On Writing Short Stories
Don't overlook theOnin the title ofOn Writing Short  Stories. Though there is a chapter by its editor, Tom Bailey, on the  elements of short fiction, the book explores a variety of issues of  interest to short-story writers. Francine Prose grapples with the  what-constitutes-a-short-story question: "Great short stories make us  marvel at their integrity, their economy," she writes. "If we went at them  with our blue pencils, we might find we had nothing to do." Joyce Carol  Oates ponders reading as a writer, Andre Dubus contemplates the habit of  writing, and Robert Coles explores "literatures as a means of understanding  human affairs."C. Michael Curtis, writer of 30 to 40 rejection letters daily as senior editor forThe Atlantic Monthly, tells how best to ensure that your short-fiction submissions receive "friendly consideration." And University of Iowa Writers' Workshop director Frank Conroy weighs in on the writer's workshop and what he sees as the mistaken belief that workshops imprint themselves upon their students' work. "Art cannot be made by committee," he writes. "The student ... should not be looking for solutions from the other students or from the teacher. The student should be looking for problems in the text that he or she had not been aware of." Also here are writing exercises; a list of magazines, journals, and quarterlies that publish short fiction; and 18 classic short stories, including de Maupassant's "The String," Tillie Olsen's "I Stand Here Ironing," and Tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried."--Jane Steinberg