What do you think?
Rate this book
The Penguin Books of Short Stories
The Penguin Book of the British Short Story, Volume 2: From P.G. Wodehouse to Zadie Smith
'Eclectic, entertaining ... almost all British, if not human, life is here' Boyd Tonkin, Independent
'Mind-stretching, heart-breaking, beautifully-crafted fiction' Claire Harman, Evening Standard
'She would tear the house down - shatter the windows, slash the furniture, flood the baths, fire the curtains!'
Hilarious, exuberant, surreal, subtle, tender, brutal, spectacular and above all unexpected: this extraordinary selection celebrates the British short story from the 1920s to the present day. From Angela Carter to V. S. Pritchett, Elizabeth Taylor to J. G. Ballard, Ali Smith to a host of little-known works from magazines and periodicals, and including tales of air-raids, phone sex, snobbery, modern-day slavery, grief, desire, the familiar and the strange, here is the short story in all its limitless possibilities.
Edited and with an introduction by Philip Hensher, the award-winning novelist, critic and journalist.
'Mind-stretching, heart-breaking, beautifully-crafted fiction' Claire Harman, Evening Standard
'She would tear the house down - shatter the windows, slash the furniture, flood the baths, fire the curtains!'
Hilarious, exuberant, surreal, subtle, tender, brutal, spectacular and above all unexpected: this extraordinary selection celebrates the British short story from the 1920s to the present day. From Angela Carter to V. S. Pritchett, Elizabeth Taylor to J. G. Ballard, Ali Smith to a host of little-known works from magazines and periodicals, and including tales of air-raids, phone sex, snobbery, modern-day slavery, grief, desire, the familiar and the strange, here is the short story in all its limitless possibilities.
Edited and with an introduction by Philip Hensher, the award-winning novelist, critic and journalist.
784 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2015
63 people are currently reading
457 people want to read
About the author
Philip Hensher
41 books111 followersHensher was born in South London, although he spent the majority of his childhood and adolescence in Sheffield, attending Tapton School.[2] He did his undergraduate degree at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford before attending Cambridge, where he was awarded a PhD for work on 18th century painting and satire. Early in his career he worked as a clerk in the House of Commons, from which he was fired over the content of an interview he gave to a gay magazine.[1] He has published a number of novels, is a regular contributor, columnist and book reviewer for newspapers and weeklies such as The Guardian, The Spectator , The Mail on Sunday and The Independent.
The Bedroom of the Mister’s Wife (1999) brings together 14 of his stories, including ‘Dead Languages’, which A. S. Byatt selected for her Oxford Book of English Short Stories (1998), making Hensher the youngest author included in the anthology.http://literature.britishcouncil.org/...
Since 2005 he has taught creative writing at the University of Exeter. He has edited new editions of numerous classic works of English Literature, such as those by Charles Dickens and Nancy Mitford, and Hensher served as a judge for the Booker Prize. From 2013 he will hold the post of Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.[3]
Since 2000, Philip Hensher has been listed as one of the 100 most influential LGBT people in Britain,[4] and in 2003 as one of Granta's twenty Best of Young British Novelists.[1]
In 2008, Hensher's semi-autobiographical novel The Northern Clemency was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. In 2012, Hensher won first prize -German Travel Writers Award, and is shortlisted for the Green Carnation Prize. He also won the Stonewall Prize for the Journalist of the Year in 2007 and The Somerset Maugham Award for his novel Kitchen Venom in 1996. He wrote the libretto for Thomas Adès' 1995 opera Powder Her Face. This has been his only musical collaboration to date.
His early writings have been characterized as having an "ironic, knowing distance from their characters" and "icily precise skewerings of pretension and hypocrisy"[1] His historical novel The Mulberry Empire "echos with the rhythm and language of folk tales" while "play[ing] games" with narrative forms.[1]
He is married to Zaved Mahmood, a human rights lawyer at the United Nations.
You can find out more about Philip on his author page at 4th Estate Books: http://www.4thestate.co.uk/author/phi...
The Bedroom of the Mister’s Wife (1999) brings together 14 of his stories, including ‘Dead Languages’, which A. S. Byatt selected for her Oxford Book of English Short Stories (1998), making Hensher the youngest author included in the anthology.http://literature.britishcouncil.org/...
