Stephen King: What Ails the Short Story?

[Rumple Foreskin]

WARNING: Writer Thread

Anyone who has tried to peddle a short story these days knows they're a tough sell. In days of old, writers could gain experience and exposure by selling short stories to periodicals. No more.

This link is to a NYT reprint of Stephen King's "state-of-the-story" essay that introduces, "Best American Short Stories of 2007," which he edited.

Stephen King: What Ails the Short Story?

Any thoughts, comments, concern?

Rumple Foreskin

 

[Weird Harold]

Any thoughts, comments, concern?

I think that the New York Times wants way too many cookies placed onmy macine for my peace of mind -- and that's just to refuse me access because I'm not registered for their spam distribution and refused permission for the cookies.

Consequently, I have no idea what kind of excuse SK postulates for a lack of quality short stories.

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I think that the New York Times wants way too many cookies placed onmy macine for my peace of mind -- and that's just to refuse me access because I'm not registered for their spam distribution and refused permission for the cookies.

Consequently, I have no idea what kind of excuse SK postulates for a lack of quality short stories.

Always ready to come to the aid and assistance of Weird Harold.

Rumple Foreskin

What Ails the Short Story?
By STEPHEN KING
Published: September 30, 2007

The American short story is alive and well.

Do you like the sound of that? Me too. I only wish it were actually true. The art form is still alive — that I can testify to. As editor of “The Best American Short Stories 2007,” I read hundreds of them, and a great many were good stories. Some were very good. And some seemed to touch greatness. But “well”? That’s a different story.

I came by my hundreds — which now overflow several cardboard boxes known collectively as The Stash — in a number of different ways. A few were recommended by writers and personal friends. A few more I downloaded from the Internet. Large batches were sent to me on a regular basis by Heidi Pitlor, the series editor. But I’ve never been content to stay on the reservation, and so I also read a great many stories in magazines I bought myself, at bookstores and newsstands in Florida and Maine, the two places where I spend most of the year. I want to begin by telling you about a typical short-story-hunting expedition at my favorite Sarasota mega-bookstore. Bear with me; there’s a point to this.

I go in because it’s just about time for the new issues of Tin House and Zoetrope: All-Story. There will certainly be a new issue of The New Yorker and perhaps Glimmer Train and Harper’s. No need to check out The Atlantic Monthly; its editors now settle for publishing their own selections of fiction once a year in a special issue and criticizing everyone else’s the rest of the time. Jokes about eunuchs in the bordello come to mind, but I will suppress them.

So into the bookstore I go, and what do I see first? A table filled with best-selling hardcover fiction at prices ranging from 20 percent to 40 percent off. James Patterson is represented, as is Danielle Steel, as is your faithful correspondent. Most of this stuff is disposable, but it’s right up front, where it hits you in the eye as soon as you come in, and why? Because these are the moneymakers and rent payers; these are the glamour ponies.

I walk past the best sellers, past trade paperbacks with titles like “Who Stole My Chicken?,” “The Get-Rich Secret” and “Be a Big Cheese Now,” past the mysteries, past the auto-repair manuals, past the remaindered coffee-table books (looking sad and thumbed-through with their red discount stickers). I arrive at the Wall of Magazines, which is next door to the children’s section, where story time is in full swing. I stare at the racks of magazines, and the magazines stare eagerly back. Celebrities in gowns and tuxes, models in low-rise jeans, luxury stereo equipment, talk-show hosts with can’t-miss diet plans — they all scream Buy me, buy me! Take me home and I’ll change your life!+

I can grab The New Yorker and Harper’s while I’m still standing up, without going to my knees like a school janitor trying to scrape a particularly stubborn wad of gum off the gym floor. For the rest, I must assume exactly that position. I hope the young woman browsing Modern Bride won’t think I’m trying to look up her skirt. I hope the young man trying to decide between Starlog and Fangoria won’t step on me. I crawl along the lowest shelf, where neatness alone suggests few ever go. And here I find fresh treasure: not just Zoetrope and Tin House, but also Five Points and The Kenyon Review. No Glimmer Train, but there’s American Short Fiction, The Iowa Review, even an Alaska Quarterly Review. I stagger to my feet and limp toward the checkout. The total cost of my six magazines runs to over $80. There are no discounts in the magazine section.

So think of me crawling on the floor of this big chain store and ask yourself, What’s wrong with this picture?

We could argue all day about the reasons for fiction’s out-migration from the eye-level shelves — people have. We could marvel over the fact that Britney Spears is available at every checkout, while an American talent like William Gay or Randy DeVita or Eileen Pollack or Aryn Kyle (all of whom were among my final picks) labors in relative obscurity. We could, but let’s not. It’s almost beside the point, and besides — it hurts.

