BS: Short stories anyone?

Subject: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 07 Jul 11 - 09:45 PM

Hello everyone.

I think I know how the search function works here, and I couldn't turn up any threads on "short stories." But I see threads on books and movies, so why not one about stories.

I'm trying to get back into reading fiction and I make myself read an hour per night, one or two stories. Some of the better pieces I've come across lately:

All the Young Men by Oliver La Farge
His First Ball by Witi Ihimaera
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gillman
Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr
The Fellow who Married the Maxill Girl by Ward Moore
Frost Rides Alone by Horace McCoy

The McCoy story may be in public domain and on the web somewhere. It's from a book called The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps. Cops and robbers stories from the 1920's, 30's and 40's.

I'll add more to this list as I find other stories I think are worth mentioning. You might want to seek them out.

I'd appreciate any recommendations on authors or stories. Just list them below.

SW

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Janie
Date: 07 Jul 11 - 09:59 PM

Check out Ellen Gilchrist.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 12:46 PM

Look up Alice Munro.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: autolycus
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 01:04 PM

Wiki is great for lists.

There are about 400 short story writers listed here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_short_story_authors

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: kendall
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 01:06 PM

Time and the Riddle by Howard Fast. 31 short Zen stories
It is fascinating.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: gnu
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 01:08 PM

I'll be darned if I can recall the name of my favourite... a Canuck. I am sure I still have the first book I bought when I was a lad. Hmmm... maybe not, though. >;-)

The bluey won't work so...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Munro

Worth a cut and paste.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 01:24 PM

Not sure Alice Munro would appreciate that, Triple-9

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 01:28 PM

Also "The Great Electrical Revolution" by Ken Mitchell. Darned near anything by Leacock.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 02:25 PM

You are a sick man, MacKenzie.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 02:31 PM

Yup

Good innit?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: gnu
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 03:06 PM

Leacock... great stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: bobad
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 03:13 PM

Raymond Carver, T.C. Boyle

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Joe_F
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 08:28 PM

Mark Twain, "The Mysterious Stranger"
Chan Davis, "Adrift on the Policy Level"
J. J. Coupling, "Period Piece"
James Agee, "A Mother's Tale"
E. M. Forster, "The Machine Stops"
Avram Davidson, "No Fire Burns"
Daniel Keyes, "Flowers for Algernon"
Damon Knight, "The Country of the Kind"
Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery"
Thomas Mann, "Mario and the Magician"
John Cheever, "The Enormous Radio"
Robert A. Heinlein, "Universe"
John Collier, "Witchs Money"

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: gnu
Date: 08 Jul 11 - 09:01 PM

Well, if we are gonna talk obvious check out a guy by the last name of Poe. I hear his heart was bigger than a swamp frog.

That's about as literary as I git me son eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 12:00 AM

Oh, for crying out loud.

Saki!
James Thurber!

If I write a short story would it get its own thread or could I post it here?

Also, how long does a story have to be to be a short story and not (what would you call it? A paragraph? A sentence? A page?) something else?

At what length does it become a "novella" (if fiction) or is the distinction between novel and -lla obsolete, in which case, same question for novel?

Can there be a short story that isn't fiction, or does the word "story" in the phrase determine it to be fiction?

If no, then what do you call a short non-fiction piece?

Now *this* is a Mudcat thread!

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: autolycus
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 03:31 AM

I've heard tell about O.Henry, Katherine Mansfield and read the Sherlock Holmes short stories of Conan Doyle nearly at a sitting.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 03:59 AM

D H Lawrence
John Steinbeck

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Max Johnson
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 06:03 AM

Some of Patrick O'Brien's short stories were collected under the title 'The Chian Wine'. Apparently he wasn't happy with them all, but I must say that I was.

'After Rain' by William Trevor. Beautifully crafted.

'The Illustrated Man' by Ray Bradbury. Classic SF.

'Declarations of War' by Len Deighton. Anti-War stories.

