The Best American Short Stories of the Century (The Best American Series(R))

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At age 67, the perennially youthful John Updike may at last qualify as something of an elder statesman. But the Best American Short Stories annual--whose greatest hits package Updike has now assembled--is almost a generation older, having commenced publication in 1915. This staying power allows the hefty Best American Short Stories of the Century to perform double duty. It is, on the one hand, a priceless compendium of American manners and morals--a decade-by-decade survey of how we lived then, and how we live now. Yet Updike very consciously avoided the sociological angle in making his selection. "I tried not to select stories because they illustrated a theme or portion of the national experience," he writes in his introduction, "but because they struck me as lively, beautiful, believable, and, in the human news they brought, important." In this he succeeded: the 55 fictions that made the grade are most notable for their human (rather than merely historical) interest.

So who got in? There are a good number of cut-and-dried classics here, including Hemingway's "The Killers," Faulkner's "That Evening Sun Go Down," and Philip Roth's acidic spin on religious connivance, "Defender of the Faith." In other cases, major authors are represented by relatively minor works. Yet it's hard to quibble with the inclusion of Willa Cather, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tennessee Williams, J.F. Powers, Eudora Welty--particularly when you take into account that their second-tier creations are fully the equal of anybody else's masterpieces. And the final third of the book really does constitute an honor roll of contemporary American fiction, with brilliant entries by Saul Bellow, Donald Barthelme, Raymond Carver, Tim O'Brien, Bernard Malamud, Cynthia Ozick, John Cheever, and Vladimir Nabokov. (For the latter, Updike actually succumbed to his own idolatry and bent the rules for admission--but nobody who reads the hallucinatory "That in Aleppo Once..." will regret it.) It goes without saying that fiction fans will be complaining about the editor's sins of omission well into the next century. But no matter how you slice it, this remains an elegant and essential advertisement for the short form. --James Marcus

Book Description

John Updike has selected enduring stories from the eighty-four annual volumes of "THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES", and the result is "a spectacular tapestry of fictional achievement" (Entertainment Weekly). Available for the first time on compact disc, this extraordinary collection features a wide variety of contemporary writers reading classics of the genre, along with authors reading from their own work. Containing twenty-two unabridged stories in all, the expanded audio edition includes a new story from "THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES 1999" to round out the century.

Customer Reviews:

Not what I really wanted.......2007-10-10

Only unknown authors to me. I was expecting some works by Edgar Allan Poe, O. Henry and/or Agatha Christie (maybe I ordered the wrong volume!). Also, some of the stories are quite dull and end as if the author didn't know how to end it! Quite disappointing!

A good effort.......2007-06-20

I read "The Best American Short Stories of the Century" to get a broad overview of the contemporary American short story genre. John Updike edited the collection. The introduction, written by Updike, is an interesting essay on the difficulties inherent in assembling any best-of collection. I suppose I would have liked to have read more of his thoughts on the form, its progress over the century and perhaps its place in contemporary fiction rather than his struggle in selecting pieces. But taken together with the forward, written by co-editor Katrina Kenison, the two essays offer an interesting look into the fickleness of publishing tastes and how those tastes can be influenced by only a few people. It makes the current consolidation of the publishing world seem slightly less troubling.

In any event, there are many people I would have included in the collection that are absent--John Edger Wideman comes quickly to mind, and Latino writers seem strikingly absent. And similarly, though I would not even pretend to know all that one needs to know to authoritatively assemble a collection with such a presumptuous title, I would nonetheless exclude more than one or two pieces that were included in the anthology. But as I reflect on the collection, it occurs to me that it was written more for the general reading public and less for a person interested in the diversity of the form and its practitioners. There are some great stories in the collection, however, I suspect that it more closely represents a particular writer's tastes than a true overview of the form.