Instead, let us consider what the bottom shelf does to writers who still care, sometimes passionately, about the short story. What happens when he or she realizes that his or her audience is shrinking almost daily? Well, if the writer is worth his or her salt, he or she continues on nevertheless, because it’s what God or genetics (possibly they are the same) has decreed, or out of sheer stubbornness, or maybe because it’s such a kick to spin tales. Possibly a combination. And all that’s good.

What’s not so good is that writers write for whatever audience is left. In too many cases, that audience happens to consist of other writers and would-be writers who are reading the various literary magazines (and The New Yorker, of course, the holy grail of the young fiction writer) not to be entertained but to get an idea of what sells there. And this kind of reading isn’t real reading, the kind where you just can’t wait to find out what happens next (think “Youth,” by Joseph Conrad, or “Big Blonde,” by Dorothy Parker). It’s more like copping-a-feel reading. There’s something yucky about it.

Last year, I read scores of stories that felt ... not quite dead on the page, I won’t go that far, but airless, somehow, and self-referring. These stories felt show-offy rather than entertaining, self-important rather than interesting, guarded and self-conscious rather than gloriously open, and worst of all, written for editors and teachers rather than for readers. The chief reason for all this, I think, is that bottom shelf. It’s tough for writers to write (and editors to edit) when faced with a shrinking audience. Once, in the days of the old Saturday Evening Post, short fiction was a stadium act; now it can barely fill a coffeehouse and often performs in the company of nothing more than an acoustic guitar and a mouth organ. If the stories felt airless, why not? When circulation falters, the air in the room gets stale.

And yet. I read plenty of great stories this year. There isn’t a single one in this book that didn’t delight me, that didn’t make me want to crow, “Oh, man, you gotta read this!” I think of such disparate stories as Karen Russell’s “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves,” John Barth’s “Toga Party” and “Wake,” by Beverly Jensen, now deceased, and I think — marvel, really — they paid me to read these! Are you kiddin’ me???

Talent can’t help itself; it roars along in fair weather or foul, not sparing the fireworks. It gets emotional. It struts its stuff. If these stories have anything in common, it’s that sense of emotional involvement, of flipped-out amazement. I look for stories that care about my feelings as well as my intellect, and when I find one that is all-out emotionally assaultive — like “Sans Farine,” by Jim Shepard — I grab that baby and hold on tight. Do I want something that appeals to my critical nose? Maybe later (and, I admit it, maybe never). What I want to start with is something that comes at me full-bore, like a big, hot meteor screaming down from the Kansas sky. I want the ancient pleasure that probably goes back to the cave: to be blown clean out of myself for a while, as violently as a fighter pilot who pushes the eject button in his F-111. I certainly don’t want some fraidy-cat’s writing school imitation of Faulkner, or some stream-of-consciousness about what Bob Dylan once called “the true meaning of a pear.”

So — American short story alive? Check. American short story well? Sorry, no, can’t say so. Current condition stable, but apt to deteriorate in the years ahead. Measures to be taken? I would suggest you start by reading this year’s “Best American Short Stories.” They show how vital short stories can be when they are done with heart, mind and soul by people who care about them and think they still matter. They do still matter, and here they are, liberated from the bottom shelf.

Stephen King is the author of 60 books, as well as nearly 400 short stories, including “The Man in the Black Suit,” which won the O. Henry Prize in 1996.

 

[MagicaPractica]

I wonder if he's right about the dwindling audience. The students that can say with no reservations, "I don't like to read" or even "I don't read" versus the students who can't wait to pick up a new book in the library. The population continues to expand so shouldn't these numbers of new readers at least keep the population of readers level? I fear not and I'm not sure who to blame. Television and video games? The school systems that beat the love of reading out of the students by the end of middle school? I have far more questions than answers.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

You'd think, with our shortening attention spans, that short stories would be "in." Funny, how it's the opposite. I love SK's short stories. I have a particular liking for horror stories. But I agree with him... it has to be a good story. Self-important, self indulgent writing doesn't do it for me.

I have taken to listening to books/stories on tape... that's a great way to take in a short story. And I can't 'skip words' like I can in print... makes for a more whole experience - for me.

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

You'd think, with our shortening attention spans, that short stories would be "in." Funny, how it's the opposite. I love SK's short stories. I have a particular liking for horror stories. But I agree with him... it has to be a good story. Self-important, self indulgent writing doesn't do it for me.

I have taken to listening to books/stories on tape... that's a great way to take in a short story. And I can't 'skip words' like I can in print... makes for a more whole experience - for me.

