The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction

by R.V. Cassill

Revised by celebrated novelist and short-fiction writer Richard Bausch, this edition continues to offer the most exciting blend of contemporary and classic short stories in a portable format. 135 stories—34 of them new to this edition—by 114 authors are lightly supplemented by a general introduction, biographical notes, and essays written for the benefit of beginning writers.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Anthologies, Literature, Classics, Literary Fiction, Reference

1520 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Ronald Verlin Cassill, Professor of English at Brown University, was a novelist and anthologist.

Reviews

[Billie Pritchett · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction is a great place to start to get a sense for the landscape of the short story historically and across continents. Sure, you might take issue with some inclusions (Why this story? Why this author?) and some exclusions, but there is plenty here to learn from and get exposed to, and I know that I made some discoveries having read this book.

Here are some of my favorite discoveries:

"Anna on the Neck" made me want to read more Anton Chekhov. A poorer woman fears marrying a bourgeois oafish men but then the table's turn.

In "A Wall of Fire Rising" by Edwidge Danticat, a Haitian father wants to escape his rigid society, even if it's to the detriment of his family.

Stuart Dybek's "We Didn't" is basically a perfect story. A young man explains how someone's death got in the way of his first sexual encounter and haunted him thereafter.

In Ralph Ellison's "King of the Bingo Game," one struggling black man stakes everything on a cash prize at a bingo hall.

"The Conscience of the Court" by Zora Neale Hurston made me cry. A black woman, a servant of a white family avoiding its debt, stands trial in this story for beating a debt collector who comes to take away the white family's poverty. It's not clear whether the story will become tragedy or comedy, but when you reread you realize how smartly Hurston laid it out from the beginning to tip in one direction. It really is a beautiful, moving story.

Jhumpa Lahiri is awesome. Her story, "Hell-Heaven," is told from the perspective of an Indian-American girl whose mother suffers her love for another man in silence.

D.H. Lawrence is a weird sybarite, and that comes through in both the stories here, "The Horse Dealer's Daughter," and "The Rocking-Horse Winner." I won't even spoil them. Lawrence is sensuous without being vulgar, sincere without being sentimental.

Doris Lessing's "To Room Nineteen" made me want to hunt for all her stories and anything else she's written. The story is terrific but terrifically odd. A rich woman in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) decides she wants time away from her family and so decides to rent a room in a cheap hotel where she can sit and be alone with her thoughts. That's it. But the story winds up opening all sorts of avenues. Her life feels meaningless and she's wrestling with that.

(Real quick, John L'Heureux's "Brief Lives in California" and Amy Tan's "Rules of the Game" are stories I loved, but unfortunately for me these writers are primarily novelist and so I couldn't follow up and check out more of their stories, though we're lucky to have these.)

Bernard Malamud's "Angel Levine" is about finding angels among ordinary people. Malamud's stories are terrific. So are the stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer, as you'll see with "Gimpel the Fool" about a rabbi who suffers as many trials as Job does and who must learn to accept his many misfortunes.

Guy De Maupassant is a classic master of the short story. Two of his stories are collected in this anthology and, although it could be my failure, I only liked one of his stories but liked it enough to get his collection. The story is called "An Adventure in Paris," about a woman who wants to have a wild time in sensuous Paris.

There are some stories I'm leaving out, but I'll finish here with two. John Steinbeck's "The Chrysanthemums" is as good as any story you'll ever read and so is Edith Wharton's "Xingu." The former is about a woman who feels a kind of awakening after a new encounter in the countryside and the latter is about the pretense of communities of intellectuals, so-called.

Oh, and honorable mention goes to Bobbie Anne Mason who writes about my hometown and the town adjacent where she grew up. The story in here by her is "Shiloh," and it's a fine story.

What follows is a list of further reading, collections of short stories I discovered after reading these authors and the above stories:

-- Anton Chekhov, Selected Stories
-- Edwidge Danticat, Krik? Krak!
-- Stuart Dybek, I Sailed with Magellan
-- Ralph Ellison, Flying Home and Other Stories
-- Zora Neale Hurston, The Complete Stories
-- Jhumpa Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies
-- Doris Lessing, Stories
-- Bernard Malamud, The Complete Stories
-- Bobbie Ann Mason, Shiloh and Other Stories
-- Guy de Maupassant, Complete Original Short Stories
-- Isaac Bashevis Singer, The Collected Stories
-- John Steinbeck, The Long Valley
-- Edith Wharton, Complete Works of Edith Wharton

[Stetson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of all the Norton Anthologies, I used this one the most. It is a pretty representative and diverse collection of short fiction. A lot of the greats, some flashes in the pan, some novelty items, and some strange choices. Nonetheless, it is a handy collection that I return to sometimes. I'm not knowledgeable enough about other short fiction anthologies to recommend a superior alternative. The coverage provided by this one should generally be acceptable to anyone looking for an introduction to the form, a form that is dominant in MFA programs today (i.e. a high prestige genre - though this was perhaps more true when I read this first than now).

