What is a Short Story?

Strictly speaking, a short story, often called short fiction (who cares what it’s called), is a story with no more than 4 characters and 3 quick scenes. My quick perusal of the table of contents of my volume of the stories of Flannery O’Connor, an accomplished short story writer, shows a total page length of from 8 to 21 pages, which is about the range which mine fall into, though I have one more than 50 pages long, hovering between a short story and a novella, but who cares if it’s good.

I started writing short stories when I was in a writing class at the University of Wisconsin, and my teacher suggested that if I wanted to learn to write more parsimoniously, I should write a short story and recommended the above guidelines. I did, and I thought what I wrote was good, and wrote more of them. Now I have enough for a collection which I’m going to publish when it to it.

A novella may be a short novel, but a short story is NOT just a short novella. It has a different structure altogether. You have to suggest a whole world in a very short space. It’s more difficult to write a short story than a novel because it is so compressed.

You read some famous ones, like those authored by the above-cited O’Connor, or O. Henry, or Shirley Jackson. The latter’s The Box and O. Henry’s The Ransom of Red Chief, are classics and fun to read even if you don’t want to write any. I saw a classic, short film of the O. Henry work with Fred Allen and some other famous comedian. There was a more modern film with Bette Midler and Danny DeVito adapted from O. Henry’s story.

There are a lot of pieces out there called “short stories” that aren’t. They may be good, but they’re not short stories. I have one 50 pages long, which hovers on the border between a short story and a novella. I don’t really care what one may call it.

Next time: Flash Fiction