The Best American Short Stories 1973 is a volume in The Best American Short Stories series edited by Martha Foley. The volume was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Background The series is considered one of the "best-known annual anthologies of short fiction""Short and Sweet" by Mark Harris, Entertainment Weekly, 11/05/99, issue 511, page 73. and has anthologized more than 2,000 short stories, including works by some of the most famous writers in contemporary American literature."The Best American Short Stories of the Century," Publishers Weekly, 3/8/1999, volume 246, issue 10, page 47.
In particular, the Willa Cather Review wrote that The Best American Short Stories series "became a repository of values" for creative writing programs, college libraries, and literary magazines."'Long-Cellared Wine': 'Double Birthday,' Edward J. H. O'Brien, and the Best American Short Stories Series" by Timothy W. Bintrim and Scott Riner, Willa Cather Review, spring 2023, volume 64, issue 1, page 18. The Los Angeles Times, reflecting on the hundred-year anniversary of the series, noted that it eventually became an "institution" itself, often being taught in classrooms.
Short stories included AuthorStorySourceDonald Barthelme"A City of Churches"The New YorkerHenry Bromell"The Slightest Distance"The New YorkerJohn Cheever"The Jewels of the Cabots"PlayboyJohn J. Clayton"Cambridge is Sinking!"The Massachusetts ReviewJohn William Corrington"Old Men Dream Dreams, Young Men See Visions"The Sewanee ReviewGuy Davenport"Robot"The Hudson ReviewWilliam Eastlake"The Death of Sun"CosmopolitanAlvin Greenberg"The Real Meaning of the Faust Legend"The New American ReviewJulie Hayden"In the Words of"The New YorkerGeorge V. Higgins"The Habits of Animals: The Progress of the Seasons"North American ReviewWard Just"Burns"The Atlantic MonthlyJames S. Kenary"Going Home"The Massachusetts ReviewWallace E. Knight"The Way We Went"The Atlantic MonthlyKonstantinos Lardas"The Broken Wings"The South Dakota ReviewJames Alan McPherson"The Silver Bullet"PlayboyBernard Malamud"God's Wrath"The Atlantic MonthlyJoyce Carol Oates"Silkie"The Malahat ReviewSylvia Plath"Mothers"McCall'sErik Sandberg-Diment"Come Away, Oh Human Child"Kansas QuarterlyDavid Shetzline"Country of the Painted Freaks"The Paris ReviewTennessee Williams"Happy August the 10th"Esquire
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