When it comes to audio books, Stephen King (and me) agree with you.

What's always surprised me is how there is virtually no market for romance genre short stories unless they're "hot" enough to be classified as, Erotica.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[Weird Harold]

Instead, let us consider what the bottom shelf does to writers who still care, sometimes passionately, about the short story. What happens when he or she realizes that his or her audience is shrinking almost daily?

I don't know whether he intended the inference, but I got the image of half-sized readers with the short-stories on the bottom shelf at eye-level.

The short story magazines are on the bottom shelf because the demand is shrinking and the demand is shrinking because the magazines are on the bottom shelf where they're hard to find and literally beneath notice.

But then, almost all magazines are being trumped by their own online versions and short fiction is being dominated by "fan fiction" and online amateur story sites like Literotica and other genre specific sites.

I think SK is a bit too pessimistic about the health of the short story and mistaking the health of short story magazines for the health of the short story.

 

[Caitano]

What about genre shorts? Ellery Queen magazine, The Saint, IF, and Fantasy and Science Fiction? There used to be genre outlets for shorts. Hell, in SF the Short was frequently more honored than the novel. Doesn't that sort of mag still publish?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I dont agree with King that the stories are all THAT great. A lot of crap gets published. And a lot of crap gets hyped as better than it is.

Back in 1993 I wrote something as a goof and diversion from boredom. It took about an hour to nail together and it was excellent. People read it and loved it. Copies were made and it went everywhere. A friend made an audiotape of it and the tapes vanished. My copy was stolen.

I didnt get a single complaint from anywhere, and no one suggested ways to improve it.

In 1998 I saw it posted on a comedy website where it took 2nd Prize in a contest. Someone recently made it into a video and posted the video on YOUTUBE. It's a riot. The video is likely a school project.

Good stuff gets bought or stolen. And I believe you know it when you write something THAT good. People really want excellent material.

 

[gauchecritic]

I kind of half-heartedly looked into the magazine short story market (one submission - one rejection) this year. For this past week or two someone's been bringing what I presume are popular magazines into work. I've had a look. Not one of them has even a single short story in it.

Double page spreads on how someone cried for weeks when her husband left her for another guy, or what dress someone I didn't recognise wore to the premier of a film I've never heard of. But nil short stories.

The magazine I submitted to (from a website general invitation, though they wanted a double spaced ms sent through the post along with the concomitant outlay) garnered exactly zero. I don't mind. They didn't like the story, that's fine. It was probably one of several million they had to read so couldn't take a lot of time over it, which is ok (although it took them three months to return it) But the rejection was simply that. A rejection. Not even: 'not our kind of story' or 'not up to our standard'. Just 'No thanks'. But that's by the way.

Unfortunately, I think it's probably true that the largest demographic that any magazine aims for is the one that has least motivation in reading for pleasure and the rest of the public (over 35) are so compartmentalised as to be generally unreachable by broad issue publications.

Was it The Times that published Sherlock Holmes' adventures? I can't imagine The Sun or Daily Mail (No idea what the Yanqui equivalents are) taking half a page which could be filled with advertising to print anything that they think their "readers" could concentrate on long enough to finish.

It seems that King may have something when he says that the circulation of short story magazines is generally sold to short story writers.

And $80 is a lot of money to pay for market research.

 

[impressive]

This is where electronic publishing excels, IMO.


~ Imp (who just sold 3 non-erotic short stories to Amazon Shorts)

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

My guess is short stories are marketed incorrectly. And most writers write crap.

Back in the 20s the most popular magazines offered an assortment of articles: short stories, poems, non-fiction, opinion, criticism, etc. And the times were blessed with incredible talent who submitted short stories to augment their income from book sales.

 

[xssve]

I heard King being interviewed on this a couple months back on NPR, and it's soemthing I'd been observing for a while, precipitated by my search for a really good story to adapt to sequential graphics, or comix, as the poplular term goes.

It's really a lost art in many respects, I did manage after a while to scrape together a small stash of good short fiction, but it's pretty much what the convential wisdom used to say anyway: the short story is an art in itself, and a difficult one to master, much more difficult than the novel in fact, and most of my story stash are the work of a small handfull of people who happen to excell at this particualr medium - most others don't even try.

In a novel you have 200 pages or more to develop your characters, to weave intricate plots, etc. - in the short story you have room for exactly one idea, and 2000 words, give or take, whatever it is, to get that idea across and make an impact.

