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7th out of 218 books
—
70 voters
The Best American Short Stories of the Century (The Best American Short Stories)
by
John Updike ,
Jean Toomer , Ernest Hemingway , Willa Cather , Grace Stone Coates , Katherine Anne Porter , William Faulkner , Dorother Parker
,
more…
Since the series' inception in 1915, the annual volumes of The Best American Short Stories have launched literary careers, showcased the most compelling stories of each year, and confirmed for all time the significance of the short story in our national literature. Now THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES OF THE CENTURY brings together the best -- fifty-six extraordinary storie...more
Paperback, 864 pages
Published
April 20th 2000
by Mariner Books
(first published April 5th 1999)
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OK I know it's cliche to rate this five stars but for the record I normally don't rate BASS and BAE that well.. BUT here I got a chance to read writer's I've long heard so much about but hadn't really read - like Joyce Carol Oates (ridonculous, time-less story in here, Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?, about a pretty girl who gets lots of attention but it eventually gets her in a jam), and F. Scott Fitzgerald, because really I'd long been in the camp who'd read Gatsby and nothing else o...more
It can't be easy to choose the best American short stories of the 20th Century. Even if you have over 700 pages to fill (like this collection) classic stories are bound to be left out. Although there are plenty of good stories here from canonical writers, I had a few problems with this anthology. First of all, some of the stories were not very good, and I can't help feeling that they were chosen because they fit some kind of needed token representation. It's a crime that Shirley Jackson's "The L...more
This ought have been called the "Best American Short Stories About New York WASPs, Jewish Males and the Dark South." From Flannery O' Connor we get "Greenleaf", a questionable and surely non-representative selection; from Hemingway "The Killers", probably among the lesser third from The Snows of Kilmanjaro. Also, I'm pretty sure Alice Munro is Canadian, yet John O' Hara finds no place here (both are semi-explained in Updike's introduction--the former hailing from "Anglophone Canada" (how does th...more
There were a few really good ones hidden among the pages. As a writer, it gave me hope that this is the best America can do. It's saying I got a chance. Either that or it was a really slow century. Its kind of funny because at the beginning John Updike explains how he tried to get a sampling across all walks of American life, yet the majority of the stories are about Jews or the Jim Crow south. The rest of them are about New York. I am quite sick of hearing about New York. Only a few stories des...more
First you should know I've always loved short stories. The really great ones seem to have all the richness and plot and feeling of a novel, but wrapped up in a few short pages. So it's a challenging genre to do well, sort of like the famous apology from Blaise Pascal for writing a long letter because he "lacked the time to make it short." This book is specifically American stories published in the 20th century, and you can imagine the process they must have gone through to narrow down the list....more
What I learned from this book... Edward O'Brien, who started the annual Best American Short Stories, saw the virtue in our diversity as a nation being represented so well in a distinctly American literature. So from the intro I learned that the short story form is an American genre (think Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, etc) and it has been mostly dismissed by the rest of the literary world for lacking "sophistication and technique".
The introductions are given by the year's guest editor and...more
The introductions are given by the year's guest editor and...more
Many of my favorite authors were in here, Ernest hemingway, William Faulkner, Joyce carol Oates, Richard Wright, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tennessee Williams, Robert Penn Warren and many more I plan on reading in the future. This was a wonderful collection of short stories from crime, love, illness, death, racism, and humor.
Short stories! What could be better reading material for someone with a head cold, mild general malaise, and the attention span of a five-year-old?
There actually is an answer to this question, and it's "comic books." But I'm fresh out, so Updike's favorites will have to tide me over.
There actually is an answer to this question, and it's "comic books." But I'm fresh out, so Updike's favorites will have to tide me over.
I would be hard-pressed to say anything negative about a collection of short stories selected by John Updike. This collection of stories are character and era-defining, stunning classics of American short story literature. With pieces from classic American authors like Faulkner, O'Brian, and Lardner, it does not disappoint. I was excited to read and reread each story to pick up differnt details and subtlities; each author had his/her own way of expressing the period sentiment.
My opinion of this...more
My opinion of this...more
A wonderful collection. We really lost a jewel when Updike died.
Updike's scan of the twentieth century's short fiction. I liked it best when I didn't know the authors-- or when the reason for its inclusion wasn't immediately apparent (outside of how the story itself was written). Updike seems to have taken the job of editing to give a time line of major events in the century and how they were handled by the writers at the time (or a little after). Grateful for now knowing about Paul Horgan and the stellar "Peach Stone." Mostly this is the who's who roster of...more
Wow -- this is one of the best books I read in 2010. So many great stories by my favorite authors (Willa Cather, Sherwood Anderson, Ring Lardner, John Updike, I.B. Singer, ) and also great stories by genius writers whose short stories I had never read: Lonnie Moore, Tennessee Williams, E.B. White, Dorothy Parker, and James Allen McPherson. There were several stories that were too dark for my taste, so I skipped them. The best of the best was probably Alice Munro's Meneseteung. This is what writi...more
This book has been my occasional bedtime reading material since the middle of September (OK, there was a while when I wasn’t reading before going to sleep). The Best American Short Story volumes have been publishing the best American short stories for each year since 1915; and this volume contains the editors’ opinion of the best fifty-five stories, from “Zelig” by Benjamin Rosenblatt in 1915 to “The Half-Skinned Steer” by Annie Proulx in 1998. Some of these stories I have encountered before in...more
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Mar 09, 2012
Lisa (Harmonybites)
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Lovers of Short Literary Fiction
The title is a misnomer. Not that there aren't some wonderful stories here, but they were never really chosen because they're the best American short stories of the 20th century. Rather, these are Updike's 56 picks out of the 2,000 stories originally chosen in the 84 volumes of a yearly anthology published from 1915 through 1999. If a story was never published in Best American Stories they weren't available to be selected. Updike couldn't select "Paul's Case" by Willa Cather, "Are These Actual M...more
Yes, I finished the last four stories of this fifty-six story volume during the week that little Nico decided to arrive in this world. I found it useful to have this book at the hospital as I read outloud a few of the stories I most appreciated to Jessica and Nico during labor (yes, there are some calmer moments before the dilation and the "big push"). I noted about 20 stories for a re-read due to story construction, writing technique, or overall likability of the story, which of course, is trul...more
November 2010
Just re-listened to this collection, and once again, thoroughly enjoyed it.Great collection. This is one I could listen to many, many times.
