{"id":246,"date":"2016-05-05T16:41:12","date_gmt":"2016-05-05T16:41:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/?page_id=246"},"modified":"2023-07-28T17:07:40","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T23:07:40","slug":"about-victorian-short-fiction","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/victorian-short-fiction-project\/about-victorian-short-fiction\/","title":{"rendered":"Introduction to Victorian Short Fiction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1337\" style=\"\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1337\" class=\"wp-image-1337 \" src=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Bentleys.jpg\" alt=\"bentleys\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-1337\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo by Melissa Cox. Used by permission, L. Tom Perry Special Collections Library, Brigham Young University.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Most histories of the British short story begin with two assertions: first, that it is notoriously difficult to define the genre of the short story; and second, that the genre did not come of age in Britain until the late nineteenth century.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_1');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_1');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_1\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">1<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_1\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">See, for example, Allen, 9-10; Dean Baldwin, \u201cThe Tardy Evolution of the British Short Story,\u201d <em>Journal of Short Fiction<\/em>, Vol. 30 No. 1, 1993, 1-10; Wendell V. Harris, <em>British Short Fiction in the Nineteenth Century: A Literary and Bibliographic Guide<\/em>, Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1979: 91-3; Barbara Korte, <em>The Short Story in Britain: A Historical Sketch and Anthology<\/em>, Francke, 2003: 27; Emma Liggins, Andrew Maunder, and Ruth Robbins, <em>The British Short Story<\/em>, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011: 5-6; Brander Matthews, <em>The Philosophy of the Short-Story<\/em>, New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1901: 10-13; Andrew Maunder, <em>The Facts on File Companion to the British Short Story,<\/em> New York: Facts on File, Palgrave, 2010: viii. Tim Killick offers an alternate view in <em>British Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century: The Rise of the Tale<\/em>, Ashgate, 2008: 5-13 and 162. Edgar Allan Poe gave more credit to the British than more recent scholars have done (Edgar Allan Poe, \u201cHawthorne\u2019s <em>Twice-Told Tales,\u201d <\/em>in<em> Literary Criticism of Edgar Allan Poe,<\/em> Ed. Robert L. Hough, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1965, 133-41: 134.).<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> In compiling this digital collection, our aim has been to examine these assumptions. Is it true that there were very few short stories written and published in Britain before 1880? How do we define short story in terms that acknowledge our current understanding of the genre while making room for historical specificity?<\/p>\n<p>Defining the short story would seem to be a simple task. After all, the definition appears to be part of the term itself\u2014a short story is a story that is short. Yet scholars of the genre have gone to great lengths to distinguish between the short story proper and other relatively brief fictional forms. For our purposes, it is most helpful to begin with the oft-quoted definition given by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe. In an 1842 review of Nathanial Hawthorne\u2019s <em>Twice Told Tales,<\/em> Poe made a lofty claim for the genre of the brief \u201ctale,\u201d arguing that it \u201caffords unquestionably the fairest field for the exercise of the loftiest talent, which can be afforded by the wide domains of mere prose.\u201d<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_2');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_2');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_2\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">2<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_2\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Poe, 134.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_2').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_2', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> During a time when the lengthy multi-volume novel was coming to the fore in both the United States and Britain, why would Poe insist that a brief tale could showcase an author\u2019s talent more effectively? According to Poe, a tale\u2019s very brevity was the reason: since a tale would \u201crequire[e] from a half-hour to one or two hours in its perusal,\u201d it could create a \u201cunity of effect or impression,\u201d something a longer tale, or novel, could never do.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_3');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_3');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_3\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">3<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_3\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Poe, 135.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_3').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_3', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> Scholars look back on this review as a signature moment in the history of the short story in English. Poe\u2019s concept of a \u201cunity of effect\u201d is still at the heart of our concept of the modern short story. Indeed, no history of the genre can avoid engaging with his influence on the tradition.<\/p>\n<p>The influence of Poe\u2019s review, however, came mostly in hindsight. At the time Poe\u2019s essay was published, it garnered no more notice than the typical book review. Certainly, it did not receive wide attention on the other side of the Atlantic. In other words, there was no expectation in the British literary market that a tale should fit the model Poe outlined in his review of Hawthorne&#8217;s tales. Instead, the British market for short fiction accommodated a tremendous variety of fictional forms.<\/p>\n<p>In compiling this digital collection, then, we aim to explore the range of short fiction prevalent during the nineteenth century. In essence, we are asserting that there was a large selection of traditions and models for short fiction upon which nineteenth century authors could draw.