Short stories
Time is of the essence in Helen Simpson’s Cockfosters
Helen Simpson is not a prolific writer; six slim collections of short stories in 25 years, each timed quinquennially with…
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and other characters to make you cry with laughter
Coup de Foudre has a line from Antony and Cleopatra as its epigraph: ‘Some innocents ’scape not the thunderbolt.’ In…
Fathers and sons — seen from multiple angles
‘People talk about their childhood and it’s so mundane. I don’t remember much about it, if I’m honest. I can’t…
The secret life of the short story
The short story likes to play the underdog. Famously unfavoured by publishers, it has none of the commercial clout of…
The short story in Britain today: enough to make Conan Doyle weep
Philip Hensher bewails the current neglect of the short story, especially in the British literary press
Stories about storytelling: Kirsty Gunn’s preoccupation with words is utterly entrancing
Although entitled Infidelities this collection of short stories could as well be called Choices, because that is what really preoccupies…
The problem when novelists write short stories
Rose Tremain walks on water. Her historical novels are absolutely marvellous, brilliantly plotted, witty and wise, with some of the…
Hilary Mantel’s fantasy about killing Thatcher is funny. Honest
Heaven knows what the millions of purchasers of the Man Booker-winning Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies will make…
Tip-toeing through Sri Lanka
‘The first night I stayed in Kilinochchi, I was a little apprehensive,’ admits the usually cool-headed Vasantha, van-driver and narrator…
The Russian literary celebrity who begged Tolstoy to spare Prince Andrei
Nadezhda Alexandrovna Lokhvitskaya was a literary celebrity in pre-revolutionary St Petersburg. She chose the pen-name ‘Teffi’ because it was androgynous,…
There's so much mystery around Charles Portis that we're not even clear whether he’s alive
The American writer, Charles Portis, has had what some novelists — the more purist ones — might regard as an…
No one would want to live in Jane Gardam's stories – but they're an amazing place to visit
In the world of Jane Gardam’s stories the past is always present, solid and often unwanted and always too big,…
Don't let creative writing students read this book
One of these is by Lydia Davis, acclaimed American writer. One is not. They are whole pieces, by the way,…
Samuel Beckett walks into a nail bar
It isn’t very often that a writer’s work is so striking that you can remember exactly where and when you…
Sometimes one story is worth buying a whole book for. This is one of those times
Any new book by Lorrie Moore is a cause for rejoicing, but her first collection of short stories for 16…
The food of love
The Albek Duo are two astonishingly beautiful and talented Venetian musicians, Fiona and Ambra, who are identical twins. Hearing the…
Ann Patchett's new book will win you over, in spite of yourself
Ann Patchett’s novels revel in the tightly constructed ecosystems imagined for their characters: an opera singer besieged among diplomats in…
Shire, by Ali Smith - review
Pastoral elegy is not what you expect to find in a collection of short stories, but then Ali Smith is…
