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Lead book review

The best British short stories — from Daniel Defoe to Zadie Smith

Philip Hensher’s two-volume anthology is bigger and broader than anything else available — and handsome enough to hang on the wall

7 November 2015

9:00 AM

7 November 2015

9:00 AM

The Penguin Book of British Short Stories Volume I: From Daniel Defoe to John Buchan Philip Hensher

Penguin, pp.717, £25, ISBN: 9780141395999

The Penguin Book of British Short Stories Volume II: From P.G. Wodehouse to Zadie Smith Philip Hensher

Penguin, pp.734, £25, ISBN: 9780141396019

Philip Hensher, the thinking man’s Stephen Fry — novelist, critic, boisterously clever — begins his introduction to his two-volume anthology of the British short story with typical gusto. ‘The British short story is probably the richest, most varied and most historically extensive national tradition anywhere in the world.’ Take that, ye upstart Americans, with your dirty realism and your New Yorker swank! Read it and weep, ye Johnny-come-latelys! Look to your laurels, Chekhov and Carver.

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The Penguin Book of British Short Stories Volume I: From Daniel Defoe to John Buchan, £20 and Volume II: From P.G. Wodehouse to Zadie Smith, £20 are available from the Spectator Bookshop, Tel: 08430 600033. Ian Sansom’s books include Paper: an Elegy, The Truth about Babies and two ‘County Guides’ detective novels, The Norfolk Mystery and Death in Devon.

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