There is some good stuff out there, but most of it old, written back in the heyday of the short story, the Fifties and Sixties, the early days of television - the best anthology I have is one of Alfred Hitchcocks, that guy knew how to pick a short story, but it presents numerous problems in terms of tracking down authors, many of whom are probobly dead by now, so I've been searching the web for up and coming authors to work with - in fact to a large extent I've pretty much given up and decided to learn to write myself, although I'd still prefer to collaborate - it's just that very few people seem to know how to write a good short story, number one - and there are actually more than it might seem sometimes, just fewer in comparision to the people doing longer work - and of that few, even fewer know how to write one for comix.

I had this conversation via PM with Dr. Mabuse, who has actually done some fooling around in comix, but it even took hima minute to remember the constraints of the Graphic format: action over introspection, etc.

Some of the best comix shorts are in fact basically expanded one liners, the denoument is a punch line, and that works in comix, and in fact, I'm beggining to think the whole short story is very much related to the joke - it's short, pared down to the essentials of the story, and there is some sort of a twist at the end - not neccesarily funny, but something that leaves a lasting impression.

In short, if it would work on television, it would probobly work in comix, and it's very much a crossover medium between writing and film, a lot of authors approach comix work like a pitch for the film industry - it gets more attention than a pile of printout, the producer doesn't have to use their imagination as much - they can see whether it works or not.

I do happen to like the introspective, slice of life stuff too, although it tends to be more personal - check this one: http://www.nowheregirl.com/

This is good stuff, though not short, and it's not wild action comix, but it's also not an easy genre to collaborate in, it's very personal and requires a more personal relationship I believe - most of these things are authored and drawn by the same person - and also harder to pull off in short form, unless you follow that ironic/joke formula.

Anyway, erotica/porn seems to be the last refuge of the short story, so here I am, looking for stuff to practice and gain experience on, and don't get me wrong if I say I still haven't found what I'm looking for, I do have very specific ideas what I'm looking for, kind of a cross, physical and action oriented, but with a real psychological dimension, maybe even a punchline, and I'm about three stories behind anyway.

 

[BOSTONFICTIONWRITER]

It starts when they are young

Back in his day before television, videos, shopping malls, credit, debit, and ATM cards, before Toyota, Honda, SUV's, and Mustangs, before O. J. Simpson, World Series, and I-Pods, before Windows, Macs, and laptops, before Micky D's, Burger King, and the Colonel, before Elvis, Greatful Dead, and the Rolling Stones, and before instant gratification, there was Charles Dickens.

He was the rock star back then. His audience could not wait to read the next series of his story to find out what happens next.

Now, too many graduate from high school who cannot read and those who can read do not read anything beyond browsing through the owners manual of their new car or how to set up their Hi-Def TV. We are a world of idiots who are too busy charging ourselves into credit card debt and working two jobs to pay the interest on our ARM mortgages to read.

"What? Short story? You want me to read that? How many pages is it? Sixty-pages? I'll wait until when the video comes out."

I can't get my loved ones to read some of my stories and I'm not talking about the "erotic" ones, how are we going to get the rest of the world to read? Yeah, there are still those who curl up in bed with a book every night but most of us are surfing our lives away in cyber space.

You just have to look at the ratio of income between what the movies earn and what books earn. That tells it all. How many times have you heard box office bananza when it comes to books? Every week a new movie breaks the previous record. The books of J. K. Rowlings are a fluke but then look how much her movies earned.

Nothing has changed since the 60's. People want to be strapped in, numbed out, and entertained and they do not want to lift a finger to turn a page to do it.

So, what is the answer? Well, it starts when they are young and the next generation with their video games and cell phones is another lost generation of readers. It starts with the schools.

Sometimes things that are lost from our past, such as reading a good book, is lost to the invention of the future. I say bring back the past. We all need to get out of the high speed lanes of our lives and read where we have been to discover where we are going.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

So, what is the answer? Well, it starts when they are young and the next generation with their video games and cell phones is another lost generation of readers. It starts with the schools.

No, it starts with the parents. I've read aloud to my kids since they were babies. They see me reading books around them constantly. They understand the value of the written word to entertain. They've experienced it firsthand. (Even if it was Harry Potter and Goosebumps!)

And we don't have video games at our house.

 

[Guest]

So, what is the answer? Well, it starts when they are young and the next generation with their video games and cell phones is another lost generation of readers. It starts with the schools.

Agree with everything except this line.

It starts with the parents. Within the home.

 

[cloudy]

Agree with everything except this line.

It starts with the parents. Within the home.

Exactly.

My seven-year-old is already picking up my heavy duty novels, and trying to read them - and succeeding, for the most part.

