11
or disapproves in general of the ending is irrelevant. In this case, this
9:16
story must take its place as one of the best dozen stories of the war.
9:22
Thirteen Boys Will Be Boys, fourteen The Family Tree, and fifteen Quality
9:28
Folks by Irvin S. Cobb, all in the Saturday Evening Post. It
9:35
is seven years since Irvin Cobb published his first short story, The Escape of
9:39
Mister Trim, in the Saturday Evening Post. During that short period, he
9:45
has passed from the position of an excellent journalist to that of America's most representative
9:50
humorist in the truer meaning of that word. Upon him, the mantle of
9:54
Mark Twain has descended, and with that mantle he has inherited the artistic virtues
10:01
and the utter inability to criticize his own work that was so characteristic of mister
10:07
Clements. But the very gusto of his creative work has been shaping his style
10:11
during the past two years, to a point where he may now fairly claim
10:16
to have mastered his material and to have found the most effective human persuasiveness in
10:22
its presentation. Our grandchildren will read these three stories and thank God that there
10:28
was a man named Cobb, once born in Paducah, Kentucky, sixteen Laughter
10:35
Harper's Magazine and seventeen Our Dog pictorial Review by Charles Caldwell Dobie. The rapid
10:43
rise of mister Dobe in less than two years from the date when his first
10:46
short story was published challenges comparison with a similar career of Maxwell Struthers Burt.
10:54
As mister Bird's art has its analogies with that of missus Cheruls, DOBIE's art
11:01
has its analogies with that of Wilbur Daniel Steele. I am not certain that
11:05
mister DOBIE's talent is not essentially that of a novel writer, but certainly at
11:11
least four of the short stories which he has published during the past year are
11:16
notable artistic achievements in widely different moods. If tragedy prevails, it is purified
11:22
by a fine spiritual idealism which takes symbols and makes of them something more human
11:28
than a mere allegory. If an American publisher were courageous enough to start publishing
11:35
a series of volumes of short stories by contemporary American writers, he could not
11:41
do better than to begin with a selection of mister DOBIE's Tales eighteen A Little
11:46
Nipper of Hide and Seek Harbor by Norman Duncan, Pictorial Review. This story
11:54
has a melancholy interest because it was the last story sold by its author before
11:58
his sudden death last year, But it would have been remembered for its own
12:03
sake as the last, and not the least important, of the long series
12:07
of Newfoundland sagas which mister Duncan has given us. It shows that Norman Duncan
12:13
kept his artistic vigor to the last, and those who know Newfoundland can testify
12:18
that such stories as these will always remain its most permanent literary record. Nineteen
12:26
The Emperor of Elam by H. G. Dwight, The Century Magazine.
12:31
Those who have read mister Dwight's volume of short stories entitled stambul Knights do not
12:37
need to be told that mister Dwight is the one American short story writer whom
12:43
we may confidently set beside Joseph Conrad as a master in a similar literary field.
12:48
American editors have been diffident about publishing his stories for reasons which cast more
12:54
discredit on the American editor than on mister Dwight. Acordingly, it is a
13:00
genuine pleasure to encounter the Emperor of Elam and to chronicle the hardihood of the
13:05
editor of the Century magazine. The story is a modern odyssey of adventure,
13:11
set as usual in the Turkish background with which mister Dwight is most familiar,
13:18
in its atmospheres, realize completely for its own sake, and as a motive
13:22
power, urging the lives of his characters to their inevitable end. Twenty The
13:28
Gay Old Dog by Edna Ferber Metropolitan Magazine is, in my opinion, the
13:33
big story which The Eldest was not. It is my belief that Edna Ferber
13:39
is a novelist first and a short story writer afterwards. But in The Gay
13:45
Old Dog she has accepted a theme which can best be handled in the short
13:48
story form and has made the most of it artistically. Much as Fanny Hurst
13:54
has done in all of her better stories, Miss Ferber has not sentimentalized her
13:58
substance as she does most often, but has let it remain at its true
14:03
valuation. Twenty one bread Crumbs by Waldo Frank Seven Arts Magazine. I cannot
14:11
help feeling that this is an extremely well written and honestly conceived story whose substance
14:16
is essentially false, but the author has apparently persuaded himself of its truth and
14:22
presents it almost convincingly to the reader. Be this as it may, mister
14:28
Frank has not failed to make his two characters real for us, and the
14:31
poignancy of their final revelation is certainly genuine. Mister Frank, however, should
14:37
save such material as this for longer fiction, as his method is essentially that
14:43
of a novelist. Twenty two Pearls before Swine by Cornelia Throop, Year Atlantic
14:50
Monthly. With a quiet and somewhat reticent art, The author of this story
14:56
has succeeded in deftly conveying to her readers a delicate pastoral scene of innocence reflecting