[Emily ☾]

I had to read this for an English class :)

[Kira Nerys]

Simply because it became too much of a hassle to add each story individually:

Atwood, Margaret. "Death by Landscape." 3 stars. Finished 4/13/15.
Bell, Madison Smartt. "Witness." 5 stars. Finished 3/23/15.
Bradbury, Ray. "The Veldt." 5 stars. Finished 1/22/15. (science-fiction)
Cather, Willa. "Paul's Case." 3 stars. Finished 2/25/15.
Cheever, John. "The Enormous Radio." 3 stars. Finished 1/22/15. (science-fiction)
Chopin, Kate. "The Story of an Hour." 4 stars. Finished 3/4/15.
Cortázar, Julio. "A Continuity of Parks." 4 stars. Finished 2/18/15. (books-about-writing)
Cortázar, Julio. "Letter to a Young Lady in Paris." 5 stars. Finished 2/18/15. (magic)
Dodd, Susan. "Public Appearances." 4 stars. Finished 3/2/15.
Dubus, Andre. "The Intruder." 3 stars. Finished 3/23/15. (teens-and-death)
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. "The Yellow Wallpaper." 4 stars. Finished 2/21/15.
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "The Birthmark." 3 stars. Reread. (classics, monstrosity-themed, science-fiction)
Le Guin, Ursula K. "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas." 4 stars. Finished 1/28/15. (childhood-abuse, fantasy)
Mansfield, Katherine. "Bliss." 4 stars. Finished 3/2/15.
O'Brien, Tim. "The Things They Carried." 3 stars. Reread. (war-related)
O'Connor, Flannery. "A Good Man Is Hard to Find." 4 stars. Reread. (monstrosity-themed)
O'Connor, Flannery. "Everything That Rises Must Converge." 3 stars. Finished 3/9/15. (african-american)
Smith, Lee. "Intensive Care." 4 stars. Finished 4/26/15.
Thurber, James. "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." 3 stars. Finished 3/4/15. (movies)
Tolstoy, Leo. "The Death of Ivan Ilych." 3 stars. Finished 4/19/15.

[Karen L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ah yes, I found a fun and cute story, by Jean Shepherd, the author of the well known story," A Christmas Story," called, "Lost at C." It is told from the perspective of a kid and is hilariously funny. It reminded me of my school days.

Want to read more Flannery O'Connor. She has a nice southern story tellers voice. Read "A Good Man is Hard to Find." It was good, suspenseful, yet as with most short stories, has a disturbing ending!Doesn't anyone write short stories with satisfying, or positive endings?

Didn't like Richard Bausch's "Byron the Lyron." Boring. about a woman and her weird relationship with her son, and her son's weird relationship with her male P.T. Too emo!

I Liked Capote's "Miriam." It had great characters and an intriguing plot.

I liked Shirley Jackson's, "The Lottery," though it was a disturbing story of human cruelty.

Didn't like Bartholeme's "Me and Miss Mandible." Just too weird, a man in a sixth grade class room. That's a nightmare!

I will borrow this book from the library again in the future.

[Charles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great grouping of fiction from the US and Europe. I have to admit that I read the first edition, a beaten up thrift store find, over the period of five years, picking it up in earnest and putting it down when other duties called, only to pick it up again. In fact, I could probably start over at the beginning now and enjoy getting re-familiar with the works at the front of the anthology. Reading this collection gave me the chance to read some short fiction that is not usually included in short stories collections (guess that is why it is a "short fiction" anthology) that I had been wanting to read: these included Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener." Also of note was Mann's "Disorder and Early Sorrow" and a really interesting story by Elizabeth Parsons, "The Nightingales Sing." Obviously, there are many more, but I can't forget to mention George P. Elliott's shocking "The NRACP."

[grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

loved loved loved diving into this anthology for my fiction course. so many wonderful stories from so many great authors in this one. it'll stay on my bookshelf forever

[Peter Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Please note: I read the sixth edition, published in 2000. I have no idea what stories might have been added or dropped from this seventh, or later editions.

I've been dipping in and out of this large tome of short fiction for over twenty years and finally finished it. It's a wonderful introduction to many classic, famous (and some forgotten) writers.
A handful of highlights for me include:

"Sonny's Blues" by James Balwin. Recently read "The Rockpile" for discussion in the George Saunders Story Club (Substack). Balwin's fiction has an immediate vitality and is a joy to read.

