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Aug 19, 2020 · Can a short story really be iconic in the way of a poem, or a painting, or Elvis? Well, who knows, but for our purposes, “iconic” means that the story has somehow wormed its way into the general cultural consciousness—a list of the best short stories in the English language would look quite different than the one below. (Also NB that in ...
- Why is The Internet in an Uproar Over a Single Short Story? ‹ Literary Hub
This weekend, everyone you know was reading “Cat Person,” a...
- The Best Short Stories Ever Written
It is perfect in its obscurity. The story has already done...
- The 32 Most Iconic Poems in The English Language ‹ Literary Hub
Wallace Stevens, “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird”...
- Why is The Internet in an Uproar Over a Single Short Story? ‹ Literary Hub
- Free Short Stories to Read Right Now
- “Lamb to The Slaughter” by Roald Dahl
- “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson
- “How to Become A Writer” by Lorrie Moore
- “Cat Person” by Kristen Roupenian
- “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver
- “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor
- “Symbols and Signs” by Vladimir Nabokov
- “Sticks” by George Saunders
- “The Veldt” by Ray Bradbury
These individual short stories are the best of the best — and the even better news is that they're available for free online for you to peruse. From classics published in the 1900s to a short story that exploded in late 2017, here are ten of the greatest free short storiesfor you to read.
While not exactly a philosophical or political tale like our first two examples, this twisty short storyfrom Dahl does delve into some shady moral territory. We are introduced to Mary Maloney: a loving wife and dedicated homemaker. In just a few short paragraphs describing how she welcomes her husband home, Dahl makes us sympathize with Mary — befo...
A perennial feature in many a high school syllabus, Shirley Jackson’s best-known short storyclinically details an unusual ritual that takes place in a small town. There’s not exactly a lot of plot to spoil in The Lottery — but within a few short pages, Jackson manages to represent the mob mentality that can drive reasonable people to commit heinous...
Told in the second person point of view, this story from Moore’s debut anthology Self-Helptakes an honest look at the inner life of a struggling artist. Through the use of an unusual POV, the author manages to turn her reader into a confidante — making it abundantly clear that the ‘you’ the narrator is speaking about is actually herself. This story...
In the Social Media Age, no short story has gone viral the way this New Yorker contributionfrom Roupenian has. Arriving at the height of #MeToo, it begins with 20-year-old Margot embarking on the early stages of flirtation with an older man, Robert. As she gets to know more about this man (as well as filling in the gaps with her imagination), the p...
First published in The Atlantic Monthly in 1981, “Cathedral”is today known as one of Raymond Carver’s finest works. When it opens, we meet a narrator whose wife is expecting a visit from an old friend, a blind man. Dissatisfied and distrusting of people not like him, our narrator struggles to connect until the blind man asks him to describe a cathe...
Innocuously titled, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”is nevertheless Flannery O’Connor’s bleakest — and most famous — work. It begins unassumingly with a Southern family who’s planning to go on a road trip. Yet the journey is rudely interrupted when their car overturns on an abandoned dirt road — and they are met by an enigmatic group of three men, comi...
The famous author of Lolita wrote “Signs and Symbols”in 1948. Its premise is seemingly simple: an elderly couple visits their mentally ill son in the sanatorium in America. Yet their background and trials come into sharp focus as the story develops, until an explosive ending disrupts everyone’s peace of mind. As you might expect, the somber “Symbol...
Not so much a short story as it is flash fiction, “Sticks”is written from the perspective of a young man whose father has an unusual habit: dressing up a crucifix that’s built of out a metal pole in the yard. One of America’s greatest living short story writers, George Saunders explained: "For two years I'd been driving past a house like the one in...
If there’s anyone who you can trust to deliver thought-provoking, terrifying science fiction on the regular, it’s Ray Bradbury. In “The Veldt,”George and Lydia Hadley have bought an automated house that comes with a “nursey,” or a virtual reality room. Worried about the nursery’s effect on the kids, George and Lydia think about turning off the nurs...
- Reedsy
Complete Short Stories by D. H. Lawrence. This collection brings together a vast array of narratives exploring human nature, relationships, and society through the lens of early 20th-century experiences. The stories delve into themes of love, sexuality, class, and industrialization, often challenging the norms and mores of the time.
Dec 23, 2019 · We began with the best debut novels of the decade, and now we’re back with the best short story collections of the decade—or to be precise, the best collections published in English between 2010 and 2019. The following books were chosen after much debate (and several rounds of voting) by the Literary Hub staff.
- Book Marks
- Afterparties by Anthony Veasna So. (Ecco) 22 Rave • 5 Positive • 1 Mixed. “The presence of the author is so vivid in Afterparties, Anthony Veasna So’s collection of stories, he seems to be at your elbow as you read … The personality that animates Afterparties is unmistakably youthful, and the stories themselves are mainly built around conditions of youth—vexed and tender relationships with parents, awkward romances, nebulous worries about the future.
- Filthy Animals by Brandon Taylor. (Riverhead) 19 Rave • 7 Positive • 2 Mixed. Read an interview with Brandon Taylor here. “Taylor plays the Lionel-Charles-Sophie storyline for all its awkwardness and resentment, but it can feel like a note held too long to suspend commitment, which is the resolution we’re trained to expect … The violence is neither glamorous nor gratuitous; it is senseless without being pointless.
- First Person Singular by Haruki Murakami. (Knopf) 13 Rave • 17 Positive • 7 Mixed • 5 Pan. “… a blazing and brilliant return to form … a taut and tight, suspenseful and spellbinding, witty and wonderful group of eight stories … there isn’t a weak one in the bunch.
- That Old Country Music by Kevin Barry. (Doubleday) 13 Rave • 10 Positive •1 Mixed. “There’s not a bad story in the bunch, and it’s as accomplished a book as Barry has ever written … Barry does an excellent job probing the psyche of his diffident protagonist, and ends the story with an unexpected moment of sweetness that’s anything but cloying—realism doesn’t need to be miserablism, he seems to hint; sometimes things actually do work out … Barry has a rare gift for crafting characters the reader cares about despite their flaws; in just 13 pages, he manages to make Hannah and Setanta come to life through sharp dialogue and keen observations … Barry proves to be a master of writing about both love and cruelty … Barry brilliantly evokes both the good and bad sides of love, and does so with stunningly gorgeous writing … There’s not an aspect of writing that Barry doesn’t excel at.
In this article we’re going to look at the top English-language short stories that everyone should read. If you’re interested in developing your reading skills and learning how to construct persuasive prose , or looking at what it takes to produce your own film at our Film Academy Course , take a look at our Oxford Summer Course , Cambridge ...
There are over 4000 titles in our short story library, including the greatest short stories ever written. The best short story collection on the internet.