Since 2005 he has taught creative writing at the University of Exeter. He has edited new editions of numerous classic works of English Literature, such as those by Charles Dickens and Nancy Mitford, and Hensher served as a judge for the Booker Prize. From 2013 he will hold the post of Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.[3]
Since 2000, Philip Hensher has been listed as one of the 100 most influential LGBT people in Britain,[4] and in 2003 as one of Granta's twenty Best of Young British Novelists.[1]
In 2008, Hensher's semi-autobiographical novel The Northern Clemency was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. In 2012, Hensher won first prize -German Travel Writers Award, and is shortlisted for the Green Carnation Prize. He also won the Stonewall Prize for the Journalist of the Year in 2007 and The Somerset Maugham Award for his novel Kitchen Venom in 1996. He wrote the libretto for Thomas Adès' 1995 opera Powder Her Face. This has been his only musical collaboration to date.
His early writings have been characterized as having an "ironic, knowing distance from their characters" and "icily precise skewerings of pretension and hypocrisy"[1] His historical novel The Mulberry Empire "echos with the rhythm and language of folk tales" while "play[ing] games" with narrative forms.[1]
He is married to Zaved Mahmood, a human rights lawyer at the United Nations.
You can find out more about Philip on his author page at 4th Estate Books: http://www.4thestate.co.uk/author/phi...
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
June 7, 2017
If I was the leader of a vicious gang of literary-minded hoodlums (and who’s to say I’m not?) I think number one on tomorrow’s agenda would be to capture Philip Hensher and take him to a safe house and subject him to very rigorous questioning about the many terrible choices he made for this anthology. What’s with this gratingly sexist William Sansom rubbish? I would bawl, from behind my balaclava. Or this tripe from V S Pritchett who you describe as “the greatest of British short story writers” – no “perhaps” there, he’s THE greatest. Not on this showing he isn’t, his one is actually one of the four unreadable stories in this giant collection. While under interrogation I could take the opportunity to get Mr Hensher to explain to me the point of some of the items here. You so often get to the end of a short story and feel like you really didn’t get it, like not getting a joke. Which can spoil your day.
But I also should say that there were four or five great stories here which I would never otherwise have come across and a whole bunch which didn’t rock my soul but which I was pleased to encounter.
The introduction makes some interesting observations. Such as : why is Typhoon by Conrad always regarded as a short story but Nightmare Abbey by Peacock which is 4000 words shorter is published as a novel?
He says that the modern short story really kicked off around 1870 or so in Britain – a little earlier in America for a very specific reason. Americans loved to RIP OFF British novels, i.e. publish them without paying any copyright, which meant that American authors could not find a market for novels. But they could find mags which would publish short stories. I did not know that.
Next – top short story writers in the 1880-1920 period could earn squillions. Thomas Hardy got a cool £100 for a single story in 1894. What? Doesn’t sound like a lot? The historical inflation calculator on google tells me that in today’s money that would be £11,800 or $15,300. Better than a poke in the eye from a wet fish, no? So for this period short stories were the boy bands of English literature, and Conan Doyle was Take That.
This is now all changed, and in Britain a short story has now become something you hastily scrape off your shoe. Whatever outlets still exist are in America (which explains why there are so many great American short story writers right now and so few British).
I only recommend this big book if you’re prepared to roll with the punches because there’s a whole lot of blah and quite a lot of good stuff all mingled together.
My favourites:
The German Prisoner – James Hanley (written in 1930? WOW!)
Private Jones – Alun Lewis
The Mouse – Francis King
The Perfect Tenants – V S Naipaul
Notes for a Case History – Doris Lessing
But I also should say that there were four or five great stories here which I would never otherwise have come across and a whole bunch which didn’t rock my soul but which I was pleased to encounter.
The introduction makes some interesting observations. Such as : why is Typhoon by Conrad always regarded as a short story but Nightmare Abbey by Peacock which is 4000 words shorter is published as a novel?
He says that the modern short story really kicked off around 1870 or so in Britain – a little earlier in America for a very specific reason. Americans loved to RIP OFF British novels, i.e. publish them without paying any copyright, which meant that American authors could not find a market for novels. But they could find mags which would publish short stories. I did not know that.
Next – top short story writers in the 1880-1920 period could earn squillions. Thomas Hardy got a cool £100 for a single story in 1894. What? Doesn’t sound like a lot? The historical inflation calculator on google tells me that in today’s money that would be £11,800 or $15,300. Better than a poke in the eye from a wet fish, no? So for this period short stories were the boy bands of English literature, and Conan Doyle was Take That.
This is now all changed, and in Britain a short story has now become something you hastily scrape off your shoe. Whatever outlets still exist are in America (which explains why there are so many great American short story writers right now and so few British).
I only recommend this big book if you’re prepared to roll with the punches because there’s a whole lot of blah and quite a lot of good stuff all mingled together.
