The Best Continental Short Stories of 1927/Preface
PREFACE
A comparative study of the Continental short story cannot help but show a remarkable similarity of civilizations and problems. The Chauvinistically inclined diplomat or statesman from Pategonia who reads several short stories from as many neighboring countries, is certain to become more sympathetically inclined towards his near-by rivals. The short story is admittedly a reflection of a cross-section of the life of a nation or a community. The reading of hundreds of short stories from a score of European countries impresses me particularly with the great similarity in the fundamental problems of life in Esthonia as well as in Egypt.
In the preface to “Continental Short Stories of 1926,” I spoke of the division of European short stories into certain racial groups irrespective of political boundaries such as Latin, Teutonic, Slavic, etc., the stories of each group having the same characteristics and standards of production. Were it not for the question of language and the customs which have been created by linguistic isolation many of the slight differences between the Russian and Spanish, the German and the Roumanian stories would disappear. It was this same reasoning which led to the creation of an international language, unfortunately an idea too idealistic to succeed in our practical age. I hasten to add that there are always exceptions to every rule, and it is quite possible for certain short stories even in this book to defy all comparison with stories from other countries. These are exceptions. Consider the great short stories of Poe, of De Maupassant, of Wilde, of Flaubert. Poe is as much at home at the fire-side of a Slovakian family as De Maupassant. John becomes Jean, Johann, Jan, Janko, or Ivan; Newtown, Villeneuve, Neustadt, Citta nova, Novgorod, as the language of the country requires, but the fundamental problems, the crises and emotions of the characters in the short story, are universally understood.
The task of choosing the “best” short story of 1927–28 in each country is none too easy, for the choice is as wide in the case of certain nations as it is limited in the case of others. I have been guided therefore in my selection, not only by the usual standards of unity, construction, style, interest and completeness of plot, but by a consideration of the customs and intellectual development of each nation.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published in 1928, before the cutoff of January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1981, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 42 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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