'No Comebacks' by Frederick Forsyth. Very slick - Classic FF.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Max Johnson
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 06:08 AM

One of the best short stories I ever read was about a little girl having adventures with her invisible friend on the way to school. At the end it becomes clear that the story is being related by the invisible friend, sad when they arrive at the school and the girl must leave for a while.

Can't remember where I read it - anyone recognise it?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 06:29 AM

Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: saulgoldie
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 08:54 AM

This has always been one of my favorites. I was "forced" to read it back in high school English class. Reload your coffee, and you'll be done reading before your cup runneth out.


IRTNOG, by E.B. White (1938)

Apropos of nothing but The Modern Condition (Long-Obtaining), an extremely short work of dystopian fiction:

    Along about 1920 it became apparent that more things were being written than people had time to read. That is to say, even if a man spent his entire time reading stories, articles, and news, as they appeared in books, magazines, and pamphlets, he fell behind. This was no fault of the reading public; on the contrary, readers made a real effort to keep pace with writers, and utilized every spare moment during their walking hours. They read while shaving in the morning and while waiting for trains and while riding on trains. They came to be a kind of tacit agreement among numbers of the reading public that when one person laid down the baton, someone else must pick it up; and so when a customer entered a barbershop, the barber would lay aside the Boston Evening Globe and the customer would pick up Judge; or when a customer appeared in a shoe-shining parlor, the bootblack would put away the racing form and the customer would open his briefcase and pull out The Sheik. So there was always somebody reading something. Motormen of trolley cars read while they waited on the switch. Errand boys read while walking from the corner of Thirty-ninth and Madison to the corner of Twenty-fifth and Broadway. Subway riders read constantly, even when they were in a crushed, upright position in which nobody could read his own paper but everyone could look over the next man s shoulder. People passing newsstands would pause for a second to read headlines. Men in the back seats of limousines, northbound on Lafayette Street in the evening, switched on tiny dome lights and read the Wall Street Journal. Women in semi-detached houses joined circulating libraries and read Vachel Lindsay while the baby was taking his nap.

    There was a tremendous volume of staff that had to be read. Writing began to give off all sorts of by-products. Readers not only had to read the original works of a writer, but they also had to scan what the critics said, and they had to read the advertisements reprinting the favorable criticisms, and they had to read the book chat giving some rather odd piece of information about the writer such as that he could write only when he had a gingersnap in his mouth. It all took time. Writers gained steadily, and readers lost.

    Then along came the Reader's Digest. That was a wonderful idea. It digested everything that was being written in leading magazine, and put new hope in the hearts of readers. Here, everybody thought, was the answer to the problem. Readers, badly discouraged by the rate they had been losing ground, took courage and set out once more to keep abreast of everything that was being written in the world. For a while they seemed to hold their own. But soon other digests and short cuts appeared, like Time, and The Best Short Stories of 1927, and the new Five-Foot Shelf, and Wells' Outline of History, and Newsweek, and Fiction Parade. By 1939 there were one hundred and seventy-three digests, or short cuts, in America, and even if a man read nothing but digests of selected material, and read continuously, he couldn't keep up. It was obvious that something more concentrated than digests would have to come along to take up the slack.

    It did. Someone conceived the idea of digesting the digests. He brought out a little publication called Pith, no bigger than your thumb. It was a digest of Reader's Digest, Time, Concise Spicy Tales, and the daily news summary of the New York Herald Tribune. Everything was so extremely condensed that a reader could absorb everything that was being published in the world in about forty-five minutes.   It was a tremendous financial success, and of course other publications sprang up, aping it: one called Core, another called Nub, and a third called Nutshell. Nutshell folded up, because, an expert said, the name was too long; but half a dozen others sprang up to take its place, and for another short period readers enjoyed a breathing spell and managed to stay abreast of writers. In fact, at one juncture, soon after the appearance of Nub, some person of unsound business tendencies felt that the digest rage had been carried too far and that there would be room in the magazine field for a counterdigest, a publication devoted to restoring literary bulk. He raised some money and issued a huge thing called Amplifo, undigesting the digests. In the second issue the name had been changed to Regurgitans. The third issue never reached the stands. Pith and Core continued to gain, and became so extraordinarily profitable that hundreds of other digests of digests came into being. Again readers felt themselves slipping. Distillate came along, a superdigest which condensed a Hemingway novel to the single word "Bang!" and reduced a long article about the problem of the unruly child to the words "Hit him."