My favourites:
The German Prisoner – James Hanley (written in 1930? WOW!)
Private Jones – Alun Lewis
The Mouse – Francis King
The Perfect Tenants – V S Naipaul
Notes for a Case History – Doris Lessing
December 2, 2021
The trouble with anthologies is you always disagree about the choices. VS Pritchett, yes, but for 'The Fly in the Ointment' or 'The Fall', not 'The Perfect Tenants.' Likewise, JG Ballard should be represented by the 'Garden of Time', Graham Greene by 'The Destructors', and Ian McEwan by 'Psychopolis.'
I don't see, either, why William Boyd and Graham Swift didn't make the cut, but a has-been like Martin Amis did. The less said about Zadie Smith the better - whose career to date still represents for this reviewer the ongoing victory of hype over talent. DH Lawrence, one hopes, was included in the previous volume. I assume William Trevor has been left out because the editors classed him as Irish rather than British?
With all that said, it is gratifying to see the talents of Jon McGregor and Georgina Hammick recognised, and Tessa Hadley (my ex-teacher - I still feel a measure of guilt for not referring to her as 'Ms. Hadley').
I don't see, either, why William Boyd and Graham Swift didn't make the cut, but a has-been like Martin Amis did. The less said about Zadie Smith the better - whose career to date still represents for this reviewer the ongoing victory of hype over talent. DH Lawrence, one hopes, was included in the previous volume. I assume William Trevor has been left out because the editors classed him as Irish rather than British?
With all that said, it is gratifying to see the talents of Jon McGregor and Georgina Hammick recognised, and Tessa Hadley (my ex-teacher - I still feel a measure of guilt for not referring to her as 'Ms. Hadley').
May 2, 2018
Published in 2015, The Penguin Book of the British Short Story is the second volume of this undertaking. Arranged in rough chronological order, it contains 54 stories written from 1929 to 2013, each by a different British author. These are all highly acclaimed authors, and this allows for a fairly high standard throughout, combined with a great way to sample any famous authors that you have not tried. The downside, which is true of any anthology, is that the resultant mixture of styles will not suit all meaning that the individual reader will, like me, have come away from the exercise with some favourites, some average, and some that made no sense at all. My personal favourites were Alisdair Gray's 'Five Letters from an Eastern Empire' and Zadie Smith's 'The Embassy of Cambodia', but opinions will vary greatly. Very enjoyable.
August 9, 2021
I love short stories, but apart from about 10 stories, I really struggled to read this book and had no idea why some of the stories were included. It was a very disappointing read and I’m glad to be done with this anthology.
July 24, 2017
I read a lot of short stories and always make myself read every last story in a collection, no matter how awful. I have now freed myself from this obligation having started this collection! I have decided not to read the boring stories and to abandon those dull ones. I shall do this in future. I am glad I started at the back where I found good stories. I then went to the beginning and am currently floundering in the middle. It is nothing to do with the age of a story but the substance of a story.
August 2, 2018
Loved this one. Some stories where absolutely amazing, others not so much. But overall it is a wonderful collection of short stories.
December 15, 2019
Being the second volume in the Penguin series, it presents the stories in chronological order following on from where the previous volume left off. So it begins with PG Wodehouse and finishes with Zadie Smith, a 20th Century progressive look at the British short story form. 54 stories ranging in length from a little over an hour’s reading to the shortest at just a few pages.
A number of the authors I knew - big names, in fact - and some I’d read before, although in longer forms, yet there were many names unfamiliar to me. It was a good introduction to those “new” authors. This is what I especially like about these collections: new names to follow.
Apart from two - Wodehouse’s which I couldn’t get a hold on despite liking his Jeeves stories previously, and JG Ballard’s (steadily becoming my least favourite famous writer) - I found them engaging and readable; very enjoyable as a whole. On reflection though, it’s a very safe compilation with a narrow span of genres; it could have been more daring, with more examples of unusual subjects and styles. Only McGregor’s appeared to step out of the standard storytelling framework, and it’s the shortest story in the book, probably for this reason.
Worthwhile?: yes. Read better collections?: yes.
Three to four-ish stars.
A number of the authors I knew - big names, in fact - and some I’d read before, although in longer forms, yet there were many names unfamiliar to me. It was a good introduction to those “new” authors. This is what I especially like about these collections: new names to follow.
Apart from two - Wodehouse’s which I couldn’t get a hold on despite liking his Jeeves stories previously, and JG Ballard’s (steadily becoming my least favourite famous writer) - I found them engaging and readable; very enjoyable as a whole. On reflection though, it’s a very safe compilation with a narrow span of genres; it could have been more daring, with more examples of unusual subjects and styles. Only McGregor’s appeared to step out of the standard storytelling framework, and it’s the shortest story in the book, probably for this reason.
