Preface 1
A Brief History of the Short Fiction 1
The Elements of Fiction 5
Edgar Allan Poe 12
The Fall of the House of Usher 14
Mark Twain 41
The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County 42
Sarah Orne Jewett 52
A White Heron 53
Katherine Mansfield 68
The Garden-Party 69
Sherwood Anderson 90
I Want to Know Why 92
David Herbert Lawrence 106
The Horse Dealer's Daughter 107
Virginia Woolf 131
Kew Gardens 133
Isak Dinesen 143
The Blue Jar 144
Ernest Hemingway 148
Hills Like White Elephants 150
William Faulkner 157
A Rose for Emily 159
Katherine Anne Porter 174
Theft 175
John Cheever 185
The Enormous Radio 186
Eudora Welty 202
A Worn Path 203
Doris Lessing 216
To Room Nineteen 218
Amy Hempel 265
In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried 266