The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1915-03-11

THE SHORT STORY: ITS PLACE IN MOD
ERIN LITERATURE AND THOUGHT
Chantauqua Paper By Beau Esprita

Chantauqua Paper By Beau Esprita
The short story as we know it today, is dis
tinctly modern form of literature. Brief tales
there have been since the world began; since the
cave men filled the long evenings around the
smoking fire with narratives of the wOndrous deeds
of the mysterious creatures with which their
primitive imaginations conceived the universe to
be populated The story writer is, in way, a
direct descendant of the old time story teller who
went about from place to place spinning yarns OF
the adventures and misadventures which, in his
fancy had befallen. The epic poem, that marvel
of imaginative latitude, for centuries the
dominant story form: and we find many great
stories in the famous epics of the ancients. Pro-
fessor Baldwin, in his preface to American
Short Stories" has pointed out that the ancient
and medieval tales were of three distinct types
the simple anecdote the scenaror, condensed
plot, and the linked anecdotes, or epic. which,
very rarely. approached somewhat the modern
short story form. These distinctions are largely
academic and are based principally on the length
of the tale most of the ancient and medieval tales
being restricted as to form to comply with the
necessities of oral reproduction.
The first written stories of which now know
are those Of the Egyptian papyrus, about 1000 B.
"
of the 10Th century A. D.. there no essential
progress in form structure of the tale, with the
exception of isolated instances. Several of these
occur in the sacred books of the east, and more
particularly in the old testament and kindred
writings of the Jews. The story of the Prodigal
Son is the purest and most beautiful style of
anecdote, and modern literature has yet to produce
the writer who can equal the simple and powerful
beauty of the Book of Ruth.
Brete Harte once said that the American short
story is the germ of American literature to come.
This might be extended by eliminating the second
American without undue exageration, for the
short story of Irving, Hawthorne and Poe has left
it's indellibe impress on the literature of all mod
ern nations. In France the center, of the literary
world during the early part of the 10Th century,
Merimee, Nodier, Bazac and Musset seized with
enthusiasm on the new narrative form as deineated
in the stories and critical writings of Poe, and in
Germany that master techncian E. T. A. Hoff-
man, on the newly created loom those tales of
delicate phantasy which were to place him high
among modern classic authors
Critics have differed, as critics will. as to the
relative value of the short story and the novel in
modern literature. The novel has the advantage
of having been developed long before the short
yet it is interesting to note that it has been by the
way of the short story that majority of the great
writer's of the 10Th and 10th centuries have won
prominence; and it is by their short stories that
such writer's as Poe, Harte Hawthorne and Irving;
Maupassant, Gautier, Balzac and Merrimee; Stew
enson, Barrie and Kipling, are best known
1t is certainly different mood perhaps even
different temperament that prefers the short story
to the novel; but the rush and hurry of modern
life tends to create and stimulate wider interest
in and larger demand for the shorter FORM The
busy readers of today who must cover so vast
field in order to keep abreast of the tide of modern
literature and thought, are less willing to have
their author elaborate and analyze incident and
character than formerly. 1t is, perhaps, ques-
ton whether this modern demand for quick action
for compression, for Capitalization of ideas so
manifest in every part of our life today is wholly
commendable: but it is fact with which we have
to deal in considering any phase of present day
life and thought and it undoubtedly works to en-
large the sphere of influence of the short story
The rise of the popular priced magazine is part
cause and part effect of the wide spread influence