My Twelve Favorite SHORT STORIES

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12) THE STOWAWAY                                               Julian Barnes
Because Noah's Ark was made of wood, there was an animal species on board whose population was much greater than two.
There were more woodworms than there were humans on Noah's Ark. One of those worms tells us much more about the floating zoo than any Biblical scholar would want you to know. Imagine what would have happened if the National Inquirer existed when Noah built this boat. If that were true, Mr. Barnes might not have needed to write this story.

11) YOU CAN'T TELL A MAN BY THE SONG...      Philip Roth
I've read over two thousand pages of Philip Roth and am insanely jealous of his talents but what makes this short story stand out is that nowhere in its approximately twenty pages does he use the word Jew. The main character, excluding the narrator (his former classmate) is an Italian street thug.
 
10) THE MAN WHO LOVED LEVITTOWN          J.D. Wetherell

Narrated by a "settler" of the town on Long Island developed by Arthur Levitt shortly after World War II. He gave priority ownership to World War II veterans. But, years later, all of the narrator's original neighbors either died or moved away, selling their homes to a foreign element, commonly known as yuppies.

Being a fellow Long Islander who was well-acquainted with another of Arthur Levitt's building projects (Le Havre, in Beechhurst), this story hit close to home. I once had incendiary urges when a newcomer moved into Rocky Point and eliminated a memorable beach cliff by building a house there. 
Also, there happens to be a Paul Oliverio residing in present-day Levittown. We were both named for his father. My cousin was neither a veteran nor would he ever be mistaken for a Yuppie. I am, however, convinced that the man who loved Levittown would have welcomed cousin Paul as a neighbor.

9) A CLEAN WELL-LIGHTED PLACE          Ernest Hemingway

Set in a saloon, this story is famously known as the source of the non-prayer Our Nada who art in Nada, Nada be thy name. It is nothing like what Hemingway is famous for. No macho characters, no punches thrown and amazingly short: no more than five pages.

8) A DIAMOND AS BIG AS THE RITZ               Scott Fitzgerald

This is the only story written by Fitzgerald that qualifies as science fiction but it would never make you think of Ray Bradbury. Of course, somewhere within this short story, "boy meets girl" and their love has strange legs as mountains explode in the background.

7) THE DOUBLE                                             Fyodor Doestoevski

An author not known for his sense of humor, Doestoevski will have you laughing out loud (LOL-ing) in this story about a pencil pushing clerk who is not invited to an office party. But he witnesses the festivities from outside the door. The center of attention at the party is none other than himself in sartorial splendor.

6) THE MAN WHO CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG     M. Twain
The most profound, prolific, and quote-worthy writer this country has ever produced, Mark Twain tells the story of a village full of good Christian folk. When a stranger arrives there with a bag full of lucre, the devout denizens react in a most un-Christian manner.
Like the story ranked #1, a quote altering the words of the perfect prayer has  resonated with me for more than forty years.
  
5) THANK YOU MA'AM                                    Langston Hughes

A classic example of the generation gap in Harlem with universal implications. Sadly, nothing listed above or below had gotten me in so much trouble as a teacher.

In 1983, I was substituting for an English teacher in Oceanside. There was no lesson plan and I happened to have a Langston Hughes anthology in my attache case. So I impulsively decided to Xerox enough copies for 150 students.

Thank You Ma'am is four pages long, therefore, more than 400 pages of Xeroxing was done (without requesting permission) in the main office of the school. If Oceanside High wasn't desperate for substitute teachers, I would have been fired on the spot.

That's not correct: subs did not get fired. their phones just stopped ringing at 5AM.

Most of the students thoroughly enjoyed the story. One of them was Junior Seau, the late great linebacker who is in the Football Hall of Fame.
In 1973, I substituted for another English teacher at a  Junior High School in New York. That teacher also left no lesson plans so I read Thank You, Ma'am.  The Principal chastised me for doing so and  I will quote the chosen Caucasian: 

"Langston Hughes was not a short story writer.

He wrote plays and poems." 

I challenged that statement, telling him that Langston doubled as "the black O Henry." In response, the Principal's eyes told me that my services would no longer be needed at his school which was fine by me: there were enough other schools in need of substitute humans teachers.
    
4) A PERFECT DAY FOR BANANA FISH               J.D. Salinger

This is the entry story for the Glass family. Date-wise, it precedes Franny and Zooey who are the two youngest of seven gifted Glass siblings, all of whom achieved national fame on a radio quiz show. Banana Fish is about the eldest and most influential Glass sibling. His name is Seymour and the story takes place in Miami where he is on his honeymoon. Seymour's wedding (though the word should be in quotation marks) is the subject of another Salinger novella: Raise High The Roofbeam, Carpenters. 

3) THE CAMEL'S BACK                                       Scott Fitzgerald

Like his novels, Diamond As Big As The Ritz  does not have any laugh out loud moments. That is not true of The Camel's Back nor most of the other short stories handpicked by Fitzgerald in 1922 for a volume entitled Tales Of The Jazz Age. 

This story is about an unusual way of presenting an engagement ring to one's beloved. If it doesn't make you laugh out loud, please see a doctor as soon as possible.

2) THE GLADS                                                            Dawn Powell

When her friend and drinking buddy, Dorothy Parker, read this story, she called Dawn and demanded that the lesser known DP stick to writing novels. Short stories are what made Ms. Parker famous and if Ms. Powell had specialized in short stories, Dorothy would have been only half as famous. Luckily for her, Dawn preferred novels and twelve of them inspired at least forty pages of the Godfather of Math Trilogy.

The Glads is a story about a woman who returns to Ohio, many years after seeking fame and fortune in New York and Hollywood. She returns to attend a funeral. The title is the short form of gladiolas. 

1) A HUNGER ARTIST                                               Franz Kafka

Kafka's novels and his too-long-for-this-list story, Metamorphosis are much better known than this Kafka story about a circus performer who just sat in a cage without eating any food. People came from miles around to watch this man starve himself into obscurity. It may sound like a silly premise but Kafka's logic and elegant simplicity make it sound factual. Come to think of it, so much of what Kafka wrote could easily sound "silly."

The end of A Hunger Artist—justification for the artist's existence —has been resonating in my mind since I first read the story as a high school sophomore in 1965.

  

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Footnotes

My guilt is compromised by including a story from "the black O Henry"
but too many short stories from the actual O Henry
(pen name of Sidney Porter) qualified from this list.

You can read about five of them  here.

This page has gone through four drafts and hopefully
there will not be a fifth draft.

This page also doubles as a Googler's paradise.

The next GoFather/Fitzgerald page is  there.
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