15:03
the dreams of two little Irish children. It was a difficult feat to attempt,
15:07
as few can safely reproduce the atmosphere of an alien race successfully, and
15:13
even to Irish Americans, Ireland cannot be sufficiently realized for creative embodiment. I
15:20
am told that a volume of Irish stories is promised from the pen of Miss
15:24
Gear, and it should take its place with the better folk stories of modern
15:28
Irish life. Miss Gear's method is the result of identification with rather than condescension
15:35
toward her subject. Twenty three East of Eden Harper's Magazine, twenty four,
15:43
The Hand of Jim Fayne Harper's Magazine, twenty five, The Knight's Move Atlantic
15:48
Monthly, twenty six, The Wax Doll Scribner's Magazine, and twenty seven What
15:54
They Seem Harper's Magazine by Catherine Fullerton Jeromi. In these five short stories,
16:02
Missus geroul Amplay sustains her claim to rank as one of the three most distinguished
16:07
contemporary writers of the American short story. Preoccupied as she is with the subtle
16:14
rendering of abnormal psychological situations, her work is in the great traditional line,
16:21
whose last completely adequate exponent was Henry James. One in all these stories have
16:26
the fascination of strange spiritual adventure, and the persuasiveness of her exposition conceals inimitably
16:34
the closely woven craftsmanship of her work. Of these five stories, The Knights
16:41
Move and East of Eden surely represent a development in her art which it will
16:45
be almost impossible for her to surpass. Twenty eight Darre's Gift by Ellen Glasgow
16:52
Harper's Magazine. I prefer to beg the question whether this is a short story
16:57
or a very short novel. It certainly has the unity of a well defined
17:03
spiritual incident, and if one recalls its substance, it is only to view
17:07
it as a completely rounded whole. As such is surely as fine a study
17:12
of the influence of place as Missus Wharton's Kurfall or Missus Pangbourne's Bixby's Bridge.
17:19
The brooding atmosphere of a house mindful of its past and reacting upon successive inmates
17:26
morally or perhaps immorally, has seldom been more faithfully rendered twenty nine The Hearing
17:33
Ear Harper's Magazine and thirty A Jury of Her Peers Every Week by Susan Glassbell.
17:41
It is always interesting to study the achievement of a novelist who has one
17:45
distinction deservedly in that field when that novelist attempts the very different technique of the
17:52
short story. It is particularly interesting in the case of Susan Glassbell, because
17:59
with these two stories she convinces the reader that her future really lies in the
18:03
short story rather than in the novel. Few American writers have such a natural
18:08
dramatic story sense, and to this Susan Glaswell has added an increasing reticence in
18:15
the portrayal of her characters. In these two stories, you will not find
18:19
the slightest sentimentalization of her subject matter, nor is it keyed so tightly as
18:26
some of her previous work. A Jury of Her Peers is one of the
18:30
better folk stories of the year, sharing that distinction with the Excursion by Miss
18:36
Babcock and the two stories by Francis Bizzell of which I have spoken above.
18:41
Thirty one His Father's Flag by Armistead C. Gordon Scribner's Magazine. The many
18:48
readers who have reveled in mister Gordon's admirable portraits of Virginia Negro plantation life will
18:56
be surprised and gratified at mister Gordon's venture in d this story into a new
19:00
field. This story has all the infectious emotional feeling of memory recalling glorious things,
19:08
and I can only compare it for its spiritual fidelity toward a cause to
19:12
the stories by Elsie Singmaster which he has gathered into her volume about Gettysburg,
19:18
and particularly to that fine story The Survivors thirty two The Bunker Mouse and thirty
19:26
three Molly McGuire fourteen by Frederick Stuart Greene The Century Magazine. Captain Greene's story
19:34
The Cat of the Cane Brake attracted so much attention at the time of its
19:40
publication in the Metropolitan Magazine a year ago that it is interesting to find him
19:45
achieving high distinction in other imaginative fields. Captain Green's natural gift of narrative is
19:52
the result of a strong impulse toward creative expression, which molds its form a
19:59
little self conscious but convincingly for the most part. I think that he is
20:03
at his best in these two stories rather than in The Cat of the Canebrake
20:10
and the Black Pool, because they are based upon a more direct apprehension and
20:15
experience of life. Molly McGuire fourteen adds one more tradition to those of the
20:21
Virginia Military Institute. Thirty four Rainbow Pete by Richard Matthews Hallett. The Pictorial
20:30
Review reveals the author in his most incorrigibly romantic mood. Mister Hallett cast glamour
20:36
over his creations, partly through his detached and pictorial perception of life, and
20:41
partly through the magic of his words. He has been compared to Conrad,
20:45
and in a lesser way. He has much in common with the author of
20:48
Lord Jim, but his artistic method is essentially different and quite as individual.
