The Best Short Stories of 1917 Part 97

SELTZER, THOMAS, _Editor._ (_Russian._) *Best Russian Short Stories, The. Boni and Liveright.

*s.h.i.+ELD, THE. (_Russian._) Knopf.

STRINDBERG, AUGUST. (_Swedish._) *Married. Boni and Liveright.

SUDERMANN, HERMANN. (_German._) *Dame Care. Boni and Liveright.

TCHEKHOV, ANTON. (_Russian._) *Duel, The. Macmillan.

*House with the Mezzanine, The. Scribner.

*Lady with the Dog, The. Macmillan.

*Party, The. Macmillan.

*Rothschild's Fiddle. Boni and Liveright.

*Will o' the Wisp. International Authors' a.s.sociation.

TOLSTOI, ILYA, COUNT.

*Visions. Pond.

WRIGHT, WILLARD HUNTINGTON, _Editor._ (_French._) *Great Modern French Stories, The. Boni and Liveright.

THE BEST SIXTY-THREE AMERICAN SHORT STORIES OF 1917

_The sixty-three short stories published in the American magazines during 1917 which I shall discuss in this article are chosen from a larger group of about one hundred and twenty-five stories, whose literary excellence justified me in including them in my annual "Roll of Honor." The stories, which are included in this Roll of Honor have been chosen from the stories published in about sixty-five American periodicals during 1917. In selecting them, I have sought to accept the author's point of view and manner of treatment, and to measure simply the degree of success he had in doing what he set out to achieve. But I must confess that it has been difficult to eliminate personal admiration completely in the further winnowing which has resulted in this selection of sixty-three stories. Below are set forth the particular qualities which have seemed to me to justify in each case the inclusion of a story in this list._

1. THE EXCURSION by _Edwina Stanton Babc.o.c.k_ (The Pictorial Review) is in my belief one of the best five American short stories of the year. It is significant because of its faithful and imaginative rendering of American folk-life, because of its subtle characterization, and the successful manner in which it reveals the essentially racy humor of the American countryside with the utmost economy of means. The characterization is achieved almost entirely through dialogue, and the portraiture of the characters is rendered inimitably in a phrase or two.

In this story, as well as in "The Band," Miss Babc.o.c.k has earned the right to a place beside Francis Buzzell as a regional story writer, fairly comparable to John Trevena's renderings of Dartmoor.

2. THE BROTHERS by _Thomas Beer_ (The Century Magazine) will remind the reader in some respects of Frederick Stuart Greene's story, "The Black Pool," published in "The Grim 13." But apart from a superficial resemblance in the substance with which both writers deal, the two stories are more notable in their differences than in their resemblances. If "The Brothers" is less inevitable than "The Black Pool," it is perhaps a more sophisticated work of art, and I am not sure but that its conclusion and the resolution of character that it involves is not more artistically convincing than the end of "The Black Pool." It is certainly a memorable first story by a new writer and would of itself be enough to make a reputation. Mr. Beer is the most original new talent that the Century Magazine has discovered since Stacy Aumonier.

3. ONNIE by _Thomas Beer_ (The Century Magazine) has a certain stark faithfulness which makes of somewhat obvious material an extremely vivid and freshly felt rendering of life. There is a certain quality of observation in the story which we are accustomed to think of as a Gallic rather than an American trait. I think that Mr. Beer has slightly broadened his canvas where greater restraint and less cautious use of suggestion would have better answered his purpose. But "Onnie" is a better story than "The Brothers" to my mind, and Mr. Beer, by virtue of these two stories, is one of the two or three most interesting new talents of the year.

4. IRONSTONE by _Phyllis Bottome_ (The Century Magazine). To those who have enjoyed in recent years the admirable social comedy and deft handling of English character to which Miss Bottome has accustomed us, "Ironstone" must have come as a surprise in its revelation of a new aspect in the author's talent, akin to the kind of tale which is found at its best as a "middle" in the London Nation. It compresses the emotion of a Greek drama into a s.p.a.ce of perhaps four thousand words. I find that the closing dialogue in this story is as certain in its march as the closing pages of "Riders to the Sea," and the _katharsis_ is timeless in its final solution.

5. FROM HUNGARY by "_John Breck_" (The Bookman) is perhaps not to be cla.s.sified as a short story, but the academic limitations of the short story have never interested me greatly, and in its own field this short fiction sketch is memorable. Its secret is the secret of atmosphere rather than speech, but atmosphere here becomes human in its reality and the resultant effect is not unlike that of "When Hannah Var Eight Yar Old" by Miss Girling, which appeared in the Atlantic Monthly a few years ago. "John Breck," or Elizabeth C. A. Smith, to reveal her authors.h.i.+p, has found complete embodiment for her conception in this story for the first time, and it is a promise for a vivid and interesting future.