The most interesting pieces for me were those written by writers who I associate with other genres. Robert Penn Warren's "Christmas Gift" is a beautifully raw and sensual story. And although it has been some years since I've read Warren's work, my vision of him was always that of a country gentlemen poet living the gentlemanly life in semi-rural Connecticut. The "Christmas Gift" rivals Faulkner or O'Connor in the evocation of the rough-knuckled rural life. The language of the piece and the structure of the lines felt fresh and new. The images were so unique and evocative that I must make a point not to mimic them in my own writing. The opening paragraph is wonderful, his attention to the details of the place and its people comes out with poetic precision that is at once authentic for the place and yet far, far above the circumstances of anybody involved. In this sense it brought to mind Steinbeck (another writer who didn't make the cut) yet his prose seemed even more carefully measured.

I have always admired E.B. White's essays and now, after having read the short story, "The Second Tree from the Corner," I have come to appreciate his abilities as a fiction writer. It has inspired me to track down some of his fiction--other than that written for children, though those stories are also good. "The Second Tree from the Corner" was somewhat unexpected. It's a decidedly non-country story--a far cry from many of the essays I have read. Its protagonist is a patient who is undergoing therapy--another surprise. However when I think about many of his essays, even the most well known essays written at the height of the war, essays that were intended to bring some measure of comfort to a society and culture that could not escape the general sense that they were indeed fighting for their very survival, I still find in these essays a certain sense of existential angst, of an uncertainty that seems thoroughly modern and non-sentimental.

When I hear people talk about White's well-known essay, "Once More to the Lake," it seems almost as though the last lines are forgotten. There is so much talk of lake weather, farm-girls, and berry pies that that final line seems to somehow not stick to memory. But what a line--the entire piece is informed by that last line. The last two paragraphs keep the essay from become a simple, shallow reflection on the American way of life. It was almost as though, despite the Nazis and the Imperial Japanese Emperor, White could not help but feel almost desperately modern. When he wrote, "As he buckled the swollen belt, suddenly my groin felt the chill of death," he rescued the essay from the slash pile of Americana.

And just as he rescued "Once More to the Lake," he may have condemned "The Second Tree from the Corner." Though it is a good short story, it is not at all the warm and fuzzy piece that some may expect from White. And again, in the story White waits to put the last nail in the emotional structure of the piece, which could until the final line go in any one of a number of directions. The final direction of the piece is not nearly as comfortable as it perhaps could be. He closes: "He crossed the Madison, boarded the downtown bus, and rode all the way to Fifty-second Street before he had a thought that could rightly have been called bizarre."

We never discover the nature of his bizarre thoughts, we are left to fill them in with our own interpretation of the strange, never the less, the piece is far from conclusive or comforting.

Similarly, I was impressed with Elizabeth Bishop's "The Farmer's Children." Again I am familiar with her essays and of course her poetry, but I had never before read one of her short stories.

There were also stories by writers whom I have never before read, at least as far as I can remember. Susan Glaspell's 1917 story, "A Jury of her Peers," was impressively fresh and full of a very modern sense of feminism. Grace Stone Coates', "Wild Plums," was an emotionally complex story about class in the early years of the Great Depression.

I did not find what I wanted in the collection--that is, an overview of the contemporary American short story form. I suspect that there is no easy or fast way to come to such an understanding. Maybe that has something to do with the nature of the short story, like the personal essay it is a constantly shifting form, something that responds quickly to contemporary pressures, but also somehow stays true to its form as laid down by Chekhov (or in the case of the essay, Montaign).

I did find some things I did not expect in the collection. And thought I confess that I did not like some of the stories in the and found myself questioning why they were included at the expense of other writers, it was a worthwhile read.

Very Well Done.......2007-06-14

To reduce the boredom of exercise I decided to listen to audio books. Short stories work well as I'm inclined to keep moving until the end.

This audio CD collection is very good and really well done. Many of the stories are read by their authors. The sound is crisp and clean, and (with rare exception) the diction fluid and natural. The stories themselves are varied and high-quality.

One thing to note, though, is that the audio version does not contain all the stories from the print version. That may seem obvious, but if you are expecting to hear one or anther of the stories from the book, know that the CD set only includes 22 stories.

Grand American tales of the nineteen hundreds.......2007-03-24

The quintessential in the American short story is represented in this collection of fiction. I am reading these tales both for the pleasure they bring me and as a means of studying the craft of masters in a field I hope to enter. As part of my fiction class at the University of Iowa, I have read "Janus" and "Where are you going, Where have you been?" (Beattie and Oates).