    You would think that with such drastic condensation going on, the situation would have resolved itself and that an adjustment would have been set up between writer and reader. Unfortunately, writers still forged ahead. Digests and superdigests, because of their rich returns, became as numerous as the things digested. It was not until 1960, when a Stevens Tech graduate named Abe Shapiro stepped in with and immense ingenious formula, that a permanent balance was established between writers and readers. Shapiro was a sort of Einstein. He had read prodigiously; and as he thought back over all the things that he had ever read, he became convinced that it would be possible to express them in mathematical quintessence. He was positive that he could take everything that was written and published each day, and reduce it to a six-letter word. He worked out a secret formula and began posting daily bulletins, telling his result. Everything that had been written during the first day of his formula came down to the word IRTNOG. The second day, everything reduced to EFSITZ. People accepted these mathematical distillations; and strangely enough, or perhaps not strangely at all, people were thoroughly satisfied, which would lead one to believe that what readers really craved was not so much the contents of books, magazines, and papers as the assurance that they were not missing anything. Shapiro found that his bulletin board was inadequate, so he made a deal with a printer and issued a handbill at five o clock every afternoon, giving the Word of the Day. It caught hold instantly.

    The effect on the populace was salutary. Readers, once they felt confident that they had one-hundred-per-cent coverage, were able to discard the unnatural habit of focusing their eyes on words every instant. Freed of the exhausting consequences of their hopeless race against writers, they found their health returning, along with a certain tranquility and a more poised way of living. There was a marked decrease in stomach ulcers, which, doctors said, had been the result of allowing the eye to jump nervously from one newspaper headline to another after a heavy meal. With the dwindling of reading, writing fell off. Forests which had been plundered for newsprint, grew tall again; droughts were unheard of; and people dwelt in slow comfort, in a green world.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 12:00 PM

"The Sentry" by Fredrick(sp?) Brown. It's a gem, imo.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Joe_F
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 08:16 PM

Oh, yes, John McK., absolutely, "Flowers for Algernon".
And Bret Harte, "The Luck of Roaring Camp".

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Jul 11 - 08:43 PM

"Nightfall" by Isaac Asimov

and if you can stand a slightly longer story,
"A Rose for Ecclesiastes" by Roger Zelazny, which I have long thought should be made into a movie.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 10 Jul 11 - 11:11 AM

Can't believe that nobody has mentioned the great Damon Runyon.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 10 Jul 11 - 08:02 PM

Hey thanks for the input. Lots of titles and authors here. Some I recognize, others I don't. I'll be researching the list.

I have a bunch of anthologies I'm reading from and I'm picking up single-author books by people like Hemingway, Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, Raymond Carver, Roald Dahl, V.S. Naipaul, T.C. Boyle, Robert E. Howard, Cornell Woolrich, and so on. I've read most of the Hemingway and O'Connor stories, but not many of the others. Looking forward to them.

Some of the consistently good/enjoyable writers in my experience--

Isaac Singer
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Katherine Anne Porter
P. K. Dick
Conrad
Maugham
Salinger
Joyce
Faulkner

I need to find a copy of Go Down, Moses by Faulkner. I read the four-part version of The Bear years ago, and I saw somewhere that the Moses book of stories has the original five-part version. The Bear is one of the most amazing pieces of writing I've ever come across. Novella length, I believe.

Regarding lengths, flash fiction is generally anything up to 1000 words. Short story 1000-7500. Novelette 7500-15,000. Novella 15-40k. Novel 40k+.