6. THE FLYING TEUTON by _Alice Brown_ (Harper's Magazine) is the best short story that has come out of this war as yet in either English or American magazines. Accepting the old legend of the Flying Dutchman, Miss Brown has imagined it reembodied in a modern setting, and out of the ironies of this situation a most dramatic story results with a sure and true message for the American people. It is in my opinion one of the five best short stories of the year, and I am happy to say that it will soon be accessible to the public once more in book form.

7. CLOSED DOORS, and 8. A CUP OF TEA by _Maxwell Struthers Burt_ (both in Scribner's Magazine). In these two stories, and in "The Glory of the Wild Green Earth," "John O'May," and "Le Panache," all of which appeared in Scribner's Magazine during the past year, a place is made for the author among American short story writers beside that of Mrs. Gerould, Wilbur Daniel Steele, and H. G. Dwight. Two years ago I had the pleasure of reprinting his first short story, "The Water-Hole," in "The Best Short Stories of 1915." I thought at that time that Mr. Burt would eventually do fine things, but I never suspected that, in the short period of two years, he would win for himself so important a place in contemporary American letters. Mr. Burt's technique is still a trifle over-sophisticated, but I suppose this is a fault on virtue's side. A collection of Mr. Burt's short stories in book form should be anxiously awaited by the American public.

9. LONELY PLACES, and 10. THE LONG VACATION by _Francis Buzzell_ (The Pictorial Review). The attentive reader of American fiction must have already noted two memorable stories by Francis Buzzell published in previous years, "Addie Erb and Her Girl Lottie" and "Ma's Pretties."

These two stories won for Mr. Buzzell an important position as an American folk-writer, and this position is amply sustained by the two fine stories which he has published during the past year. His imaginative realism weaves poignant beauty out of the simplest and most dusty elements in life, and it is my belief that it is along the lines of his method and that of Miss Babc.o.c.k that America is most likely eventually to contribute something distinctively national to the world's literary culture.

11. THE MISTRESS by _Fleta Campbell_ (Harper's Bazar) is a most highly polished and sharply outlined story of the war. It makes an art out of coldness in narration which serves to emphasize and bring out by contrast the human warmth of the story's substance.

12. THE FOUNDLING by _Gunnar Cederschiold_ (Collier's Weekly). Readers who recall the fine series of stories by Alden Brooks published during the past two years in Collier's Weekly and the Century Magazine will find in "The Foundling" a story equally memorable as a ruthless portrayal of the effects of war. Whether one approves or disapproves in general of the ending is irrelevant in this case. This story must take its place as one of the best dozen stories of the war.

13. BOYS WILL BE BOYS, 14. THE FAMILY TREE, and 15. QUALITY FOLKS by _Irvin S. Cobb_ (all in the Sat.u.r.day Evening Post). It is seven years since Irvin Cobb published his first short story, "The Escape of Mr.

Trimm," in the Sat.u.r.day Evening Post. During that short period he has pa.s.sed from the position of an excellent journalist to that of America's most representative humorist, in the truer meaning of that word. Upon him the mantle of Mark Twain has descended, and with that mantle he has inherited the artistic virtues and the utter inability to criticize his own work that was so characteristic of Mr. Clemens. But the very gusto of his creative work has been shaping his style during the past two years to a point where he may now fairly claim to have mastered his material, and to have found the most effective human persuasiveness in its presentation. Our grandchildren will read these three stories, and thank G.o.d that there was a man named Cobb once born in Paducah, Kentucky.

16. LAUGHTER (Harper's Magazine), and 17. OUR DOG (Pictorial Review) by _Charles Caldwell Dobie_. The rapid rise of Mr. Dobie in less than two years from the date when his first short story was published challenges comparison with the similar career of Maxwell Struthers Burt. As Mr.

Burt's art has its a.n.a.logies with that of Mrs. Gerould, so Mr. Dobie's art has its a.n.a.logies with that of Wilbur Daniel Steele. I am not certain that Mr. Dobie's talent is not essentially that of a novel-writer, but certainly at least four of the short stories which he has published during the past year are notable artistic achievements in widely different moods. If tragedy prevails, it is purified by a fine spiritual idealism, which takes symbols and makes of them something more human than a mere allegory. If an American publisher were courageous enough to start publis.h.i.+ng a series of volumes of short stories by contemporary American writers, he could not do better than to begin with a selection of Mr. Dobie's tales.

18. A LITTLE NIPPER OF HIDE-AN'-SEEK HARBOR by _Norman Duncan_ (Pictorial Review). This story has a melancholy interest, because it was the last story sold by its author before his sudden death last year. But it would have been remembered for its own sake as the last and not the least important of the long series of Newfoundland sagas which Mr.