These two tales explore the psyches of two women: one a successful married realtor obsessed who owns an artistic bowl that assumes a character of its own and, the other, a young girl who becomes a victim of her and others' obsession with her beauty.

Lesser-known authors are represented alongside the giants of American literature. Points of view representing various walks of life, ethnicities, languages and periods of time abound in the volume. For my own pleasure and out of curiosity, I have read "Zelig," a tale about a lonely man obsessed with saving his money, torn between his new home in America and his native Russian village (Rosenblatt).

Ann Beattie, Joyce Carol Oates and Benjamin Rosenblatt are authors whose works I have relished so far from the collection, and because the stories are so intricately woven, I find myself re-reading them, delaying the pleasure awaiting me in the remaining fifty plus tales.

NOT THE BEST.......2007-01-30

I AM A FAN OF BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES SERIES, BUT I DID NOT ENJOY THE STORIES CHOSEN HERE. I STARTED AT THE BEGINNING, TRIED THE END, FLIPPED THROUGH A FEW IN THE MIDDLE AND FOUND THEM DISAPPOINTING. THIS SERIES WOULD DO BETTER WITH MORE THAN ONE EDITOR TO MAKE THE FINAL CHOICES.

Selected Shorts: Lots of Laughs! (Selected Shorts series)

Average customer rating:

Excellent Storytelling!

Selected Shorts: Lots of Laughs! (Selected Shorts series)
David Schickler , Ron Carlson , Isaiah Sheffer , John Updike , Neil Gaiman , Etgar Keret , and Nicholson Baker
Manufacturer: Symphony Space
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 0971921822

Book Description

This three-CD collection features more best-loved selections from National Public Radio's Selected Shorts, an award-winning series of classic and contemporary short fiction read by acclaimed actors and recorded live at Peter Norton Symphony Space in New York City. More than three hours of recordings in each collection capture the intimacy of live performance. Stories are alternately funny, sad, moving, and exciting and make a perfect accompaniment to daily activities such as driving, cooking, exercising, and relaxing.

Lots of Laughs! includes, among others, John Updike’s “Farrell’s Caddie,” read by Charles Keating; Neil Gaiman's "Chivalry," read by Christina Pickles; Ron Carlson's "On the USS Fortitude," read by Laura Esterman; Etgar Keret's "Fatso," read by John Guare; and David Schickler's "Jamaica," read by Isaiah Sheffer.

Customer Reviews:

Excellent Storytelling!.......2006-06-29

I have been a devoted Selected Shorts fan for about 12 years and I thought this collection was really first-class. I listened to it at night in the car when I was on the road and enjoyed it thoroughly, especially the stories "Farrell's Caddy" and "Chivalry." The other stories were very good, too. I would heartily recommned this collection to anyone who enjoys a well told tale. John La Boone, St. Marys, Georgia

Average customer rating:

My favorite literary author
One of the few writers who is also a great reader
so so boring
so so boring
beautiful

The John Updike Audio Collection CD

Manufacturer: Caedmon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 0060577215
Release Date: 2003-10-14

Book Description

The extraordinarily evocative stories depict the generation born in a small-town America during the Depression and growing up in a world where the old sexual morality was turned around and material comforts were easily had. Yet, as these stories reflect so accurately, life was still unsettling, and Updike chronicles telling moments both joyful and painful. The texts are taken from his recent omnibus, The Early Stories, 1953-1975.

In describing how he wrote these stories in a small, rented, smoke-filled office in Ipswitch, Massachusetts, he says, "I felt that I was packaging something as delicately pervasive as smoke, one box after another, in that room, where my only duty was to describe reality as it had come to me -- to give the mundane its beautiful due."

Customer Reviews:

My favorite literary author.......2007-07-21

John Updike is, in my opinion, amazing in his ability to phrase, in prose, nuance of experience. One of the great, and my favorite, fiction writers.