Some favorites:
"Wild Plums" by Grace Stone Coates
"Here We Are" Dorothy Parker
"The German Refuge" Bernard Malamud
Listened on audio. Some of my favorite authors (Mary Gordon, Charles Baxter, Lorrie Moore)are featured as readers here.
One big disappointment:
The short story "The Shawl" is one I read years ago and it hit me hard. It is read here by t...more
Just re-listened to this collection, and once again, thoroughly enjoyed it.Great collection. This is one I could listen to many, many times.
Some favorites:
"Wild Plums" by Grace Stone Coates
"Here We Are" Dorothy Parker
"The German Refuge" Bernard Malamud
Listened on audio. Some of my favorite authors (Mary Gordon, Charles Baxter, Lorrie Moore)are featured as readers here.
One big disappointment:
The short story "The Shawl" is one I read years ago and it hit me hard. It is read here by t...more
Aug 15, 2007
John Wiswell
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Literary readers, short story readers, modern classics readers
Updike's The Best American Short Stories of the Century underrepresents humor and "genre" fiction, and for every drop of optimism there is a bucket of pessimism - so, it's a typical literary fiction collection. These are not the best-told stories, nor the most interesting stories. Those Updike selects are chosen for their literary value, their intellectual depth and understanding of more delicate elements of the craft, like religious allusions or flexible voice. Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzge...more
This is a truly amazing collection! My mom and I each had a copy and read it at roughly the same time. (My mom, of course, finished first!) I eagerly await each yearly edition of the Best American Short Stories, so this volume was a special treat for me. One of the things that surprised me about this book was just how 'American' it is. John Updike notes in his introduction that he tried not just to choose stories written in America, but stories that truly tell us something ABOUT America. I think...more
I've been addicted to short stories for a while now, and this volume really helped the craving. It's story-telling through the 20th century, with a story (or two) for each year starting in 1915. It's interesting to see how the short story has changed over the years. There are a lot of amazing, must-read stories in this book, and a few that made me wonder why they'd been included. At the end, I was sorry it was over.
I'm generally not a short story reader, so this audio collection seemed like the perfect way to correct that. Enjoying most of them so far, though I'm wishing for some commentary about why each story made the cut. Also, I wish this audio wasn't abridged, Hemingway and Joyce Carol Oates among others are crowded out of an already impossible-to-narrow collection.
Sweet Mary, did John Updike do a smashing job with this collection! Sure, I quibble at what is missing: Sonny's Blues, People Like That Are the Only People Here, Brokeback Mountain, Are These Actual Miles? But what is here is so very rich. Annie Proulx, Lorrie Moore, Donald Barthelmay, Joyce Carol Oates, and even Updike himself. Must buy.
I think many of these stories are fabulous! However many of them simply are not! It's about a fifty fifty mix but the great thing about collections like this is you get a wide sampling so that you can appreciate a great number of different approaches to life and writing that you would otherwise not get to enjoy.
I generally enjoyed this collection. A few of the stories I even loved. A few others I found hard to believe were even some of John Updike's favorites, much less the best this past century had to offer. All in all, a mixed bag.
Some of the stories chosen are simply amazing. Different styles of writing and different subjects are always fun to encounter within the same book. A few too many similar stories with similar styles though.
Wonderful collection of stories. I like that they have one for each year. It's a march through time reading fiction. There were some stories I had already read but quite a few surprises as well.
One story at a time--I managed to read the whole thing in about six months. My favorite was the slightly chilling "A City of Churches" by John Barthelme. I want to read more of Barthelme.
Amazing stories chosen from 1915-1999. Each story gives a picture of the lives of Americans and see how times changed not only in writing prose but of the important issues of the day.
I really like short stories and return to them when I am feeling overwhelmed with so much to read. A reminder that with just a small amount of time my soul can be refreshed.
FIC BEST - Mandy says "Fabulous selection of short stories from the 1900s through the end of the 20th century - illustrating the under-appreciated art form of the short story."
Feb 19, 2009
Kareerw
added it
When my kids were young, this was about all I could handle. But I must warn you that these stories, while. The Bernard Malamud story is truly stunning in all ways.
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| New Short Story Collection from Updike's Son | 1 | 15 | Jul 21, 2009 11:51am |
John Hoyer Updike (born March 18, 1932 in Shillington, Pennsylvania) was an American writer. Updike's most famous work is his Rabbit series (Rabbit, Run; Rabbit Redux; Rabbit Is Rich; Rabbit At Rest; and Rabbit Remembered). Rabbit is Rich and Rabbit at Rest both won Pulitzer Prizes for Updike. Describing his subject as "the American small town, Protestant middle class," Updike is well known for hi...more
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