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_4');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_4');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_4\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">4<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_4\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">For an exploration of this market in short fiction during the Romantic era, see Killick, <em>British Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century<\/em>.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_4').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_4', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> Our selection of texts follows the logic Tim Killick uses in <em>British Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century<\/em>, as he explores a thriving market for short fiction early in the century.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_5');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_5');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_5\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">5<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_5\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">See Killick 5-37.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_5').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_5', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> As\u00a0Anthony Jarrells suggests in his study of the Romantic-era tale: the narratives we have collected \u201csuggest multiple possible futures for short fiction.\u201d<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_6');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_6');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_6\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">6<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_6\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Anthony Jarrells, \u201cShort Fictional Forms and the Rise of the Tale,\u201d in <em>The Oxford History of the Novel in English: Volume 2, English and British Fiction 1750-1920<\/em>. Eds. Peter Garside and Karen O\u2019Brien. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 478-94: 493.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_6').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_6', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script> Short stories that conform to Poe\u2019s formula were only one among many of the futures that were possible during the nineteenth century.<\/p>\n<p>This approach allows us to acknowledge and explore the vibrant market for short fiction that was present in Britain during the nineteenth century. What do we find when we explore this thriving marketplace? We find a plethora of fictional narratives, including oriental tales, colonial adventure stories, legends from around the globe, sketches of urban life, moral tales, sentimental fiction, children\u2019s stories, and a host of others.<\/p>\n<h2>The Periodical Market<\/h2>\n<p>The majority of these narratives appeared in periodicals\u2014magazines and newspapers.\u00a0Due to advances in technology that resulted in much cheaper printing costs, along with an increasingly literate population, the number of periodicals expanded exponentially over the course of the century.\u00a0 These ranged from daily and weekly newspapers reporting on local events and running extensive classified ads, to quarterly review periodicals aiming to keep their well-informed readers up-to-date with political, philosophical, and literary developments.\u00a0 Some periodicals were published for children, others for working class readers, still others for political parties or religious organizations.\u00a0 Many of these periodicals appealed to readers by publishing fiction.\u00a0 Entire novels were often published, a few chapters at a time, in periodicals.\u00a0 Even more often than novels, however, the periodical format encouraged writers to compose brief, article-length narratives of various types that would fit within an issue\u2014in other words, short fiction.<\/p>\n<p>What types of short fiction appeared in these periodicals? <em>Blackwood\u2019s Edinburgh Magazine<\/em> specialized in \u201cTales of Terror,\u201d such as \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/title\/emily-von-rosenthal-how-she-was-spirited-away\/\">Emily von Rosenthal\u2014How She Was Spirited Away<\/a>,\u201d a tale of kidnapping and revenge.\u00a0 <em>The Keepsake<\/em>, one of a number of literary annuals published for the Christmas gift market, gathered sentimental narratives in prose and verse, such as Mary Shelley\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/title\/the-dream\/\">The Dream<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 During the 1840s, <em>The Keepsake<\/em> was edited by a noted author and London hostess, the Countess of Blessington, who charmed many fashionable authors into contributing, including Charles Dickens, Alfred Tennyson, and Benjamin Disraeli. Dickens\u2019 <em>Sketches by Boz<\/em>, originally written for several different periodicals and later collected into a stand-alone volume, launched his career in the 1830s, and in 1843 he would publish a relatively short one-volume tale that became a pattern for many others\u2014<em>A Christmas Carol<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Each of these narratives was crafted for its particular publishing venue and readership, some leisurely and rambling descriptions, others tight and concentrated plot-driven adventures. Some followed the ancient tradition of oral story-telling, though in print form; legends, fables, and myths were common terms describing short fiction of the time. Some sketched characters or scenes; some foreshadowed the modern short story. Others were written as linked stories with a frame narrative, aligning them with the longer novels and tales of the period.<\/p>\n<p>Given the prominence of the periodical market in the production of short fiction, we have chosen to draw all of the texts contained in this digital collection from periodicals published in Britain. These periodicals were typically the first publishing venues for short fiction, though prominent authors did at times gather their previously-published tales into volume-length collections. These were by far the exceptions, however. Most short fiction was written to suit the periodical in which it was published and was not published elsewhere.<\/p>\n<h2>A Matter of Authorship<\/h2>\n<p>In the process of exploring these periodicals, one encounters short fiction written by authors from across the globe. As one would expect, many of the authors are from the British Isles (England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland), but there are also American, Canadian, Australian, and Indian authors, among others.