"Heart of Darkness" by Joesph Conrad. It was easy to see how this novella inspired and served as a blueprint for the film "Apocalypse Now" and countless other stories, shows and films.

"Bartleby, the Scrivener" by Herman Melville. The readable prose and humor cleared away any reservations to reading Moby Dick (which I did read and enjoy.)

"The Death of Ivan Ilych" by Leo Tolstoy. Halfway through this story I started to wonder why it is so well known. Within a few pages, I knew. ("Oh. Okay")

Also, during this finishing kick, the story "Intensive Care" by Lee Smith and an autobiographical piece "Becoming a Writer" by Gail Godwin (in the "Writers on Writing" appendix) got me to add a novel from each author to my "Want to Read" queue.

[✨ Megan ✨ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stories read:

Pre-1900
The Fall of the House of Usher - Poe, 1840
The Birthmark - Hawthorne, 1846
Story of an Hour - Chopin, 1891
The Yellow Wallpaper - Perkins Gilman, 1892

Post-1900
The Metamorphosis - Kafka, 1915
Why I Live at the PO - Welty, 1941
Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote - Borges, 1944
The Lottery - Jackson, 1948
The Handsomest Drowned Man - Gracia Marquez, 1968
The Ones Who Walk Away - Le Guin, 1973
Me and Miss Mandible - Barthelme, 1981
In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried - Hempel, 1985

Others:
Veldt - Bradbury, 1951
Sonny's Blues - Baldwin, 1957
Girl - Kincaid, 1978

[spike marlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me almost 4 years to read all the short stories in this book. There were good ones and not so good ones. Pick it up and start reading you will enjoy Manet of the stories in it.

[Kayla · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was for school, but it wasn't bad

[Googoogjoob · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the first edition of a long-lived anthology, now in its eight incarnation. I got a copy at a library fundraiser sale last year. It is kind of a frustrating book, for several reasons.

It contains a lot of quality work, but the way it's presented- nearly 1500 dense pages of small print on onion paper- makes it feel more like a reference work than something you'd actually voluntarily read out of.

The blurb here on Goodreads says "From the start, it has offered students the writer's voice, pure and unencumbered by excessive editorial commentary." And that's true, but also kind of a problem- the stories have footnotes to explain obscure usages, references, or customs, but they aren't provided context or criticism beyond that. Each story is followed by several questions, of the leading sort used by English teachers desperate to push their students into a reading- any reading- of the text. I'm not really a fan of them; stale questions about the use of symbolism or the importance of a particular line of dialogue aren't going to force a given story to resonate with the reader.

It's natural that most of the authors represented should originally have been writing in English. But there's a great Eurocentricity besides- Mishima is the only author representing Asia, Borges the only Latin American author; the only African author is Doris Lessing, a white woman born in Zimbabwe who moved to Britain as a young adult. It's not like it would've been hard to find quality stories from elsewhere- from, say, Rabindranath Tagore, or Lu Xun, or Gabriel Garcia Marquez, or Chinua Achebe- such that this represents a real bias on the part of the editor, and reflects a very particular academic view of literature. 61 of the 87 authors represented are American by birth or naturalization, and 11 of the remainder are similarly British or Irish.

Further bias- maybe better described as snobbishness- is evident in the treatment of genre fiction, which is insultingly tokenist. Detective/crime fiction is represented by a single Sherlock Holmes story; allowing for the supposed subliterary quality of most detective fiction, there're still any number of stories definitely worthy of inclusion- Raymond Chandler's stories, for example, are about as well-crafted as anything in here, and better than a good chunk. Science fiction is represented by token appearances by Arthur C. Clarke, Ray Bradbury, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Kurt Vonnegut, and their biographies have a vaguely patronizing tone as well- eg Le Guin has "won an extraordinary number of science fiction prizes" for her "thematically charged use of the medium" (is the medium not normally thematically charged?) while Vonnegut's appeal "reaches to readers with a fondness for those fictional specialities" (fantasy and science fiction) but apparently no further. The selection of their stories is slanted towards conventional "literary" concerns- Bradbury is represented by a story with conscious metatextual literary elements, which must have tickled the editors, but no real science fictional elements; Le Guin is represented by "The New Atlantis," a frankly subpar story, but which may have appealed to the editors in its subdued use of speculative elements, some of which can be read as metaphorical. Clarke's story deals with an explicitly religious theme in a way not entirely characteristic of his work. Horror/weird fiction is represented by a single story by Poe. There is no fantasy fiction whatsoever. (The current, eighth, edition of the anthology actually does even worse on genre fiction, dropping Clarke, Doyle, and Vonnegut entirely, though it does at least have "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" in place of "The New Atlantis.")