One of the few writers who is also a great reader.......2006-02-12

The tone of slightly detached compassion that marks a lot of Updike's fiction is matched by his reading style. It is unhurried, conversational, intimate. It is a pleasure to be in his company for extended periods of time. His novels strike me as wildly uneven (though I always admire the ambition), the short stories have maintained a remarkable level of quality and freshness of observation. It has been something of a privilege to watch his perspective mature over his lifetime. Not that there was anything flip or juvenile about his early stuff, but he has seemed to relax into the impression of easier mastery.

so so boring.......2003-12-31

Everyone has such great things to say about Updike. I've tried to read his works before but was so put off by the self-conscious writing that I had to put his books down. So I tried to listen to his stories in audio and it was even worse. I couldn't even pay attention for more than five minutes. In my opinion, he's overrated, and it seems that at the heart of his writing and maybe at the heart of Updike himself lies a shallowness that can't be glossed over. Some say Updike's the best American writer of the last fifty years, but you never get the feeling that you're in the presence of greatness when you read him. With guys like Tolstoy, Fitzgerald, or Hemingway you feel as though you are being bowled over by something mighty. This is due not only to their great writing but to the greatness of their inner lives, which comes out in every line. And so it's not suprising that they've left a body of work that will stand for the ages. Updike, however, always leaves you feeling empty. He writes as though he had greatness within him, but his itty bitty suburban stories do nothing. They don't enliven; they are not a joy to read; they are verbose and stultify to the extreme. If Updike is considered one of America's literary gems then that should speak volumes about the deplorable state of literature in this country. Save your money. Save your sanity. Read something else.

so so boring.......2003-12-31

beautiful.......2003-12-27

The person who gave this audiobook 1 star is on crack. He (or is it she?) doesn't even own it. I do and have listened to it. I've also read the Early Stories in print from which these recording are taken. Updike is an amazing author, and in truth, the stories represented on this collection are among his best, including Pigeon Feathers and A&P. I do wish, however, that they were all read by Updike. There are two other readers in addition to Updike. But this is an enjoyable, tight, mecurial introdution to the work of a master of the short form.

In addition to this CD collection, you might also consider picking up:

Too Far To Go -- a collection of stories about the Maples, a couple on the verge of divorce. One of the Maple stories is included on these CDs. Too Far To Go includes all but one, perhaps two, stories about the Maples. The one story that I'm aware of about the couple (Grandparenting) is included in the Afterlife and was published after Too Far To Go. (BTW, if you know where the other Maples story is located, drop me a note.)

The Complete Henry Bech -- a collection of stories about Henry Bech, which includes the first three Bech books as well as subsequent material. One of the Bech stories is included on this CD collection.

Most people usually point to the Rabbit books as the place to start with the novels. They are excellent. However, Of The Farm, a short novel, is my personal favorite and ties in nicely to some of the Olinger stories included in this audio CD collection.

The stories on this colletion are mostly short. The longest, Pigeon Feathers, runs under an hour. But most are in the 15-25 mintue range. Excellent for short drives or walks.

Pick one up. There are stories on this collection I could listen to over and over again.

Average customer rating:
The John Updike Audio Collection CD
John; John, Updike Updike
Manufacturer: Caedmon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OES4DC

Customer Reviews:

Story good; Writing weak at best.......2006-06-30

The story itself is an interesting one, and Herbert sets it up well. But her writing is weak and clunky. She's all about telling, not showing, and randomly jumps to other POVs (of minor characters) for a single paragraph to show they believe/disbelieve in Valorian, rather than letting their actions show it.

Frankly the fact that the hero is named Valorian and the evildoer Tyrannis should be enough to clue you in that Herbert's writing is anything but subtle.

The First Hunneli And His Master.......2003-05-15

Valorian is the first novel in the Dark Horse series, a prequel to the other volumes. "Five hundred years before before the time of Gabria, the mage-heroine of [the other novels], the last remnants of the once great Clans struggle to survive in the barren foothills west of the Darkhorn Mountains." They need to cross the mountains to the vast Ramtharin Plains, but the high peaks and Tarnish Empire hold them back in the Bloodiron Hills.