\u00a0 At times the periodicals included translations from various European languages.\u00a0Very often no author was listed; anonymity in periodical publication, especially in the early decades of the nineteenth century, was the norm.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than limit the short fiction included in this archive to authors who can be identified as British, we have chosen to represent the transnational assortment of authors published during the nineteenth century in the British Isles. This allows us to hear the various voices contributing to the field of short fiction as encountered in Britain. Of particular importance is the decision to include fiction published anonymously.\u00a0This is exactly the type of text that typically lies buried and unexplored, since we are so accustomed to assigning importance to a literary text based on the significance we assign to its author.\u00a0If our purpose, however, is to understand the scope and variety of short fiction during the era, we cannot afford to ignore the substantial majority of texts that will remain unattributed.<\/p>\n<h2>Categories of Short Fiction<\/h2>\n<p>Looking at such a wide variety of short fiction helps us to see outside the restraints of our current generic categories for prose fiction\u2014short story, novel, novella. Given that our categories do not suffice to describe and understand the range of Victorian fiction, what can we glean from nineteenth century short fiction itself about generic divisions? What terminology is included within the texts to identify, categorize and explain their nature as short fiction?<\/p>\n<p>Examining this digital archive with these questions in mind, we encounter several organizing categories that give us a picture of how Victorian authors understood the short fiction they wrote. These categories include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/the-periodical-market-and-victorian-short-fiction\/\">Periodical Installments<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/tales-and-the-oral-tradition\/\">Tales and the Oral Tradition<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/sketches-illustrations-and-other-visual-arts\/\">Sketches, Illustrations, and Other Visual Arts<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/drama-and-adventure\/\">Drama and Adventure<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/romance\/\">Romance<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/documents-and-papers\/\">Documents and Papers<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/frame-narratives-and-interrelated-stories\/\">Frame Narratives and Interrelated Stories<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/book-reviews\/\">Book Reviews<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/short-story\/\">Short Story<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Individual texts did not always identify themselves as fitting only one of these categories. Instead, the categories often functioned as strands that could be gathered into a story as needed, creating a web of interrelated methods, traditions, and approaches that Victorian authors drew upon when crafting a piece of short fiction. As Tim Killick notes in his study of Romantic-era tales, \u201cIt is worth reiterating here that terms such as \u2018sketch\u2019, \u2018scene\u2019, \u2018tale\u2019, and \u2018story\u2019 were often used interchangeably, and while modern criticism finds it useful to distinguish between them, the boundaries were not so clear at the time of writing.\u201d<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_7');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_7');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_7\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">7<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_7\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Killick, 22<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_7').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_7', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Conclusions<\/h2>\n<p>Examining the wide variety of short fiction produced during the nineteenth century allows us to see beyond our typical assumptions about the history of the British short story. The nineteenth century saw a burgeoning of fictional forms that drew upon earlier, often oral, traditions to create a vibrant periodical market for short fiction throughout the century. Exploring this plethora of short fiction allows us to revise the common assumption that the short story came late to Britain. It\u2019s more in keeping with the historical reality of the nineteenth century publishing world to say that short fiction thrived in Britain throughout the nineteenth century, with many different subgenres intermixing to create a remarkable period of experimentation and innovation.<\/p>\n<p>In their study of <em>The British Short Story<\/em>, Emma Liggins, Andrew Maunder, and Ruth Robbins observe:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The British short story is thus a complex, multiform creature. It is made up of relationships between the material world of the demands of publishing and the marketplace, specific aesthetic schemas and programmes, the conventions of genre and the influence of the writers of other nations. It is a mongrel or, perhaps more kindly, a hybrid, and its names and forms are legion.<span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_8');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_246_1('footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_8');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_8\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">8<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_8\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\">Liggins et. al., 5.<\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_8').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_246_1_8', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This is certainly true of Victorian short fiction, which pulls together traditions and methods from older genres, innovates to meet current publishing demands, and adapts itself to any number of different audiences.