Worthwhile?: yes. Read better collections?: yes.
Three to four-ish stars.
November 24, 2017
Had to read this for a prose fiction module and I think I’ve pretty much read all the stories in here. I don’t need it for any of the lectures from now on so I’m taking it off my TBR. Also I really enjoyed the first PG Wodehouse story in here, he was just hilarious. Some of the other stories were weird (The Remains) and some were just weird (Red Gloves I think it was called?) and some were an interesting intro to an author I’ve never read before (the Embassy of Cambodia by Zadie Smith.)
I recommend you check it out if you like short stories, some of them were actually really good! I’m giving it 3 * though bc the good ones didn’t outweigh the weird ones. But you can make up your own minds.
I recommend you check it out if you like short stories, some of them were actually really good! I’m giving it 3 * though bc the good ones didn’t outweigh the weird ones. But you can make up your own minds.
December 8, 2024
This is a comprehensive collection of stories through the 20th century and into the 21st. Whilst many of the authors are familiar names, there were some who were new to me and well worth reading.
Of course, you can argue about the selection, why this story and not that one and why was nn missed out? Generally, these are all very good stories, from very good writers. I did think that the quality dropped slightly in the more recent stories. Perhaps there hasn’t been time to fully distinguish the excellent from the merely very good in modern authors’ work.
4.5 stars
Of course, you can argue about the selection, why this story and not that one and why was nn missed out? Generally, these are all very good stories, from very good writers. I did think that the quality dropped slightly in the more recent stories. Perhaps there hasn’t been time to fully distinguish the excellent from the merely very good in modern authors’ work.
4.5 stars
September 28, 2025
این مجموعه کتاب در ایران از انتشارات ققنوس چاپ شده و کتابهای جیبی کم حجمی هستن که داستانهای کوتاهی از نویسندگان بزرگ تاریخ رو چاپ میکنن و هدف بیشتر افرادی هستند که زمان خوندن کتاب ندارن و بتونن با حداقل زمان و انرژی یه کتاب رو بخونن، من کتاب "یکی مثل تو" رو خوندم که شامل ۷ داستان کوتاه از نویسندگان بریتانیا هست، برای کسی که زیاد کتاب میخونه چیز خاصی نداشت و داستانهای خاصی نبودن اما کسی که کتاب نمیخونه برای اینکه تو مترو و اتوبوس و... یه کتاب کوچیک داشته باشه برای مطالعه میتونه خوب باشه براش.
January 30, 2021
An excellent way to experiment with new authors and genres without committing to a novel. The stories were well chosen, each representing a slightly different time and style. My favourite was Five Letters from an Eastern Empire by Alasdair Gray and I'm looking forward to reading more of his work.
December 2, 2022
Dkxk
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 27, 2024
All of these stories are terrific, and many of them are hard to find. Not a clinker in a bunch.
Want to read
September 28, 2025Read so far:
*Unpleasantness of Budleigh Court / PG Wodehouse
Courage / Malachi Whitaker
Nineteen / Jack Common
*The Dancing Mistress / Elizabeth Bowen
*Cruise / Evelyn Waugh
*The German Prisoner / James Hanley
The Point of Thirty Miles / TH White
*Old Sweat / Leslie Halward
Death of a Comrade / Julian Maclaren-Ross
*Private Jones / Alun Lewis
The Lull / Henry Green --1
*The Trumpet Shall Sound / Sylvia Townsend Warner
*Winter Cruise / W. Somerset Maugham
*Someone like You / Roald Dahl
The Rook / LAG Strong
*The Key of the Field / TF Powys
*The Hint of an Explanation / Graham Greene
*A Wedding / GF Green
*The Wrong Set / Angus Wilson
*A Human Condition / Rhys Davies
The Mouse / Francis King
*A Contest of Ladies / William Samson
*Knock on Wood / Samuel Selvon
*Bang Bang You're Dead / Muriel Spark
*Bind Your Hair / Robert Aickman
*The Perfect Tenants / VS Naipaul
*The Cloud Sculptors of Coral D / JG Ballard
*Red Rubber Gloves / Christine Brooke-Rose
In and Out the Houses / Elizabeth Taylor --3
Mason's Life / Kingsley Amis --1
