Monday, November 16, 2009

First Anniversary of "Reading the Short Story"

Today, November 16, 2009, marks the one-year anniversary of Charles May’s blog “Reading the Short Story.” It was one year ago today that, calling myself a “cheerleader for the short story,” I announced my intention to write a blog in which, on a regular basis, I would post comments about reading and studying the short story, a form that I taught and wrote about for forty years before I retired four years ago from California State University, Long Beach.

In the past year, I have written sixty blog posts for this site, most of them fairly substantial discussions of new short story collections, individual short stories, and other matters of note to those interested in the short story as a form. Although I have not always succeeded, I have tried to focus on significant theoretical and generic issues, using individual collections and stories as examples of those issues.

I do not have a counter for this blog, but noticed this morning that the counter that ticks off those who have visited my user profile turned over to 1,000. I don’t know what this means. I really do not know how many people have visited the blog occasionally or how many read it regularly, although I do have twenty-eight “followers,” whatever that means.

One writes to be read, so I am grateful to those who read this blog regularly and who stumble on it while doing a Google search. I am especially grateful to those who take the time to write comments. I have tried to respond to every comment I have received, and I will continue to do so. I started the blog as a means by which I could engage in dialogue with other short story fans about the form that we love. The one thing I miss most since my retirement is the opportunity to talk “with,” not “to,” others about short fiction. However, as it was in the classroom, if my love of the short story became more a monologue than a dialogue, so be it. If no one responds to my remarks, I will still continue writing them.

I started the blog as a stimulus to myself—something to keep me reading, not aimlessly, but with a purpose—something to keep me writing, not carelessly, but with care. That seems to have worked for me. I feel compelled to write at least one blog entry a week, which means that I must continue reading new short stories, continue keeping up with what others are saying about the short story, and continue thinking about the unique characteristics of the form that make it, in my opinion, more aesthetically and psychologically complex and interesting than the novel.

Because there has been some publicity recently about bloggers receiving rewards for publicizing certain products—so-called “Mom” bloggers who get junkets and goodies—I thought I should state here quite emphatically that I receive no rewards from publishers for my comments about new collections of short stories. I do write occasional reviews for reference works and newspapers, for which I receive a copy of the book—either from the publisher or the publication where the review appears. And yes, I do receive a modest check for the published review. And yes, I do also comment on the book on this blog if it is of theoretical or critical interest. But I always read the stories I write about carefully, and at least twice, and I always try to provide a fair and well-considered evaluation. The only thing I wish to "promote" is getting more people to read and appreciate short stories. Wryly, I might add, no one should worry that anyone will try to "buy" my favor. The short story is just not a commercial commodity worth the seller's trouble.

On a personal note, I have commented occasionally that although I do not often read novels, I do “listen” to them on my daily morning walks with our dog Shannon. Today, the first birthday of this blog, is also the 15th birthday of Shannon. I just finished listening to, of all things, Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road,” a book I had not read in fifty years, a book that came out when I was sixteen and which I thought was the true document of my generation.

When I was in undergraduate school, I wrote a column for my college newspaper in which I paraded as a “Beatnik” kind of guy; it was accompanied by a drawing a friend of mine did of me in a beret, with a pointy goatee, and a set of bongo drums between my knees. There are probably some books we read in our youth that we should never read again. Instead of nodding sagely this time as I listened to Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarity pontificate about being beat and hip, I chuckled. Instead of longing to hit the road with my gang, picking up cool chicks and drinking lots of beer, I tsk tsked at the juvenile antics and irresponsibility of Kerouac and Cassidy and the rest.

I grow old . . .I grow old . . .
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

In three months, I will be sixty-nine. I trust that in a year from now, as I near seventy, I will still be writing this blog, still reading short stories, still urging others to read them, still writing about them, still listening to novels on my walks with Shannon. It is less a walk than an amble now, taking twice as long to cover half the distance we used to cover. But Shannon still explores the world around her, sniffing for scents that she has somehow missed on her many journeys. I do not get impatient. I understand. I do the same.