At any rate, continuing with my plan to mention the better stories I come across, the other evening I read one called The Haunted Palace, by Isabel Allende. Excellent. Reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,Josepp
Date: 10 Jul 11 - 11:24 PM

The Willows by Algernon Blackwood

The Willows

The Spider by Hanns Heinz Ewers

The Horror of the Heights by Arthur Conan Doyle

The Yellow Sign by Robert W. Chambers

Suffer the Little Children by Stephen King

The Ash Tree by M.R. James

Grab Bags Are Dangerous by Frank Belknap Long

The Brain-Eaters by Robert Bloch

They Bite by Anthony Boucher

The Incomplete Corpse by Jack Webb

Shadow Over Innsmouth by H.P. Lovecraft (novella)

The Terror by Arthur Machen (novella)

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 11 Jul 11 - 03:45 PM

Grand thread..I love short stories. So, Can anyone tell me who wrote the wonderful story "The Ballroom". I would love to re read it but cannot recall who wrote it.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: josepp
Date: 11 Jul 11 - 09:06 PM

Anyone read "The Cocoon" by John B.L. Goodwin?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 12 Jul 11 - 08:26 AM

Once upon a time, Jack the sailior returnd after roaming the seven seas for seven years, he met his old truelove Doreen and they settled down in a cottage in Filey and lived happily ever after.

copywrite retained

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: kendall
Date: 12 Jul 11 - 09:37 AM

A man died and found himself in the most beautiful place he could imagine. Nothing but beauty, peace and quiet. While he was drinking it all in, suddenly an entity appeared and told the man that it was his guardian angel, and that he could have anything he wanted, in any amount for as long as he wanted it.
The man pigged out on food, booze, gambling and sex.
That went on for 6 months and the man made a proper fool of himself. But, eventually, he came to his senses and realized that his existence was worthless. Calling upon his guardian he said, "This is all very nice, and I have enjoyed it all very much, but I need something to do that has some value. Give me a job."
His Guardian said, "That is the one thing you can never have."
In despair the man howled"What? you mean I must spend eternity with nothing worthwhile to do"?
Guardian says "I'm afraid so."
Man said, "I may as well be in Hell."
Guardian said, "Where do you think you are."?

This is one of my favorite short stories.Without goals and challenge we are worthless.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 12 Jul 11 - 09:43 AM

"The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door." —Fredric Brown

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 13 Jul 11 - 07:16 PM

I read some vengeance stories once, and two really stuck in my memory.

A Vendetta by Guy de Maupassant.

Hop-Frog by E. A. Poe.

A Vendetta is only about 1700 words. Well worth the effort to read. Hop-Frog has a very memorable ending.

There was a third one, I think by Saki, that was in the public domain. It concerned a man who killed a cat and how some children made him atone. Can't recall the name of the story.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 20 Jul 11 - 10:03 PM

The Penance by Saki. An excellent revenge story.

A few days ago I read Red Wind, by Raymond Chandler. Novella length. Amazing. 1938. A Phillip Marlowe story.

The dark guy took a week to fall down. He stumbled, caught himself, waved one arm, stumbled again. His hat fell off, and then he hit the floor with his face. After he hit it he might have been poured concrete for all the fuss he made.

The drunk slid down off the stool and scooped his dimes into a pocket and slid towards the door. He turned sideways, holding the gun across his body. I didn't have a gun. I hadn't thought I needed one to buy a glass of beer....

Read a really funny story called Gertrude the Governor by Stephen Leacock. It has one of the funniest paragraphs I've ever come across.

The two were destined to meet. Nearer and nearer they came. And then still nearer. Then for one brief moment they met. As they passed, Gertrude raised her head and directed towards the young nobleman two eyes so eye-like in their expression as to be absolutely circular, while Lord Ronald directed towards the occupant of the dogcart a gaze so gaze-like that nothing but a gazelle, or a gas-pipe, could have emulated its intensity.