Duncan has given us. It shows that Norman Duncan kept his artistic vigor to the last, and those who know Newfoundland can testify that such stories as these will always remain its most permanent literary record.

19. THE EMPEROR OF ELAM by _H. G. Dwight_ (The Century Magazine). Those who have read Mr. Dwight's volume of short stories ent.i.tled "Stamboul Nights" do not need to be told that Mr. Dwight is the one American short story writer whom we may confidently set beside Joseph Conrad as a master in a similar literary field. American editors have been diffident about publis.h.i.+ng his stories for reasons which cast more discredit on the American editor than on Mr. Dwight, and accordingly it is a genuine pleasure to encounter "The Emperor of Elam," and to chronicle the hardihood of the editor of the Century Magazine. The story is a modern odyssey of adventure, set as usual in the Turkish background with which Mr. Dwight is most familiar. In it atmosphere is realized completely for its own sake, and as a motive power urging the lives of his characters to their inevitable end.

20. THE GAY OLD DOG by _Edna Ferber_ (Metropolitan Magazine) is in my opinion the big story which "The Eldest" was not. It is my belief that Edna Ferber is a novelist first and a short story writer afterwards, but in "The Gay Old Dog" she has accepted a theme which can best be handled in the short story form and has made the most of it artistically, much as Fannie Hurst has done in all of her better stories. Miss Ferber has not sentimentalized her substance as she does most often, but has let it remain at its true valuation.

21. BREAD-CRUMBS by _Waldo Frank_ (Seven Arts Magazine). I cannot help feeling that this is an extremely well written and honestly conceived story whose substance is essentially false, but the author has apparently persuaded himself of its truth and presents it almost convincingly to the reader. Be this as it may, Mr. Frank has not failed to make his two characters real for us, and the poignancy of their final revelation is certainly genuine. Mr. Frank, however, should save such material as this for longer fiction, as his method is essentially that of a novelist.

22. PEARLS BEFORE SWINE by _Cornelia Throop Geer_ (Atlantic Monthly).

With a quiet and somewhat reticent art, the author of this story has succeeded in deftly conveying to her readers a delicate pastoral scene of innocence reflecting the dreams of two little Irish children. It was a difficult feat to attempt, as few can safely reproduce the atmosphere of an alien race successfully, and, even to Irish-Americans, Ireland cannot be sufficiently realized for creative embodiment. I am told that a volume of Irish stories is promised from the pen of Miss Geer, and it should take its place with the better folk stories of modern Irish life.

Miss Geer's method is the result of identification with, rather than condescension toward, her subject.

23. EAST OF EDEN (Harper's Magazine), 24. THE HAND OF JIM FANE (Harper's Magazine), 25. THE KNIGHT'S MOVE (Atlantic Monthly), 26. THE WAX DOLL (Scribner's Magazine), and 27. WHAT THEY SEEM (Harper's Magazine) by _Katharine Fullerton Gerould_. In these five short stories Mrs. Gerould amply sustains her claim to rank as one of the three most distinguished contemporary writers of the American short story. Preoccupied as she is with the subtle rendering of abnormal psychological situations, her work is in the great traditional line whose last completely adequate exponent was Henry James. One and all, these stories have the fascination of strange spiritual adventure, and the persuasiveness of her exposition conceals inimitably the closely woven craftsmans.h.i.+p of her work. Of these five stories, "The Knight's Move" and "East of Eden" surely represent a development in her art which it will be almost impossible for her to surpa.s.s.

28. DARE'S GIFT by _Ellen Glasgow_ (Harper's Magazine). I prefer to beg the question whether this is a short story or a very short novel. It certainly has the unity of a well-defined spiritual incident, and if one recalls its substance, it is only to view it as a completely rounded whole. As such it is surely as fine a study of the influence of place as Mrs. Wharton's "Kerfol" or Mrs. Pangborn's "Bixby's Bridge." The brooding atmosphere of a house mindful of its past and reacting upon successive inmates morally, or perhaps immorally, has seldom been more faithfully rendered.

29. THE HEARING EAR (Harper's Magazine), and 30. A JURY OF HER PEERS (Every Week) by _Susan Glaspell_. It is always interesting to study the achievement of a novelist who has won distinction deservedly in that field, when that novelist attempts the very different technique of the short story. It is particularly interesting in the case of Susan Glaspell, because with these two stories she convinces the reader that her future really lies in the short story rather than in the novel. Few American writers have such a natural dramatic story sense, and to this Susan Glaspell has added an increasing reticence in the portrayal of her characters. In these two stories you will not find the slightest sentimentalization of her subject matter, nor is it keyed so tightly as some of her previous work. "A Jury of Her Peers" is one of the better folk stories of the year, sharing that distinction with "The Excursion"

by Miss Babc.o.c.k and the two stories by Francis Buzzell, of which I have spoken above.