20:55
Thirty five Phrasy by Lee Foster Hartman, Harper's Magie. Mister Hartman has been
21:00
a good friend to other story writers for so long that we have begun to
21:06
forget how fine an artist he can be himself. In phrasey, he has
21:10
taken a subject which would have fascinated missus Jerul and handled it with reserve and
21:15
power. It is pitched in a quieter key than is usual on such a
21:19
story, and the result is that character merges with atmosphere almost imperceptibly. I
21:26
regard the story as almost a model of construction for students of short story writing.
21:33
Thirty six four Days by Hetty Hemenway Atlantic Monthly. This remarkable story of
21:38
the spiritual effect of the war upon two young people was so widely commented on,
21:45
not only after its appearance in the Atlantic Monthly, but later when it
21:49
was republished in book form, that I shall only commend it to the reader
21:53
here as an artistically woven study in war psychology. Thirty seven get Ready The
22:00
Wreaths by Fanny Hurst, Cosmopolitan Magazine. The artistic qualities in Miss Hurst's work,
22:07
which have commended themselves to such disinterested critics as mister Howell's, are revealed
22:14
once more in this story, in which Miss Hurst accepts the shoddiness of background
22:18
which characterizes her literary types and reveals the fine human current that runs beneath it
22:26
all. I am not sure that miss Hurst has not diluted her substance a
22:30
little too much during the past year, and in any case that danger is
22:34
implicit in her method. But in get Ready the Wreaths, the emotional validity
22:40
of her substance is absolutely unimpeachable, and her handling of the situation it presents
22:45
is adequate and fine. Thirty eight Journey's End by Percy Adams Hutcheson, Harper's
22:53
Magazine. An attentive reader of the American short stories during the past few years
22:59
may have observed with interest, at rare intervals the work of mister Hutcheson.
23:04
In it, there was always a promise of an achievement, not unlike that
23:08
of Percival Gibbon, but a certain looseness of texture prevented. Mister Hutcheson from
23:14
being completely persuasive. In Journey's end, however, it must be confessed that
23:19
he has written a memorable sea story that is certainly equal, at least to
23:23
the better stories in mister Kipling's latest volume thirty nine. The Strange Looking Man
23:30
by Fanny Kembell Johnson the Pagan. I suppose that this story is to be
23:36
regarded as a sketch rather than a short story, but in any case it
23:41
is a vividly rendered picture of war's effects, portrayed with subtle irony and quiet
23:47
art. I associate it with Shottonville by will Levington, Comfort and The Flying
23:52
Teuton by Alice Brown as one of the three stories with the most authentic spiritual
23:59
message in an American fiction that the war has produced. Forty The c Turn
24:04
by E. Clement James, the Seven Arts. In this study of the
24:11
spiritual reactions of a starved environment upon an imaginative mind, Missus Jones has added
24:17
a convincing character portrait to American letters, which ranks with the better short stories
24:22
of J. D. Beresford in a similar genre. The story is in
24:26
the same tradition as that of the younger English realists, but it is an
24:32
essential contribution to our nationalism, and as such helps to point the way towards
24:37
the future in which a true national literature must find it only an inevitable realization.
24:44
Forty one The Caller in the Night by Burton Klein, The Stratford Journal.
24:49
I believe that mister Klein has completely realized in this story a fine imaginative
24:55
situation, and has presented a folk story with a significant lie legendary quality.