A drag, overall.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderful rich and deep collection! This has been my side reading for 5 months now. I started out making notes on some of my favorites, but then stopped at some point.

The Veldt by Ray Bradbury – I have read it before and enjoyed it, but I think it struck me even harder this time. How close have we come to being addicted to electronics, and making them our family?

Chekov! Wonderful.

Stephen Crane has wonderful, rich characters.

Isak Dinesen’s Sorrow-Acre was one of the best stories. Multiple plots woven together.

F Scott Fitzgerald’s Babylon Revisited! Powerful.

D H Lawrence’s The Horse Dealer’s Daughter – Beautiful and terrifying. Very moving.

The Rocking-Horse Winner – A great story contrasting material goods and health/family.

The Garden-Party by Katherine Mansfield. Nigh perfect. Drops you straight into a scene, and takes you were you don’t expect.

[Kay · Rating 5 out of 5]

anthologies, of course, are a great way to get introduced to writers you never heard of. this one is a little heavy on american writers, but i guess that's inevitable with two american editors. on the whole though, a nice broad coverage. there is an interesting section in the back called 'writers on writing': some of the featured writers thoughts on the craft through essays or interviews. another neat feature is a cross referencing of related materials: after a story, you are referred to another writer's comments on that particular story, or that writer's comments on someone else's work.

[Brendan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd always wanted to finish reading this one cover to cover. Had it in my possession since college. And 30 years later, finished. 100-some American authors dating back a century, collected for use in an English colloquium class. A wide gamut: Joseph Conrad, Steinbeck, D.H. Lawrence, Doris Lessing, Ralph Ellison. Shirley Jackson’s ’The Lottery’ and John Updike’s 'A&P' remain highlights. Warning: present cringing on past attitudes is likely.

[Ayeesh · Rating 4 out of 5]

soooo good.

a fantastic array of authors (tim o'brien, capote, faulkner, chopin, etc) - it's a good way to dip into authors you've been interested in reading. i enjoyed the selection of stories by authors i'd read before, and was pleasantly satisfied with the ones i hadn't.

definitely a "good read".

also, i'll always have a special place in my heart for norton's.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

All I get to read these days is what I'm teaching, and I'm so lucky to get to teach a senior elective on reading and writing short stories. We're going to read as much of this book as possible, and I don't think there's a story in it that doesn't belong. I'd add thousands more, but this is as good a place as any for them to get a real taste of my favorite art form.

[Chory · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yet another in my collection of Norton Anthologies—a veritable mountain of them at his point. This one is the standard for a reason…everything you're looking for that is in the mainstream (i.e., not esoteric or too-arthouse) is in this anthology. For everything else (too-new, too avant-garde), look somewhere else.

[jacky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I used to own a huge pile of anthologies that my father got for me over the years. I didn't use them very often, so I donated most of them to my school. I did keep a few which contained stories I kept going back to. This book had stories I pulled out to use with my sophomores. If I remember correctly, I used "Everyday Use" and "The Veldt" from this book.

[Brian Godsey, now on thestorygraph · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've read less than a quarter of this anthology, but I'll already say that it's brilliant. Or, perhaps every anthology of fiction is this brilliant. It's got bits of everything.

Highlights:

Gabriel García Márquez's story The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World is a masterpiece. It's like One Hundred Years of Solitude distilled into its purest spirit, fit onto just a few pages.

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great anthology. Definitely something for every type and kind of reader. Some from authors you'll recognize and others you may not be familiar with yet. Loved that the authors are in alphabetical order - means you can read the stories without them being framed in a time period or by gender or genre or any other designation. Worthwhile to have on your shelf and read again and again.

[Deb O.]

I'm embracing the short story this summer. This is a book from college and I remember being horrified at the fact that we read so few of the stories after buying it (the book is monstrous!). Favorite so far "The Star" by Arthur C. Clarke

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of those college text books I just couldn't sell back- this collection is made up of some of the most notable pieces of literature I have studied and loved throughout my life including Young Goodman Brown, The Littoral Zone, Snow, The Dead, and the list goes on.

[Deana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Using this in a fiction class now. I like it, especially the thin pages, although it's annoying to carry around - it's a typical Norton.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful compilation of short fiction. This covers the spectrum of short fiction and has short fiction of every type.

[Meg Clayton]

stories

[Risa · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Norton anthology of short fiction by R. V. Cassill (1986)

[D.]

The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction by Richard Bausch (2006)

[Guy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very big, but not very good, collection of short stories.

[Mickie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Picking the stories I want to read. I will be reading this for the rest of my life.