Short Stories Live Forever — It’s Only the Writers Who Die Slow, Agonizing Deaths
Written by John Erianne on March 13, 2008 – 3:59 pm -A week ago, there was this brief posting about the validity of the short story on Mediabistro’s Galleycat which I found rather disturbing. I’m not really sure what I found more disturbing: the assertation from the complainers that the short story is dead because it’s no longer commercially viable or Ron Hogan’s surly response to the complaints.
The complaint about the short story being “dead” is ridiculous on two counts. First, it assumes that the short story only matters if the author is making money. Second, the disgruntled writers making this assertion assume that the short story was once-upon-a-time a cash cow for writers. There may have been a time, back in the 30’s and 40’s when a prolific hack could eek out a small income from the slicks of the day, but I doubt that was true of most writers even then. I wonder, did Franz Kafka complain that he didn’t make any money writing short stories? When Ray Carver was busting his ass in a factory and writing stories on the side, did he whine about the short story being a dead form of art? In fact, don’t most successful short story writers nowadays have day jobs? Am I wrong? It’s true that there are fewer commercial markets for short fiction presently but, overall, there are more venues than ever for stories both online and off. The short story exists with as much vitality in 2008 as it did when Washington Irving was scribbling “Rip Van Winkle” (and if Irving had fallen asleep and woke-up in the here and now, do you think he’d be displeased with the short story or marvel at how it has grown — just a thought). The genre cannot be invalid just because a particular writer feels somehow invalidated writing within that genre.
Which is not to say such writers don’t have a gripe in feeling invalidated. The problem I have with Ron Hogan’s comment is the implication that story writers outside the establishment publishing world only fail because they are bad writers. While that’s probably true enough to some degree — it’s not completely true. There are good writers who fail too. And there are bad writers who succeed for some mysterious reason I still can’t understand. For an outsider writer, the experience of writing is often akin to (Kafka, again) seeking an audience at The Castle. The Galleycat blog seems to me to have a pro-establishment bias judging by this and other posts on the website. Therefore, one wouldn’t expect much sympathy for the struggle of the average writer here. Indeed, even if the short story is alive and well, being a short story writer is frustrating most of the time. Just because there are plenty of stories being written and lots of non-paying markets to showcase them doesn’t mean the naysayers don’t have a valid argument. Short stories just don’t have quite the same cachet they once had when Hemingway was doing it. Even brand-name behemoth, Stephen King — when he even deigns to put out a new story collection — seems to look at the short story with a kind of nostalgia one reserves for a troublesome, but much-loved dead relative. The only thing worse than being a short story writer is being a poet — but poets are used to being consigned to the literary ghetto. Short fiction writers are relatively new arrivals to the gutter. The stench of the place is still fresh to them. Give them time.
March 14th, 2008 at 3:21 am
When you say I imply “story writers outside the establishment publishing world only fail because they are bad writers,” I’d say that’s a misreading of my line: “Perhaps the reason your stories aren’t getting published isn’t that the literary world is artistically bankrupt.”
I’m sure that there are good writers who “fail,” in the sense that they don’t support themselves by writing, or that they don’t even get published. I’m also pretty sure that they aren’t the ones who piss and moan anonymously to other people’s blogs about how the world fails to appreciate their art. My bias, if I have any, isn’t pro-establishment so much as it’s anti-whining.
March 14th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
I don’t disagree with you that writers whine too much. Many writers are insecure children, afterall so what do you expect? As for “misreading” you, I’m not convinced — although, I do believe you were speaking to that specific writer who was whining, the larger implication remains.
March 14th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Rest assured that I do believe there are other reasons for “failure” besides incompetence. The key to success is in how one deals with those reasons.
March 15th, 2008 at 1:02 am
I’m glad for the renewed
interest in short stories.
March 25th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
I think the Mediabistro flap was a tame reaction to what happened in the blogosphere where a writer’s manifesto showed how dead the short story really is. Mediabistro pretty much ignored it because they knew the story was too hot — this shredded the establishment view to bits.
But what happened next is interesting. Esquire actually started running some of their classic fiction. And it pretty much remains a hot topic. There’s another blog that’s had a good run of stories all about the death of fiction but I can’t remember the name right now.
March 26th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
I saw that too. In fact it started me on a “death of the short story” kick which I have yet to abandon.
My first reaction? A strong no — I spent five years teaching creative writing and know there is an incredible interest in writing and stories.
But thinking about the original premise, in part from crafting a rebuttal, I do admit there is a point: while thousands of journals exist today, they are more or less reserved for academe. They are not the same as the commercial outlets of yore: they’re not the “slick” or commercial magazines intended for the masses. They also are not intended for professional working writers who expect and demand to be paid professional rates.
So if we are talking about fiction writing as a profession (outside of academe), then these disgruntled outsiders do have a point. The same might be said for poetry. (I know an editor at a very respectable journal who alluded that she never publishes work from an unschooled poet.)
So, I will concede them that. But if you are an educator, there has never been more opportunities to publish. Never.