25:00
It is in the tradition of Hawthorne, but the substance with which mister Klein
25:06
deals is the substance of his own people, and consequently that in which his
25:10
creative impulse has found the freest scope. It may be compared to its own
25:15
advantage with The Lost Phoebe by Theodore Dreiser, which was equally memorable among the
25:21
folk stories of nineteen sixteen, and the comparison suggests that in both cases the
25:27
author's training as a novelist has not been to his disadvantage as a short story
25:33
teller. Forty two When Did You Write Your Mother Last? By Addison Lewis
25:40
Reedy's Mirror. This is the only story I have read in three years in
25:45
which it seemed to me that I found the authentic voice of O. Henry
25:48
speaking. Mister Lewis has been publishing a series of these tales while you wait
25:53
in Reedy's Mirror during the past few months, and I should much prefer them
25:57
to those of Jack Lee eight for the complete success with which he has achieved
26:03
his aims. Imitation of O Henry has been the curse of American storytelling for
26:07
the past ten years, because O. Henry is practically inimitable. Mister Lewis
26:14
is not an imitator, but he may well prove before very long to be
26:18
O. Henry's successor. In the words of Padna Dan and MICUs Pat,
26:22
here's the chance for someone to make a discovery. Forty three Widow LaRue by
26:30
Edgar Lee masters Reedy's Mirror. This is the best short story in verse that
26:34
the year has produced, and his literature it realizes, in my belief,
26:40
even greater imaginative fulfillment than Spoon River Anthology. I should have most certainly wished
26:47
to include it in the Best Short Stories of nineteen seventeen had it been in
26:51
prose, and it adds one more unforgettable legend to our folk imagination. Forty
26:57
four The Understudy by Johnson Morton Harper's Magazine is an ironic character study, developed
27:04
with much finesse in the tradition of Henry James. Its defect is a certain
27:10
conventional atmosphere which demands an artificial attitude on the part of the reader. Its
27:15
admirable distinction is its faithful rendering of a personality, not unlike the taunt of
27:22
Anne Douglas Sedgwick. If a novel portrait and a short story portrait may fittingly
27:27
be compared, if the portraiture is unpleasant, it is at any rate rendered
27:33
with incisive kindliness. Forty five The Heart of Life by Meredith Nicholson, Scribner's
27:41
Magazine. Mister Nicholson has treated an old theme freshly in the Heart of Life,
27:47
and discovered in it new values of contrasting character. Among his short stories,
27:52
it stands out as notably as a Hoosier chronicle among his novels. It
27:57
is in such work as this that mister Nicholson justifies his calling, and it
28:03
is by them that he has most hope of remembrance in American literature. Forty
28:08
six Murder by Sumus O'Brien The Illustrated Sunday Magazine, with something of Hardy's stark
28:17
rendering of atmosphere, mister O'Brien has portrayed a grim situation, unforgettably woven out
28:23
of the simplest elements, and with an entire lack of literary sophistication. His
28:29
story is fairly comparable to the work of Daniel Corkery, whose volume A Monster
28:33
Twilight has interested me more than any other volume of short stories published in America
28:41
this year. The story is of particular interest because mister O'Brien's reputation as an
28:45
artist has been based solely upon his work as a satirist and Irish fabulouist.
28:52
Forty seven The Interval by Vincent O'Sullivan, Boston Evening Transcript. It is odd
29:00
to reflect that a literary artist of mister Sullivan's distinction is not represented in American
29:07
magazines during nineteen seventeen at all, and that it has been left to a
29:11
daily newspaper to publish his work. In the Interval, mister O'Sullivan has sought
29:17
to suggest the spiritual effect of the war upon a certain type of mind.
29:22
He is rendered with faithful settleness, the newly aroused longing for religious belief or
29:27
some form of concrete spiritual expression that bereavement brings. This state has a pathos
29:33
of its own that the author adequately realizes in his story, in his irony
29:40
in portraying it is gallic in its quality. Forty eight Bixby's Bridge by Georgia
29:47
Wood Pangborn Harper's Magazine. Missus Pangborne is well known for her artistic stories of
29:53
the supernatural, and this will rank among the very best of them. She
29:57
shares with Algournon blos Backwood that gift for making spiritual illusion real, which is
30:03
so rare in contemporary work. What is specially distinctive is her gift of selection,
30:08
by which she brings out the most elusive psychological contrasts. Forty nine A
30:15
Certain rich Man by Lawrence Perry Scribner's Magazine. I find in this story an
30:22
emotional quality keyed up as tightly but as surely as in the best short stories
30:26
by Mary Synon remote as its substance may seem, superficially, it touches the
30:33
very heart of the experience that the war has brought to us all and reveals
30:37
the naked stuff out of which our war psychology has emerged. Fifty The Portrait
30:45
by Emery Poddle the Touchstone. This study in Italian backgrounds is by another disciple
30:51
of Henry James, who portrays with deft, sure touches the nostalgia of an
30:56
American girl unhappily married to an Italian none. It just fails of complete persuasiveness
31:03
because it is a trifle overstrung, but nevertheless it is memorable for its artistic
31:08
sincerity. Fifty one The Path of Glory by Mary Brecht Pulver, Saturday Evening
31:15
Post. This story of how distinction came to a poor family in the Mountains
31:21
through the death of their son in the French Army is simply told with a
31:25
quiet, unassuming, earnestness that makes it very real. It marks a new
31:30
phase of missus Pulver's talent, and one which promises her a richer fulfillment in
31:34
the future than her other stories have suggested time and time again. I have
31:40
been impressed this year by the folk quality that is manifest in our younger writers.