31. HIS FATHER'S FLAG by _Armistead C. Gordon_ (Scribner's Magazine).

The many readers who have revelled in Mr. Gordon's admirable portraits of Virginia negro plantation life will be surprised and gratified at Mr.

Gordon's venture in this story into a new field. This story has all the infectious emotional feeling of memory recalling glorious things, and I can only compare it for its spiritual fidelity toward a cause to the stories by Elsie Singmaster which she has gathered into her volume about Gettysburg, and particularly to that fine story, "The Survivors."

32. THE BUNKER MOUSE, and 33. "MOLLY MCGUIRE, FOURTEEN" by _Frederick Stuart Greene_ (The Century Magazine). Captain Greene's story "The Cat of the Cane-Brake" attracted so much attention at the time of its publication in the Metropolitan Magazine a year ago that it is interesting to find him achieving high distinction in other imaginative fields. Captain Greene's natural gift of narrative is the result of a strong impulse toward creative expression, which molds its form a little self-consciously, but convincingly, for the most part. I think that he is at his best in these two stories rather than in "The Cat of the Cane-Brake" and "The Black Pool," because they are based upon a more direct apprehension and experience of life. "Molly McGuire, Fourteen"

adds one more tradition to those of the Virginia Military Inst.i.tute.

34. RAINBOW PETE by _Richard Matthews Hallet_ (The Pictorial Review) reveals the author in his most incorrigibly romantic mood. Mr. Hallet casts glamour over his creations, partly through his detached and pictorial perception of life, and partly through the magic of his words.

He has been compared to Conrad, and in a lesser way he has much in common with the author of "Lord Jim," but his artistic method is essentially different and quite as individual.

35. FRAZEE by _Lee Foster Hartman_ (Harper's Magazine). Mr. Hartman has been a good friend to other story writers for so long that we had begun to forget how fine an artist he can be himself. In "Frazee" he has taken a subject which would have fascinated Mrs. Gerould and handled it with reserve and power. It is pitched in a quieter key than is usual in such a story, and the result is that character merges with atmosphere almost imperceptibly. I regard the story as almost a model of construction for students of short story writing.

36. FOUR DAYS by _Hetty Hemenway_ (Atlantic Monthly). This remarkable story of the spiritual effect of the war upon two young people was so widely commented upon, not only after its appearance in the Atlantic Monthly, but later when it was republished in book form, that I shall only commend it to the reader here as an artistically woven study in war psychology.

37. GET READY THE WREATHS by _Fannie Hurst_ (Cosmopolitan Magazine). The artistic qualities in Miss Hurst's work which have commended themselves to such disinterested critics as Mr. Howells are revealed once more in this story, in which Miss Hurst accepts the shoddiness of background which characterizes her literary types, and reveals the fine human current that runs beneath it all. I am not sure that Miss Hurst has not diluted her substance a little too much during the past year, and in any case that danger is implicit in her method. But in "Get Ready the Wreaths" the emotional validity of her substance is absolutely unimpeachable and her handling of the situation it presents is adequate and fine.

38. JOURNEY'S END by _Percy Adams Hutchison_ (Harper's Magazine). An attentive reader of the American short stories during the past few years may have observed with interest at rare intervals the work of Mr.

Hutchison. In it there was always a promise of an achievement not unlike that of Perceval Gibbon, but a certain looseness of texture prevented Mr. Hutchison from being completely persuasive. In "Journey's End,"

however, it must be confessed that he has written a memorable sea story that is certainly equal at least to the better stories in Mr. Kipling's latest volume.

39. THE STRANGE-LOOKING MAN by _f.a.n.n.y Kemble Johnson_ (The Pagan). I suppose that this story is to be regarded as a sketch rather than a short story, but in any case it is a vividly rendered picture of war's effects portrayed with subtle irony and quiet art. I a.s.sociate it with "Chautonville" by Will Levington Comfort, and "The Flying Teuton" by Alice Brown, as one of the three stories with the most authentic spiritual message in American fiction that the war has produced.

40. THE SEA-TURN by _E. Clement James_ (The Seven Arts). In this study of the spiritual reactions of a starved environment upon an imaginative mind, Mrs. Jones has added a convincing character portrait to American letters which ranks with the better short stories of J. D. Beresford in a similar _genre_. The story is in the same tradition as that of the younger English realists, but it is an essential contribution to our nationalism, and as such helps to point the way toward the future in which a true national literature must find its only and inevitable realization.