While the short story has existed in various forms for centuries, it has particularly flourished during the last hundred years, and especially in recent decades. Though many outstanding novels have been written in the 20th century, most of these writers have also published short fiction. And in many cases, their short stories exhibit a greater degree of coherence and integrity than their longer works. The rise of creative writing programs in the 1960s helped fuel the growth of the short story and brought academic attention to it. So, too, the emergence of multiculturalism encouraged authors of diverse backgrounds to write about their cultures. This reference is a guide to the contemporary English-language short story. Included are alphabetically arranged entries for roughly 50 English-language short story writers from around the world, such as Chinua Achebe, John Barth, Jamaica Kincaid, Salman Rushdie, and Amy Tan. More than half the American writers profiled are from historically marginalized groups, such as Jewish-Americans, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans. Most of these authors have been active since 1960, and they reflect a wide range of experiences and perspectives in their works. Each entry is written by an expert contributor and includes biographical material, a brief review of existing criticism, a lengthier analysis of specific works, and a selected bibliography of primary and secondary sources. The volume begins with a detailed introduction to the short story genre and concludes with an annotated bibliography of major works on short story theory.

The 1990s have seen a renaissance in short fiction studies. Today's short story writers are testing the boundaries of short fiction through minimalist works; extended short story cycles; narrative nonfiction forms, such as histories, memoirs, and essays; and even stories created interactively with readers on the computer. Short story critics, in turn, are viewing the short story from the perspective of genre, history, cultural studies, and even cognitive science. This volume brings together the opinions, theories, and research of many of today's best-known short story writers, theorists, and critics. Contributors include some of the most widely read contemporary authors, such as Joyce Carol Oates, John Barth, Gay Talese, W. P. Kinsella, Robert Coover, Barry Hannah, and Leslie Marmon Silko.

The authors and scholars who have contributed to the volume provide an entertaining and informative exploration of modern short fiction. The volume traces the origins of the short story back to Chaucer, the joke, and the instinct for play, and follows the development of the form through today's hyper-stories created interactively in cyberspace. Along the way, it presents essays on miminalism in short fiction, on the transformation of short stories into films, and even on AIDS and the short story. The broad scope of the volume includes a wide variety of critical approaches brought to bear on literature from around the world, including short stories from Africa, Australia, Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States.