In this novel, the hunter Valorian has shared meat with a group of Tarnish legionnaires and overheard talk of the legion pulling back to Tarnov, leaving the Ramtharin Plains unoccupied. Also, he heard mention of a Wolfeared Pass in the mountains which is large enough for supply wagons. He begins searching for the pass, but has had no luck for three days. He has wandered up through the foothills onto a ridge crest, but rain shrouds the peaks and drives him to shelter. When the rain blows through, Valorian returns to the crest and calls upon the gods to show him a way to save his people. A bolt of pure power arcs down through his sword and helmet, his body, and his horse to the rocky ground. They are both dead before they know it.

Valorian finds himself in a vast, unutterable silence. He is standing over his own body, and that of his horse, smoke arising from the corpses. However, he is not alone, for Hunnel, his stallion, is also there in spirit, if not quite in body. The land around them is slowly fading away. The two are facing down the Harbringers, the escorts of the dead, when the goddess Amara intervenes to save them.

It seems that some gorthlings have stolen her crown, her brother Sorh thinks her requests for help are a game, and she has no power over her brother's creatures. She asks Valorian and Hunnel to retrieve the crown and gives him the power of magic to use in the quest. She then returns him to the Habringers for escort to the realm of the dead.

When Valorian returns from that realm, he is dirty, tired and has a pounding headache. Moreover, Hunnel has a wound like a brand mark on his side shaped like a lightning bolt. Wondering about his dreams, he mounts Hunnel and goes home. However, he soon learns that he can use magic just as in the dream. Was it a dream or not?

This novel is the backstory of the migration of the clans to the Plains and the occurance of magic users among them. Valorian has other tasks ahead of him, including giving Hunnel the power to mindspeak, before his time is past, but he and his people will now be accompanied by the Dark Horses, Hunnel's descendents.

Recommended for Herbert fans and anyone else who enjoys a good fantasy story about riders of the plains.

Names Remembered........2000-04-05

This book is a gem. I read many books when I was in middle school, and the Dark Horse Clan books are some of the few I actually remember. I suggest you read at least one of these books, and I hpe you can get your hands on them. Try your Local library.

Valorian.......1999-11-26

Wicked series! if this is the only one you have heard of, check out Dark Horse, Lightening's Daughter and City of Sorcerors also done by Mary Herbert

i am impressed!.......1999-04-09

she teaches the history of her characters and makes the past come alive as the prelude shows, she makes her hero act unsure and human, and her villin is pure evil. The ending is climatic and suspened.

Average customer rating:

Two great books in one

Valorian's children
Mary H Herbert
Manufacturer: SFBC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0739409492

Customer Reviews:

Two great books in one .......2007-02-12

Valorian's Children is a Science Fiction Book Club omnibus edition of Dark Horse and Lightning's Daughter.

Since both books are a relatively fast read, having the first two stories in this series in a single edition is comfortable and useful.

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Omnibus Edition

Valorian's Legacy
Mary H. Herbert
Manufacturer: Science Fiction Book Club (SFBC)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0739433040

Customer Reviews:

Omnibus Edition.......2007-02-12

"Valorian's Legacy" is a "Science Fiction Book Club" omnibus edition of "City of Sorcerers" and "Winged Magic", the final two books of Mary Herbert's "Hunnuli" series.

Gabria's daughter is now in the spotlight as a new magical threat faces the Clans. They must leave the Clan's home on the plains and venture into the city that created the Clans' belief that magic is inherently evil.

But even after that problem is solved, the return of magic to the plains and the results of that magic bring outsiders eager to gain what the Clans have created.

If you prefer a hardcover book and a longer read for a single book, this is a great way to finish the Hunnuli series.

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Die letzte Zauberin. Valorians Kinder.
Mary H. Herbert
Manufacturer: Heyne
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 345386476X

Gangs and Governments: The Human Predicament

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Gangs and Governments: The Human Predicament
Valorian Society
Manufacturer: Sovereign Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Human History Viewed as Sovereign Individuals Versus Manipulated Masses

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Human History Viewed as Sovereign Individuals Versus Manipulated Masses
From the Valorian Society
Manufacturer: Rochester, WA: Sovereign Press, 1986
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000O3PF9E

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Valorians Legacy
Mary H Herbert
Manufacturer: SFBC SCIENCE FICTION
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UDCMKI

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