Why read short stories? Author: Doctor Terence Rajivan Edward (or 0161__Rajivan, if that helps) Draft version: version 3 (27th March 2026, last 3 reasons added) 2024 or 2025. I was working voluntarily at Elizabeth Gaskell's House when a young man appeared, educated at Cambridge University, Jesus College, Cambridge, in modern languages. He had a wide vocabulary, read French novels, and taught me: persona non-grata. He asked me if I write short stories: I said, "No, I write jokes," which was true at the time, but I had earlier put some short stories online and furthermore have some story-like essays. He said he was interested in fascism and literature. I asked him if he knew Wyndham Lewis. He said, "No." The next week he spoke to me more boldly. He said, "Why do you like short stories? Reading a short story is like consuming a crisp! Defend yourself." I should say that two other volunteers also told me that they did not like short stories. An obvious defence. Some people are busy and don't have the time for reading whole novels, or feel they don't at least. They can read short stories. Relatedly, some people would like to read some literature in a prestigious sense, highbrow literature, but highbrow literature is often demanding and they are too busy for a demanding novel. They can try some short stories. Character defence. Some people read fiction to better understand the thoughts and emotions of others. But is every character of interest to oneself in some novel or other (and sufficiently treated there)? That seems a doubtful assumption. So one can try short stories. (There is also a wealth of information in short stories about social situations, such as about French teachers in the 19th century, immigration in the 1950s, etc.) One word away. Are short story opponents okay with the next category up: novellas? But then can you really be opposed to a short story one word off a novella? Another obvious defence: new authors. Why are you reading this particular novel? "Someone recommended it to me." Indeed, reading a novel is, for many, a large investment of time and effort and so one tends to rely on recommendations from others. Short stories are a good way to find new authors. Anthologies of best short stories of a given year have introduced me to numerous new authors. Relatedly: a climate of distrust. A novel is a large investment of time and effort and so one relies on recommendations. But who are these people who recommend? Do you trust them? Would they ever spot something good and not tell anyone? A scandal fills the newspapers these days involving powerful people: the Epstein scandal, concerning sex trafficking. In a climate of distrust, it may be good to find some new authors oneself, rather than being so reliant on a social network, and short stories are a way. A meritorious author. The question of why read short stories probably cannot be separated "wholly" from why write them. ("They are different questions though!" you say.) You think you have some literary talent and plan to write a novel. But you are not connected with literary circles yet. What should you do? An obvious move: write some short stories. Have a flashy opening paragraph that grabs attention - after all, you don't have a name in the business yet or literary friends. Send them off to magazines. You will hopefully get some publications, get an agent maybe, and then you can move to publishing a novel hopefully. But this all depends probably on people reading short stories! (What to make of an author who does not take this path? Were they simply born into the literary field? Publish some short stories to begin with, so as to appear an author by merit - or an author who could have been at least! I happen to know someone who has, or had, ambitions to write a novel and he refuses to start by writing and hopefully publishing short stories. WHAT?!) Another character defence. Some people value fiction for its characters rather than plot. I once wrote a few short stories about a certain avuncular figure. You probably don't need any more to grasp their character. The short fiction is enough. (Somewhat relatedly, "we can work out the rest of the story for some fictions.") Pastiche defence. The styles of various authors are imitated in short stories, even if the authors are chiefly known as novelists or novella writers, and you like reading imitations too, or must for your research. For example, Max Beerbohm's The Feast imitates Joseph Conrad. Watering down problem. If enough people say, "I don't read short stories, only novels," then people start selling goods as novels which perhaps are not: merely short story collections. To do your part in preventing this, read short stories. Specialization. You must specialize in something and everyone else specializes in novels, so you specialize in short stories. Early anticipation. An important author is emerging. Early responses to the author often appear in short stories, even suggesting "This is what he is going to write like. Why do you need him? I can do that!" Consider the early imitations of R.K. Narayan by Suresh Vaidya and Sylvia Townsend Warner. *Best authors. Let's suppose you want to set up literature in your country as an exclusive club, the following way: only for or mainly for people of a certain social network, even if others have the talent. But you are not allowed an explicit prohibition. What you do is make the obvious pathway in for outsiders difficult to pursue. How so? One way is to send the best writers from the established social network there. The obvious path to publishing a novel, for someone without literary connections, an upstart, is to start by publishing a short story and thereby get one's name known in literary circles, then get an agent, and then hopefully publish a novel. So one might predict best well-connected young authors start with short stories too, to block upstarts! A personal reason. In 2023, I could not find some cards I purchased. I asked the police whether it could be that someone sent an electronic bug under my door and took them. This was later used as evidence of psychosis by a psychiatrist, even though I did not believe this, merely asked a question. Later I read a story by Monya Baker with these sentences. "A hoax. A prank. Maybe inside the vase there was a flea-sized speaker-bug-camera spy gadget installed by an asshole at Trader Joe’s." She suggests the question is not on a par with some highly unrealistic delusion. Less tricky. A whole book can play tricks with you. You underline things, but were those the best things to underline. A short story you can read again and again, until you feel safe! References Baker, Monya. 2025. Lucky Bamboo. Flash Fiction Magazine 2 June 2025. Available at: https://flashfictionmagazine.com/blog/2025/06/02/lucky-bamboo/ Beerbohm, Max. 1912. The Feast. In A Christmas Garland. Available at: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/14667/14667-h/14667-h.htm Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2025. Why read short stories? Available at: https://philpapers.org/rec/EDWWRS Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2025. Dialogue with O on the short story. Available at: https://philpapers.org/rec/EDWDWO-6 Vaidya, Suresh. 1930s? Sandals for his son. The London Mercury. Available at: https://website2.net/vaidya_sandals.html (I bought a copy of this secondhand and threw it away, after typing the story. Not sure of the exact volume and date. ) Warner, Sylvia Townsend. 1930s? The Best Bed. Available at: https://website2.net/townsendwarner_thebestbed.txt Some short story summaries Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2025. Eleven R.K. Narayan short story synopses. Available at: https://www.academia.edu/144237229/Eleven_R_K_Narayan_short_story_synopses Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2026. Summaries of three V.S. Naipaul stories, from Miguel Street (1959). Available at: https://www.academia.edu/165047711/Summaries_of_three_V_S_Naipaul_stories_from_Miguel_Street_1959_ Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2026. Three Samuel Selvon stories, fictions, summarized. Available at: https://www.academia.edu/165118448/Three_Samuel_Selvon_stories_fictions_summarized