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/lit/ - Literature

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12291489 No.12291489 [Reply] [Original]

Which is better?
Also short story thread
>Which collections would you call essential other than pic related?
>What is the best individual short story you've ever read?

>> No.12291513

>>12291489
>What is the best individual short story you've ever read?

For sale; very ugly baby

>> No.12291529

Russian literature is mostly overrated middlebrow trash for impressionable Americans, but Gogol’s “Petersburg Tales” is probably the best collection of short stories ever written

>> No.12291545

>>12291489
> Which is better?
Ficciones is better.
>Which collections would you call essential other than pic related?
Cortázar's Blow Up, Fitzgerald's All the Sand Young Men, Salinger's Nine Stories.

>What is the best individual short story you've ever read?
Borges' The Secret Miracle or Bolaño's The Return. Not sure if they are the best I've read but they're my favorites.

>> No.12291547

Why the fuck compare the two? Personally I'd put Borges ahead, but they're doing such different things, it doesn't seem valuable to compare them.
Other essentials: Kafka's "Metamorphosis and other stories" (basically collects all his work that was published in his lifetime), a collection of Chekhov (I went with Penguin's, which are split into two books of earlier and later short stories - would recommend, but you could go with a different collection).
There are other like Turgenev that some some great short stories, but I think those would be the top 4 for me - especially Borges and Chekhov.
I haven't read Poe yet, but would imagine that would be up there too.

>> No.12291561

>>12291529
>Trashing Russian lit in the context of short stories without evening mentioning Chekhov.
Opinion disregarded.

>> No.12291571

>>12291489
Poe is essential.

>> No.12291572

>>12291489
Dubliners. /lit/ vastly overrates Borges because he's really just giving people philosophy second hand since nobody actually wants to go back and read Kant, Spinoza, etc. His symbols of the labyrinth, the library, and the dagger that recur over and over are a gimmick and people say that he's explored the idea of infinity like no other writer just cuz he used those symbols a million times. He is a clever magician capable of pulling off impressive tricks but nothing more.

>> No.12291589

Are there any good short story anthologies?

>> No.12291592

>>12291572
>"cuz"
Opinion discarded.

>> No.12291598

>>12291589
The ones mentioned in this thread.

>> No.12291601

>>12291513
i actually laughed out loud. thanks.

>> No.12291611

>>12291572
>His symbols of the labyrinth, the library, and the dagger that recur over and over are a gimmick
>a writer's motifs are a gimmick
One of Joyce's motifs is Dublin and being Irish, therefore Dubliners is a total cheap gimmick multiplied by 15.

>> No.12291619
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12291619

>>12291592
>upset about an abbreviation on the internet
*Snap*

>> No.12291620

>>12291572
There's more to the stories than just "what if subjective idealism became reality" though. There's layers of meaning in the details and a playfulness - especially to works like Pierre Menard, imo - in how he illustrates his ideas. He uses philosophy as his playground, yes, but the images he creates with it are his own.

>> No.12291625

>>12291572
>He is a clever magician capable of pulling off impressive tricks but nothing more.
>what is a writer
You just proved Borges was a great writer. Congratulations.

>> No.12291631

>>12291489
Cortázar would be another essential, as well as Chekhov. Hemmingway has some absolutely brilliant ones, but he can be hit or miss. I've been reading Calvino's short fiction lately and enjoying it a lot, planning to go into Cosmiconomics soon enough.

>> No.12291670

>>12291598
I mean anthologies of various authors

>> No.12291693

>>12291670
*Memorable Tales According to Borges
*Dangerous Visions

>> No.12291694

>>12291529
Twice based

Also Poe, also Maupassant. Everybody would be licking their boots if they were russian. Also Akutagawa. Fuck. When I publish my first novel I'll get some stupid russian-sounding alias.
>t. Anonov

>> No.12291699

>>12291513
Lol anon

>> No.12291710

>>12291693
Antologia de la literatura fantastica by Borges and Bioy Casares

>> No.12291720

>>12291710
This. It's called The Book of Fantasy in English, and I'm not sure buy I think the English version includes additional stories, like those by Ballard.

>> No.12291752

>>12291710
Adding to this, Cuentos Breves y Extraordinarios also curated by Borges and Bioy Casares. Same idea as Memorable Tales but focused on short short fiction. Think flash fiction, parables, jokes, anecdotes and whatnot from literary traditions across the globe. Most of them aren't even a page long and yet it's full of amazing stories.

>> No.12291766
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12291766

ez answer

>> No.12291779

>>12291752
I have Memorable Tales in Spanish, sadly I don't think it was published in English and the Spanish edition is out of print. Glad I own this.