It was such a thing of beauty
It was a sight to see
It was the perfect masterpiece
Full of grace and majesty
I found myself thinking
to what can this compare
And then, of course, I thought of you
And I wished that you were there
God sure was extra careful
When He formed and fashioned you
You too, became a masterpiec
Yet God is still not through
He"s daily making changes
that other folks can"t see
You"re already true perfection
At least you are to me
،،
~ Author Unknown ~
Elements and characteristics
Short stories tend to be less complex than novels. Usually, a short story will focus on only one incident, has a single plot, a single setting, a limited number of characters, and covers a short period of time.
In longer forms of fiction, stories tend to contain certain core elements of dramatic structure: exposition (the introduction of setting, situation and main characters); complication (the event of the story that introduces the conflict); rising action, crisis (the decisive moment for the protagonist and their commitment to a course of action); climax (the point of highest interest in terms of the conflict and the point of the story with the most action); resolution (the point of the story when the conflict is resolved); and moral.
Because of their short length, short stories may or may not follow this pattern. Some do not follow patterns at all. For example, modern short stories only occasionally have an exposition. More typical, though, is an abrupt beginning, with the story starting in the middle of the action. As with longer stories, plots of short stories also have a climax, crisis, or turning-point. However, the endings of many short stories are abrupt and open and may or may not have a moral or practical lesson.
Of course, as with any art form, the exact characteristics of a short story will vary by author
Modern short stories emerged as their own genre in the early 19th century. Early examples of short stories include the Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales (1824–1826) or Nikolai Gogol"s Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka (1831-1832). Charles Brockden Brown"s "Somnambulism" (1805), Washington Irving"s Rip van Winkle (1819) and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1820), Edgar Allan Poe"s Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (1840) and Nathaniel Hawthorne"s Twice-Told Tales (1842) are the first examples in the USA.
In the later part of the 19th century, the growth of print magazines and journals created a strong market demand for short fiction between 3,000 and 15,000 words in length. Among the famous short stories to come out of this time period was "Ward No. 6" by Anton Chekhov.
At the same time first literary theories about the short story appeared. The first widely known theory is Edgar Allan Poe"s "The Philosophy of Composition" (1846). In 1901 Brander Matthews, first US-American professor of dramatic literature published his "The Philosophy of the Short-Story."
In the first half of the 20th century, a number of high-profile magazines, such as The Atlantic Monthly, Scribner"s, and The Saturday Evening Post, all published short stories in each issue. The demand for quality short stories was so great, and the money paid for them so high, that F. Scott Fitzgerald repeatedly turned to short story writing to pay off his numerous debts.
The demand for short stories by print magazines hit its peak in the middle of the 20th century, when in 1952 Life magazine published Ernest Hemingway"s long short story (or novella) The Old Man and the Sea. The issue containing this story sold 5,300,000 copies in only two days.
Since then, the number of commercial magazines that publish short stories has declined, even though several well-known magazines like The New Yorker continue to feature them. Literary magazines also provide a showcase for short stories. In addition, short stories have recently found a new life online, where they can be found in online magazines, in collections organized by author or theme, and on blogs
