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Short Story-Writing: An Art or a Trade?

Chapter 18: FOOTNOTES:
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About This Book

The author examines whether short-story composition is a fine art or a commercial trade, blending pedagogy with critical commentary. He critiques popular influences that encourage formulaic or sensational tales, surveys technical elements such as action, plot construction, endings, and the relationship of form to substance, and warns against cinematic imitation and contrived conclusions. Chapters mix classroom observations, recurring faults, and practical guidance for cultivating effective narrative effect and craft. The work aims to help aspiring writers distinguish enduring artistic choices from market-driven shortcuts and to sharpen technique through disciplined attention to structure, tone, and reader response.

INDEX

  • Addison, Joseph, 115.
  • Ade, George, 9.
  • Admirable Crichton, The, 77.
  • Aeschylus, 109.
  • American Magazine, The, 70, 71.
  • Anderson, Sherwood, 16, 17, 79, 81, 128, 129; The Other Woman, 81.
  • Atheist’s Mass, An, 85, 86.
  • Balzac, Honoré, de, 85, 86, 118; An Atheist’s Mass, 85, 86.
  • Barnes, Djuna, 17.
  • Barrie, J. M., 77.
  • Bates, Arlo, 2.
  • Beyond the Horizon, 64.
  • Bierce, Ambrose, 9.
  • Brandes, Georg, 87.
  • Brooks, Van Wyck, 73.
  • Brown, Alice, 17.
  • Butler, Ellis Parker, 8.
  • Cabell, James Branch, 17, 79; The Wedding Jest, 111.
  • Clay, Bertha M., 79.
  • Chambers, Robert W., 9.
  • Chatterton, Thomas, 6.
  • Chekhov, Anton, 13, 26, 74, 99; Ward No. 6, 33.
  • Chester, George Randolph, 33.
  • Chwang-Tse, 22, 23.
  • Cohen, Octavus Roy, 16.
  • Conrad, Joseph, 27, 103, 119; Youth, 27, 110.
  • Crane, Frank, 34, 71, 87.
  • D’Annunzio, Gabrielle, 74.
  • Davis, Richard Harding, 33.
  • Daudet, Alphonse, 78.
  • Dial, The, 69.
  • Dickens, Charles, 51, 118.
  • Dostoyevski, Fyodor, 74, 116.
  • Dreiser, Theodore, 17, 34, 79, 82; The Lost Phoebe, 34.
  • Edwards, Jonathan, 85.
  • Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 62.
  • Esenwein, J. Berg, 127; Writing the Photoplay, 58, 90; Writing the Short Story, 127.
  • Fall of the House of Usher, The, 14, 15.
  • Flaubert, Gustave, 86; Madame Bovary, 86.
  • Four Million, The, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40.
  • Frank, Waldo, 8, 17.
  • Freeman, Mary E. Wilkins, 33, 110; The Revolt of Mother, 33, 110, 111.
  • Gerould, Katharine Fullerton, 44.
  • Glaspell, Susan, 17.
  • Gorki, Maxim, 38, 74; Her Lover, 38.
  • Gourmont, Remy de, 120, 121; Le Probleme du Style, 120, 121.
  • Griffith, David Wark, 105, 106.
  • Hall, Holworthy, 16.
  • Hamsun, Knut, 5.
  • Hardy, Thomas, 64.
  • Harper’s Magazine, 69.
  • Harte, Bret, 103.
  • Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 65.
  • Hearn, Lafcadio, 11.
  • Hecht, Ben, 17.
  • Her Lover, 38.
  • Hergesheimer, Joseph, 5, 8; Java Head, 23.
  • Howells, William Dean, 15; Great Modern American Stories, 34.
  • Hugo, Victor, 119.
  • Hungry Hearts, 34.
  • Hurst, Fannie, 5.
  • In the Moonlight, 33, 111.
  • Irving, Washington, 116.
  • James, Henry, 116.
  • Java Head, 23.
  • Jessup, Alexander, 44.
  • John Ferguson, 64.
  • Johnston, William, 35, 41, 42.
  • Kelland, Clarence Budington, 33.
  • Kipling, Rudyard, 4, 26, 103, 126; Without Benefit of Clergy, 33.
  • Kling, Joseph, 32.
  • Kuprin, Ivan, 118.
  • Lawrence, D. H., 74.
  • Leeds, Arthur, 56.
  • Lewisohn, Ludwig, 23, 24.
  • Literary Digest, The, 105.
  • Little Review, The, 16, 69, 81.
  • London, Jack, 4, 7, 8, 9, 41, 103, 114, 115, 118; Martin Eden, 4.
  • Lost Phoebe, The, 34.
  • McCardell, Roy L., 55.
  • Macdonald, George, 116.
  • Madame Bovary, 86.
  • Maeterlink, Maurice, 74.
  • Malthus, 114.
  • Marden, Orison Swett, 34.
  • Markheim, 14, 15.
  • Martin Eden, 4.
  • Masefield, John, 4.
  • Mason, Walt, 34.
  • Mather, Cotton, 85.
  • Matthews, Brander, 33.
  • Maupassant, Guy de, 14, 15, 26, 33, 103, 109, 111, 130; Solitude, 14, 15; In the Moonlight, 33, 111.
  • Mencken, H. L., 47.
  • Nation, The, 24, 112, 113, 128.
  • New Success, The, 69.
  • O’Brien, Edward J., 15; Best Short Stories of 1920, 81, 97; Best Short Stories of 1919, 97.
  • O. Henry, 9, 22, 26, 29, 30, 31, 32, 35, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 60, 116, 135; The Four Million, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40.
  • Our America, 8.
  • Our Short Story Writers, 9, 39.
  • Pagan, The, 16, 32.
  • Passing of King Arthur, The, 6.
  • Patee, Fred Lewis, 44.
  • People’s Favorite Magazine, 87.
  • Poe, Edgar Allan, 14, 15, 26, 42, 74, 102, 116; The Fall of the House of Usher, 14, 15.
  • Pollock, Channing, 51.
  • Porter, William Sidney (See “O. Henry”).
  • Probleme du Style, Le, 121.
  • Revolt of Mother, The, 33, 110, 111.
  • Rinehart, Mary Roberts, 33.
  • Robbins, E. M., 54.
  • Sandburg, Carl, 118.
  • Sapho, 78.
  • Saturday Evening Post, The, 69, 71.
  • Seven Arts, The, 7, 84.
  • Shakespeare, 60, 116.
  • Smart Set, The, 69.
  • Solitude, 14, 15.
  • Spingarn, Joel Elias, 83.
  • Steele, Richard, 115.
  • Stevenson, Robert Louis, 14, 26; Markheim, 14, 15.
  • Tagore, Rabindranath, 124.
  • Tatler, The, 115.
  • Times, The New York, 45.
  • Triumph of the Egg, The, 129.
  • Twain, Mark, 7, 41.
  • Van Doren, Carl, 112, 113.
  • Villon, François, 6.
  • Walter, Eugene, 60.
  • Ward No. 6, 33.
  • Warner, Charles Dudley, 120.
  • Wedding Jest, The, 111.
  • Wells, H. G., 99.
  • Whitman, Walt, 82, 99.
  • Williams, Blanche Colton, 9, 39.
  • Winesburg, Ohio, 129.
  • Without Benefit of Clergy, 33.
  • Witwer, H. C., 8, 65.
  • Writer’s Monthly, The, 56, 71.
  • Writing the Photoplay, 58, 90.
  • Writing the Short Story, 127.
  • Yezierska, Anzia, 34; Hungry Hearts, 34.
  • Youth, 27, 110.
  • Zola, Emile, 74.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Our America, by Waldo Frank.