11 comments:

Lee said...

I plan to continue being one of your loyal readers.

At the moment I'm reading Josh Weil's The New Valley and thinking about the difference - or potential differences - between a short story and a novella. Lovely writing.

It may just be a temporary mood, but I'm chafing a bit at the conventions of the literary short story, particularly the so-called subtlety which often translates into capricious symbolism and incomprehensible understatement.

Charles E. May said...

Hi, Lee. Thanks for sticking with me. I too become irritated with conventions that become, well, too conventional. And Chekhov's suggestion that it is better to say too little than too much was not meant to encourage the incomprehensible. I have done some work on the novella form and will put together a post about what I think the differences between the short story and the novella are.

Charlene said...

Thank you for starting the blog. I continue to read your posts and be inspired to read more short stories. Happy Birthday to Shannon, too.

Lee said...

I'm looking forward to your thoughts on short story vs. novella - and if it's a vs. at all!

Anonymous said...

I stumbled onto your blog a few months ago and since then I have returned regularly and read everything in the archives. I check back frequently and I am impatient for new posts. I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoy your thoughtful comments and careful readings. I hope you continue to write here for many years.
Sally

Charles E. May said...

Thanks to Charlene and Sally for the kind words and continued support. I very much appreciate it. And to Lee, if I read you correctly, you agree with me that the novella is closer to the short story in form than it is to the novel. More later.

ChrisG said...

Thank you for continuing to write, Charles. As long you as you write, I'll read. And you know, other than Kurt Vonnegut, I can't remember the last novel I read - and most recently, I've been reading his short stories.

I can't wait to read what you have to say about Joyce Carol Oates' review of Alice Munro's latest story collection that appeared in the most recent _New York Review of Books_. Inevitable comparisons to Flannery O'Conner aside, Oates points out that "It's often said that Munro's short stories, richly detailed and dense with psychological observation, read like compact novels."

And Lee, I see what you're saying. I would submit that it's the short stories that skip the "capricious symbolism" and "incomprehensible understatement" that are most worthy of our attention. Nobody likes being beaten about the head by an obvious metaphor, and truly discerning readers have permanent scarring from previous clubbings.

Ann Graham said...

I too eagerly await each of your blog entries. And, it makes me happy to hear of others who love the short story.

Becky said...

Although I may not always comment, your blog is a regular destination for me. I've read at least three short story collections/authors mentioned in your posts, stories that I likely would have never stumbled upon wandering my local Borders or B&N. Those writers now take up space on my bookshelves. And about "On the Road," I agree. Perhaps because I first read "Road" when I was in my late twenties, too old, I think, to romantisize their hobo ways. But a couple years ago I was in a Big Sur bookstore, and a little depressed about having to go back home so I purchased Kerouac's "Big Sur." I read it in one sitting and found it more introspective, more adult than "On the Road."

Charles E. May said...

Thanks, Becky, for your comment. I remember you sitting in the back left corner of the room on, I think, the third floor of LA1, in my American Short Story class. You did not comment a great deal then, but I always knew you were there. I miss all of you. I was on campus today to check my mail for a letter I was expecting from Australia, and as I walked up toward MHB from the parking lot, I flashed back forty years (Good Lord! forty years! Hell, you are not even that old) to the first day I walked on the campus. It was in August, one of those June gloom kind of days, and when I left the motel to where I had just driven over two thousand miles to reach Long Beach, I took my umbrella. Several people asked me, "Do You think it's going to rain?" Silly me! At twenty-five, I was just beginning. It seems like yesterday.

Marianne said...

Please keep going, because you write one of my favorite blogs.

Happy Birthday to your blog and to your Shannon. I have a 14-year-old beagle, I celebrate each day that I still have her ...

Marianne