 

[xssve]

I should clarify, that I'm mostly referring to the pop fiction short story, not the literary short which I believe I agree with Dr. Mabuse is alive and well - and I suspect it's the pop fiction short story King is referring to as well - I think screenwriting probobly draws off a lot of people who might otherwise be writing short fiction of this nature.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Exactly.

My seven-year-old is already picking up my heavy duty novels, and trying to read them - and succeeding, for the most part.

I remember my son trying to read Harry Potter when my older daughter was reading it... she's three years older than he is! It was a laborious task, but he did it... and he's still reading them (among other series)... it's amazing what setting an example will do.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

XSSVE

Your joke premise is the scheme I use to write short stories. You need a hook to grab the reader's attention, stunning character(s), a tough problem, and a clever resolution.

The best stories operate at multiple layers of abstraction. That's why Jackson's THE LOTTERY or Faulkner's A ROSE FOR MISS EMILY are so much better reading than "Marsha Brady Stains Her Prom Gown."

The other thing is: We're too goddamned sensitive and cant laugh at ourselves. So a lot of great material is off-limits. What we do allow is fucking boring stuff.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

SK

I agree. In my childhood home we had no indoor plumbing but we had a full set of the COLLIER'S CHILDRENS STORIES (10 volumes), a full set of the JOHN MARTIN'S BIG BOOKS FOR CHILDREN, and a full set of Mark Twain. On Fridays we went to the library and loaded up on books.

 

[xssve]

XSSVE

Your joke premise is the scheme I use to write short stories. You need a hook to grab the reader's attention, stunning character(s), a tough problem, and a clever resolution.

The best stories operate at multiple layers of abstraction. That's why Jackson's THE LOTTERY or Faulkner's A ROSE FOR MISS EMILY are so much better reading than "Marsha Brady Stains Her Prom Gown."

The other thing is: We're too goddamned sensitive and cant laugh at ourselves. So a lot of great material is off-limits. What we do allow is fucking boring stuff.

On this, I believe we are of an accord, well put: hook/characterization/tension/clever resolution. My main gripe with a lot of the erotic/pronographic fiction I've read on this site, is that it's just not funny, I'm glad these people had these fantastic orgasms, but it's really not memorable enough for me to spend six weeks illustrating it.

Sex is quite often a clumsy, ridiculous, sweaty, smelly, embarrasing, even humiliating business, if it didn't feel so damn good, I doubt anybody would do it.

In any case, in sequential graphic form, humor keeps it from taking itself too seriously, and devolving into cliche - most of your European/S. American erotic comix artists tend to lean toward humor in their shorter peices - because it works.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

xssve

I wrote a story about a woman who enlists her friends' help with a kidnap/rape fantasy. She meets with her friends at a bar and thats the last she remembers until she awakens, tied to the bed, in an old house...somewhere. She calls for help and a good looking stranger finds her and has sex with her. But he really is a stranger who is ignorant of the fantasy; he was burgling the house when he found her. So his act is legally rape although she thinks its consensual until he takes off, leaving her tied up. She enjoyed the sex but then is pissed. In reality her friends believe theyve pulled a practical joke on her because the old house is a prop in a fire department training film. She, naked and bound, will be discovered by a squad of firemen trainees.

 

[R. Richard]

I wonder if he's right about the dwindling audience. The students that can say with no reservations, "I don't like to read" or even "I don't read" versus the students who can't wait to pick up a new book in the library. The population continues to expand so shouldn't these numbers of new readers at least keep the population of readers level? I fear not and I'm not sure who to blame. Television and video games? The school systems that beat the love of reading out of the students by the end of middle school? I have far more questions than answers.

I think that the highlighted segment perhaps explains a lot. Where I went to school, just reading a story, being able to describe the plot and enjoying the writing were not nearly enough. No, it was necessary to have a life-changing experience because of what the student read. Of course, it is a lot easier to fake a life-changing experience because of reading a longer work, instead of a shorter work. JMNTHO.

 

[Oblimo]

I wrote a story about a woman who enlists her friends' help with a kidnap/rape fantasy. She meets with her friends at a bar and thats the last she remembers until she awakens, tied to the bed, in an old house...somewhere. She calls for help and a good looking stranger finds her and has sex with her. But he really is a stranger who is ignorant of the fantasy; he was burgling the house when he found her. So his act is legally rape although she thinks its consensual until he takes off, leaving her tied up. She enjoyed the sex but then is pissed. In reality her friends believe theyve pulled a practical joke on her because the old house is a prop in a fire department training film. She, naked and bound, will be discovered by a squad of firemen trainees.

If you had ended that paragraph with, "Explain the culpability, if any, of all parties involved, under the Model Penal Code and the Common Law," it would have read exactly like a hypothetical from a Criminal Law final.