Read a story called B. Traven is Alive and Well in Cuernavaca, by Rudolfo Anaya. Excllent. First-rate writing. I think it would be classified as Magical Realism.

Read one by Elizabeth George, mystery writer. A man's convinced his wife is cheating on him with his brother. He arranges an alibi and sneaks home to kill her (strangle her with a sash at the front door, to make it look like an outsider did it), and when she answers he violently kills her. Does a quick, efficient job. Then the light clicks on and people yell Surprise! His wife and brother were simply arranging a party for him. The partygoers (among them the mayor and the chief of police) are rather surprised themselves, seeing him at the door on top of his dead wife.

And these are some of the stories I've read, lately. Just keeping a list of the good ones.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 21 Jul 11 - 03:57 AM

once upon a time came THE END.

GfS

Short enough?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: kendall
Date: 21 Jul 11 - 06:46 AM

Shortest poem in history titled "Fleas"

Adam had 'em.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 21 Jul 11 - 08:36 AM

It was a dark stormy night and the rain came down in torrents, so we stayed in and watched the telly.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Jul 11 - 08:38 AM

I've just about reached breaking point, he snapped.

Adrian Henri

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: gnu
Date: 21 Jul 11 - 02:22 PM

AHA! I just started to read this thread again and the name came to me in an instant... Gregory Clark!

Wiki... "Gregory (Greg) Clark, OC, OBE, MC (25 September 1892 – 3 February 1977) was a Canadian war veteran, journalist, and humorist. Both before and after World War I, Clark worked for the Toronto Star. After the war, he soon became a leading correspondent and reporter. At the Toronto Star, Clark befriended and mentored a young Ernest Hemingway, who said that Clark was the best writer on the paper. In later life Hemingway called Clark one of the finest modern short story writers in the English language."

There ya go eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 22 Jul 11 - 12:28 AM

kendall:"Shortest poem in history titled "Fleas"

Adam had 'em."

Peeved Eve

Wink,
GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: clueless don
Date: 22 Jul 11 - 09:50 AM

Speaking of short stories - For years, I have wondered about a story that I read in my high school American Literature textbook, back in my junior year (1965-66 school year.) Well, yesterday I finally described everything I could remember about the story to the BookSleuth forum at ABEbooks (http://forums.abebooks.com/abesleuthcom), and now I have it - "Of Missing Persons" by Jack Finney. I recommend it!

Don

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 24 Jul 11 - 09:24 PM

I'm a Fool, by Sherwood Anderson. Good story. He's best known for a short story collection called Winesburg, Ohio.

Also, I just read a synopsis of a play written in 1902 by James M. Barrie (of Peter Pan fame). The play's called The Admirable Crichton. Sounds hilarious. About an aristocratic British family that's marooned on an island after a shipwreck. Their butler, Crichton, is the most capable of the party and rises to become Lord of the island. I haven't read a play in years but that one's next on my list. Looks like it's on Gutenberg.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Ed T
Date: 25 Jul 11 - 06:11 PM

On Being Found Out

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 26 Jul 11 - 08:22 PM

A Conflagration Artist, by Bradley Denton. Excellent story. It's from the Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, Eighth Annual Collection, edited by Datlow and Windling. Haven't come across a bad story in it yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Zhenya
Date: 27 Jul 11 - 12:53 AM

Island - The Collected Stories of Canadian writer Alistair MacLeod.

Sixteen stories, and all of them good.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: LadyJean
Date: 28 Jul 11 - 12:45 AM

If you want a good laugh you might like:
The Open Window by Saki
Tobermory also by Saki
Gabriel Earnest likewise by Saki

or;
The Story of Webster by P.G Wodehouse
Mulliner's Buck U Uppo by P.G. Wodehouse
Just about anything by Wodehouse. I don't play golf. I don't know anything about golf. But his golf stories make me laugh.