*Mimic / Alan Sillitoe
The Camberwell Beauty / VS Pritchett --2
*Pioneers, oh Pioneers / Jean Rhys
Pornography / Ian McEwan --3
The Courtship of Mr. Lyon / Angela Carter --2
*Notes for a Case History / Doris Lessing
The Means of Escape / Penelope Fitzgerald --3
Five Letters from an Eastern Empire / Alasdair Gray --3
*Phonefun Limited / Bernard Maclaverty
Cardboard City / Shena Mackay
The Longstop / Beryl Bainbridge --2
Bobby's Room / Douglas Dunn
Grist / Georgina Hammick
*Baby Clutch / Adam Mars-Jones
*Three Old Men / George Mackay Brown
*Racine and the Tablecloth / AS Byatt
Career Move / Martin Amis --2
*The Only Only / Candia McWilliam
last thing / Janice Galloway
miracle survivors / Ali Smith
Buckets of Blood / Tessa Hadley
The 40-litre Monkey / Adam Marek
The Remains / Jon McGregor
The Embassy of Cambodia --Zadie Smith --2
*Unpleasantness of Budleigh Court / PG Wodehouse
Courage / Malachi Whitaker
Nineteen / Jack Common
*The Dancing Mistress / Elizabeth Bowen
*Cruise / Evelyn Waugh
*The German Prisoner / James Hanley
The Point of Thirty Miles / TH White
*Old Sweat / Leslie Halward
Death of a Comrade / Julian Maclaren-Ross
*Private Jones / Alun Lewis
The Lull / Henry Green --1
*The Trumpet Shall Sound / Sylvia Townsend Warner
*Winter Cruise / W. Somerset Maugham
*Someone like You / Roald Dahl
The Rook / LAG Strong
*The Key of the Field / TF Powys
*The Hint of an Explanation / Graham Greene
*A Wedding / GF Green
*The Wrong Set / Angus Wilson
*A Human Condition / Rhys Davies
The Mouse / Francis King
*A Contest of Ladies / William Samson
*Knock on Wood / Samuel Selvon
*Bang Bang You're Dead / Muriel Spark
*Bind Your Hair / Robert Aickman
*The Perfect Tenants / VS Naipaul
*The Cloud Sculptors of Coral D / JG Ballard
*Red Rubber Gloves / Christine Brooke-Rose
In and Out the Houses / Elizabeth Taylor --3
Mason's Life / Kingsley Amis --1
*Mimic / Alan Sillitoe
The Camberwell Beauty / VS Pritchett --2
*Pioneers, oh Pioneers / Jean Rhys
Pornography / Ian McEwan --3
The Courtship of Mr. Lyon / Angela Carter --2
*Notes for a Case History / Doris Lessing
The Means of Escape / Penelope Fitzgerald --3
Five Letters from an Eastern Empire / Alasdair Gray --3
*Phonefun Limited / Bernard Maclaverty
Cardboard City / Shena Mackay
The Longstop / Beryl Bainbridge --2
Bobby's Room / Douglas Dunn
Grist / Georgina Hammick
*Baby Clutch / Adam Mars-Jones
*Three Old Men / George Mackay Brown
*Racine and the Tablecloth / AS Byatt
Career Move / Martin Amis --2
*The Only Only / Candia McWilliam
last thing / Janice Galloway
miracle survivors / Ali Smith
Buckets of Blood / Tessa Hadley
The 40-litre Monkey / Adam Marek
The Remains / Jon McGregor
The Embassy of Cambodia --Zadie Smith --2
November 9, 2016
A broad survey type anthology such as this can never hope to please everybody and it's always going to be possible to argue the toss about the stories or the authors that haven't been included, but that's part of the fun, and, anyway, it's more fruitful to focus on the book as it stands. For me, this (together with volume one) is an outstanding overview of the short story form in Britain from it's earliest development to the current day. It's given me enormous pleasure, both from revisiting stories that I already knew, and, even more, from discovering new stories and authors; among the latter, William Swanson, L. A. G. Strong, Elizabeth Taylor and Tessa Hadley stand out and I hope I can explore more of their work in the future.
December 18, 2022
54 short stories, dating from 1929 to 2013. Varying quality, very varied in style and type and both well-known and unknown authors.
The best IMO:
P.G. Wodehouse - Unpleasantness at Bludleigh Court (1929)
V.S. Pritchett - The Camberwell Beauty (1974)
Alasdair Gray - Five Letters from an Eastern Empire (1984)
The best IMO:
P.G. Wodehouse - Unpleasantness at Bludleigh Court (1929)
V.S. Pritchett - The Camberwell Beauty (1974)
Alasdair Gray - Five Letters from an Eastern Empire (1984)
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews