Oh, The Open Window! Good to be reminded of that one.
Xander: Look who's got a bad case of Dark Prince envy. Dracula: Leave us. Xander: No, we're not going to "Leabbb you." And where'd you get that accent, Sesame Street? "One, Two, Three - three victims! Maw ha ha!"
'Lessons'
Natter 56: ...we need the writers.
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
-t - Jan 16, 2008 12:49:11 pm PST #3730 of 10001
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
Cashmere - Jan 16, 2008 12:50:14 pm PST #3731 of 10001
Now tagless for your comfort.
That's it, DJ!
Daisy Jane - Jan 16, 2008 12:51:07 pm PST #3732 of 10001
"This bar smells like kerosene and stripper tears."
Yes. Being a Rand fan in middle school is my secret shame.
§ ita § - Jan 16, 2008 12:51:56 pm PST #3733 of 10001
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.
I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is a specific Harlan Ellison that sticks in my mind, but much of his stuff is brilliant.
And I've had the shit scared out of me by Stephen King's shorter works, but his short stories are the length of a normal person's shorter novel.
Atropa - Jan 16, 2008 12:52:42 pm PST #3734 of 10001
The artist formerly associated with cupcakes.
Oh, The Open Window! Good to be reminded of that one.
I love love love Saki's short stories. That's where Clovis got his name.
Do the Winnie the Pooh stories count as short stories? Because if they do, they would be on my list.
-t - Jan 16, 2008 12:53:42 pm PST #3735 of 10001
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
"The Mangler" is the Stephen King I can easily recall.
Kat - Jan 16, 2008 12:54:45 pm PST #3736 of 10001
"I keep to a strict diet of ill-advised enthusiasm and heartfelt regret." Leigh Bardugo
You've all given me some great ideas of where to start. I also have some great Richard Wright stuff.
This knit frog, dissected is AWESOME. I wish I knew a science teacher who dissected frogs with her class.
juliana - Jan 16, 2008 12:55:08 pm PST #3737 of 10001
I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I miss them all tonight…
Oooh, "The Mist". Love that one.
-t - Jan 16, 2008 12:55:10 pm PST #3738 of 10001
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
I should re-read Saki, I can only vaguely remember a few details from most of them. Delightful, that I remember.
JZ - Jan 16, 2008 12:55:49 pm PST #3739 of 10001
See? I gave everybody here an opportunity to tell me what a bad person I am and nobody did, because I fuckin' rule.
Just about anything by Flannery O'Connor. "Good Country People" may be my most favorite favorite, but that's just right this minute.
Mark Helprin, despite being a dickwad neocon speechwriter, is not only a great novelist but a phenomenal short story writer. Anything at all in Ellis Island and Other Stories is just heartstoppingly good.
I love "Angel Levine" by Bernard Malamud so very much.
It's been a while since I read them so I can't rattle off any titles, but Muriel Spark was a fantastic short story writer, crisp and vivid and snarkalicious.
I will always, always have a soft spot for Harlan Ellison's "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream." My main memory of it is of a classmate bringing it in to discuss during our senior creative thesis seminar (each of us was to lead the class for one week, bringing in a piece of professional, published writing for us to read before class and then dissect for an hour). After months and months of pallid understated Raymond Carver and a billion less-gifted imitators, IHNMAIMS was a gloriously revolting, smelly, pulpalicious smack in the face. Rude and coarse and obvious and bracing.
Class began, I was all geared up to open my mouth (which I never did in this class) and launch into academia-speak for "Dudes! This fuckin' rocks!" and the guy who'd brought it in said, "So, this story was certainly my single greatest creative influence as a teenager and was such a huge part of why I wanted to become a writer. But now I look at it and I'm amazed that it ever had such power over me. It's juvenile and obvious and I really feel a sense of relief, looking back and seeing how much I've grown past this."
Sigh.