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>For more information about how we select texts for this digital archive, our editorial process, and the history of the project, please see:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/victorian-short-fiction-project\/about\/\">Our Mission<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/victorian-short-fiction-project\/about\/a-note-on-the-texts\/\">A Note on the Texts<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/victorian-short-fiction-project\/about\/history\/\">History<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Leslee Thorne-Murphy<\/p>\n<p>Posted: 26 August 2016<\/p>\n<p>Last updated: 28 July 2023<\/p>\n<div class=\"speaker-mute footnotes_reference_container\"> <div class=\"footnote_container_prepare\"><p><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_label pointer\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_246_1();\">Notes<\/span><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button\" style=\"display: none;\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_246_1();\">[<a id=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_246_1\">+<\/a>]<\/span><\/p><\/div> <div id=\"footnote_references_container_246_1\" style=\"\"><table class=\"footnotes_table footnote-reference-container\"><caption class=\"accessibility\">Notes<\/caption> <tbody> \r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_1');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_1\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>1<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">See, for example, Allen, 9-10; Dean Baldwin, \u201cThe Tardy Evolution of the British Short Story,\u201d <em>Journal of Short Fiction<\/em>, Vol. 30 No. 1, 1993, 1-10; Wendell V. Harris, <em>British Short Fiction in the Nineteenth Century: A Literary and Bibliographic Guide<\/em>, Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1979: 91-3; Barbara Korte, <em>The Short Story in Britain: A Historical Sketch and Anthology<\/em>, Francke, 2003: 27; Emma Liggins, Andrew Maunder, and Ruth Robbins, <em>The British Short Story<\/em>, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011: 5-6; Brander Matthews, <em>The Philosophy of the Short-Story<\/em>, New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1901: 10-13; Andrew Maunder, <em>The Facts on File Companion to the British Short Story,<\/em> New York: Facts on File, Palgrave, 2010: viii. Tim Killick offers an alternate view in <em>British Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century: The Rise of the Tale<\/em>, Ashgate, 2008: 5-13 and 162. Edgar Allan Poe gave more credit to the British than more recent scholars have done (Edgar Allan Poe, \u201cHawthorne\u2019s <em>Twice-Told Tales,\u201d <\/em>in<em> Literary Criticism of Edgar Allan Poe,<\/em> Ed. Robert L. Hough, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1965, 133-41: 134.).<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_2');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_2\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>2<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Poe, 134.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_3');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_3\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>3<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Poe, 135.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_4');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_4\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>4<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">For an exploration of this market in short fiction during the Romantic era, see Killick, <em>British Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century<\/em>.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_5');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_5\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>5<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">See Killick 5-37.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_6');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_6\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>6<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Anthony Jarrells, \u201cShort Fictional Forms and the Rise of the Tale,\u201d in <em>The Oxford History of the Novel in English: Volume 2, English and British Fiction 1750-1920<\/em>. Eds. Peter Garside and Karen O\u2019Brien. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 478-94: 493.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_7');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_7\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>7<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Killick, 22<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_246_1_8');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_246_1_8\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>8<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\">Liggins et. al., 5.<\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n <\/tbody> <\/table> <\/div><\/div><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> function footnote_expand_reference_container_246_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_246_1').show(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_246_1').text('\u2212'); } function footnote_collapse_reference_container_246_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_246_1').hide(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_246_1').text('+'); } function footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_246_1() { if (jQuery('#footnote_references_container_246_1').is(':hidden')) { footnote_expand_reference_container_246_1(); } else { footnote_collapse_reference_container_246_1(); } } function footnote_moveToReference_246_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_246_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } } function footnote_moveToAnchor_246_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_246_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } }<\/script>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; Most histories of the British short story begin with two assertions: first, that it is notoriously difficult to define the genre of the short story; and second, that the genre did not come of age in Britain until the late nineteenth century.1See, for example, Allen, 9-10; Dean Baldwin, \u201cThe Tardy Evolution of the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":0,"parent":43,"menu_order":2,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-246","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/246","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246"}],"version-history":[{"count":54,"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/246\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4625,"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/246\/revisions\/4625"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/43"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vsfp.byu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}