[2] Our Short Story Writers, by Blanche Colton Williams, PH.D.

[3] The Case of “John Hawthorne,” Ludwig Lewisohn, The Nation, February 16, 1921.

[4] Joseph Kling, editor of The Pagan, in symposium appended to “The Best College Short stories.” The Stratford Company.

[5] Both of these stories are to be found in William Dean Howells’ “Great Modern American Stories: An Anthology.” Boni & Liveright.

[6] Houghton, Mifflin Co.

[7] The Bookman, February 1921.

[8] See “Best Russian Short Stories,” Modern Library.

[9] “Our Short Story Writers.” Moffat, Yard and Company.

[10] Fred Lewis Patee in The Cambridge History of American Literature, Vol. II, p. 394. I find that Mr. Alexander Jessup has drawn on the same source on O. Henry in his Introduction to “The Best American Humorous Stories,” Modern Library.

[11] Introduction to Ibsen’s “Master Builder, Etc.,” Modern Library.

[12] Photoplay Magazine, August, 1919.

[13] E. M. Robbins, in the 1919 Year Book issued by Camera.

[14] Arthur Leeds in The Writer’s Monthly, April, 1919.

[15] Arthur Leeds in The Writer’s Monthly, May, 1920.

[16] Writing the Photoplay, Esenwein and Leeds.

[17] Ibid.

[18] Dr. Frank Crane to the Literary Novice, An Interview. Writer’s Monthly, January, 1921.

[19] Letters and Leadership.

[20] Little Review, May-June, 1920. Also included in E. J. O’Brien’s “Best Short Stories of 1920,” Small, Maynard & Company, and in Anderson’s “The Triumph of the Egg.” B. W. Huebsch.

[21] Joel Elias Spingarn, “The Seven Arts and The Seven Confusions,” Seven Arts, March, 1917.

[22] George Brandes, On Reading.

[23] “All Else Will Pass,” People’s Favorite Magazine, January, 1921.

[24] Writing the Photoplay, Esenwein & Leeds.

[25] Literary Digest, May 14, 1921.

[26] “Booth Tarkington,” The Nation, February 9, 1921.

[27] From Ludwig Lewisohn’s translation in “A Modern Book of Criticism.” Boni & Liveright.

[28] “The Victory,” in Hungry Stones and Other Stories.

[29] Writing the Short Story, by J. Berg Esenwein, A.M., Lit.D.

[30] Editorial Reviewer in The Nation.

[31] Sherwood Anderson in an interview for Brentano’s Book Chat.

[32] Sherwood Anderson advertising an exhibition of his paintings in the Little Review.

[33] Guy de Maupassant, in his preface to Pierre et Jean.


Corrections

The first line indicates the original, the second the correction.

p. 1

  • There as so many stories afloat
  • There are so many stories afloat

p. 105

  • where others have made scanty half-millons
  • where others have made scanty half-millions

p. 124

  • it will captivate and thrill; ruffle annd soothe;
  • it will captivate and thrill; ruffle and soothe;

p. 126

  • and accepted intelligent advice of one kind or another—from eniment
  • and accepted intelligent advice of one kind or another—from eminent

p. 133

  • Truth and spontaniety are more to me than commercial artifice and success.
  • Truth and spontaneity are more to me than commercial artifice and success.

p. 134

  • I have no fear of displeasing ony one,
  • I have no fear of displeasing any one,