The Havoc of Havelock by Gerald Durrell

The Night the Bed Fell on Father
The Night the Ghost Got In, both by James Thurber.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Will Fly
Date: 28 Jul 11 - 03:58 AM

Some other writers worth reading (in translation unless you have the gift of languages):

Guy de Maupassant
Alexander Pushkin

And don't forget M.R. James for ghost stories...
... and the whimsical pieces and pastiches by S.J. Perelman.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 02 Aug 11 - 07:31 PM

J.G. Ballard. I read an entertaining story by him a few days ago. Called The Index.

The story consists of an "Editor's Note" explaining that the following index is all that's left of the autobiography of one HRH. Says he was a famous man, hobnobbed, etc. Then comes the index, a list of names with notes next to them. HRH advised lots and of famous people. Presidents, prime ministers, actors, astronauts. Made Gandhi lose his temper. Introduced Hemingway to James Joyce. It's hinted at early on that HRH loved the ladies, but there are no notes next to the names of people like Barbra Stanwyck, Greta Garbo and so on. A really amusing story.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Songwronger
Date: 21 Aug 11 - 10:06 PM

Just read "Three O'Clock," by Cornell Woolrich. Suspense story. One of the best I've ever come across. A lot of Woolrich's stories were adapted for radio dramas in the 40's. And Rear Window, Hitchcock's movie, was taken from a Woolrich story.

Subject: RE: BS: Short stories anyone?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 22 Aug 11 - 11:39 AM

I once did some research to determine what were the most frequently anthologized short stories. This list can't be regarded as definitive, because, of course, I couldn't examine every anthology that's ever been published, but I did examine a lot of them. And my list is probably slanted toward American short stories, because that's where I did my research. And it may be a bit out of date, since I did the research maybe 20 years ago. Anyway, here's what I came up with:

All of these stories appear in at least 5 anthologies:

Sherwood Anderson, "The Egg"
James Baldwin, "Sonny's Blues"
Ambrose Bierce, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge"
Willa Cather, "Paul's Case"
Joseph Conrad, "Heart of Darkness" [some would classify this as a novel, but it does appear in anthologies]
Stephen Crane, "The Blue Hotel"
Stephen Crane, "The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky"
Stephen Crane, "The Open Boat"
Ralph Ellison, "Battle Royal" [which I think is actually an excerpt from his novel, "Invisible Man", but it stands on its own]
Ralph Ellison, "King of the Bingo Game" [ditto?]
William Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily"
William Faulkner, "Barn Burning"
William Faulkner, "That Evening Sun"
F. Scott Fitzgerald, "Babylon Revisited"
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, "The Yellow Wallpaper"
Nathaniel Hawthorne, "My Kinsman, Major Molineux"
Nathaniel Hawthorne, "The Minister's Black Veil"
Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown"
Ernest Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants"
Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery"
Henry James, "The Beast in the Jungle"
Henry James, "The Real Thing"
Sarah Orne Jewett, "A White Heron"
James Joyce, "A Little Cloud"
James Joyce, "Araby"
James Joyce, "The Dead"
Franz Kafka, "A Hunger Artist"
D. H. Lawrence, "The Horse-Dealer's Daughter"
D. H. Lawrence, "The Rocking-Horse Winner"
Jack London, "To Build a Fire"
Herman Melville, "Bartleby the Scrivener"
Flannery O'Connor, "A Good Man is Hard to Find"
Flannery O'Connor, "Everything that Rises Must Converge"
Joyce Carol Oates, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"
Grace Paley, "A Conversation with My Father"
Edgar Allen Poe, "The Cask of Amontillado"
Edgar Allen Poe, "The Fall of the House of Usher"
Katherine Anne Porter, "Flowering Judas"
Katherine Anne Porter, "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall"
John Steinbeck, "The Chrysanthemums"
James Thurber, "The Catbird Seat"
Leo Tolstoy, "The Death of Ivan Ilych"
Mark Twain, "The Notorious* Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" [* Some versions have "Celebrated"]
John Updike, "A & P"
Eudora Welty, "Why I Live at the P. O."
Richard Wright, "The Man Who Was Almost a Man"