31:45
And what is most encouraging is that when they write of the poor and
31:48
the lowly, there is less of that condescension toward their subject than has been
31:53
characteristic of American folk writing in the past. Fifty two Miss Fothergill by Norville
32:01
Richardson Scribner's Magazine. The tradition in English fiction which is most signally marked by
32:08
pride and prejudice, Cranford and Barchester Towers, and which was so pleasantly continued
32:15
by the late doctor S. W. R. Mitchell and by Margaret de
32:17
Land, is admirably embodied in the work of this writer, whose work should
32:22
be better known. The quiet blending of humor and pathos in Miss Fothergill is
32:28
unusual. Fifty three The Scar That Tripled by William Gunn Shephard Metropolitan Magazine is
32:36
nonetheless truly a remarkable short story because it happens to be based on fact.
32:40
The Deserter was the last fine short story written by the late Richard Harding Davis,
32:46
and The Scar That Tripled is the engrossing narrative of the adventure which suggested
32:52
that story. Personally, I regarded as superior to The Deserter. Fifty four
32:59
A Entry Christmas by Grant Showerman, Century Magazine. Professor Showerman's Country chronicles are
33:07
now well known to American readers, and this is quite the best of them.
33:10
These sketches rank with those of Hamlin Garland as a permanent and delightful record
33:15
of a pioneer life that has passed away forever. Their deliberate homeliness and consistent
33:22
reflection of a small boy's attitude toward life have no equal to my knowledge.
33:28
Fifty five The Christmas Angel, The Pictorial Review and fifty six The Flag of
33:35
Alephelet Boston Evening Transcript by Elsie Singmaster add two more portraits to the pleasant gallery
33:42
of Elsie Singmaster's vivid creations. Although her vein is a narrow one, no
33:46
one is more competent than she in its expression, and few surpass her in
33:52
the faithful rendering of homely but nonetheless real spiritual circumstance. Fifty seven The End
34:00
of the Road by Gordon Arthur Smith. Scribner's Magazine is a sequel two Feet
34:06
of Gold and chronicles the further love adventures of Ferdinand Thailandi and their tragic conclusion.
34:13
In these two stories, mister Smith has proven his literary kinship with Leonard
34:17
Merrick, and these stories Shirley Rank with the Chronicles of Tricketrin and p Two
34:23
fifty eight Ching Ching Chinaman Pictorial Review, fifty nine Ked's Hand Harper's Magazine,
34:31
sixty White Hands Pictorial Review, and sixty one The Woman at Seven Brothers Harper's
34:38
Magazine by Wilbur Daniel Steele. With these four stories together with a Devil of
34:45
a Fellow Free and a point of honor, mister Steele assumes his rightful place
34:51
with Katharine Fullerton, Jeroul and H. G. Dwight as a leader in
34:55
American fiction. Ching Ching Chinaman, White Hand and The Woman at Seven Brothers
35:01
are, in my belief, the three best short stories that were published in
35:07
nineteen seventeen by an American author, and I may safely predict their literary permanence.
35:13
Mister Steele's extraordinary gift for presenting action and spiritual conflict pictorially is unrivaled,
35:20
and his sense of human mystery has a rich, tragic humor akin to that
35:24
of Thomas Hardy, though his philosophy of life is infinitely more hopeful. Sixty
35:30
two None So Blind by Mary Sinon Harper's Magazine is a study in tragic circumstances,
35:37
the more powerful because it is so reticently handled. It is Miss Sinon's
35:43
first profound study in feminine psychology and reveals an unusual sense of emotional values.
35:50
Few backgrounds have been more subtly rendered in their influence upon character, and the
35:55
action of the story is inevitable despite its character of surprise. Sixty three The
36:01
Scar by Elizabeth Stead Taber The Seven Arts. The brutal realism of this story
36:07
may repel the reader, but its power and convincing quality cannot be gainsaid.
36:14
So many writers have followed John Fox's example in writing about the mountaineers of the
36:20
Alleghanies, that it is gratifying to chronicle so exceptional a story as this.
36:24
It is as inevitable in its ugliness as The Cat of the Cane Brake by
36:30
Frederick Stewart Greene, and psychologically it is far more convincing. End of section
36:37
thirty three end of the Best Short Stories of nineteen seventeen by various