The Best American Short Stories 1951 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 AuthorStorySourceRoger Angell"Flight Through the Dark"The New YorkerNathan Asch"Inland, Western Sea"The New YorkerPeggy Bennett"A Fugitive From the Mind"MademoiselleMary Bolte"The End of the Depression"Harper's BazaarHortense Calisher"In Greenwich There Are Many Grevelled Walks"The New YorkerLeonard Casper"Sense of Direction"Southwest ReviewR.V. Cassill"Larchmoor Is Not The World"FuriosoJohn Cheever"The Season of Divorce"The New YorkerHarris Downey"The Hunters"EpochElizabeth Enright"The Temperate Zone"The Virginia Quarterly ReviewJ. Carol Goodman"The Kingdom of Gordon"MademoiselleEthel Edison Gordon"The Value of the Dollar"CharmWilliam Goyen"Her Breath Upon The Windowpane"Harper's MagazineShirley Jackson"The Summer People"CharmJosephine W. Johnson"The Mother's Story"Good HousekeepingIlona Karmel"Fru Holm"MademoiselleOliver La Farge"Old Century's River"The Atlantic MonthlyGeorge Lanning"Old Turkey Neck"TomorrowEthel G. Lewis"Portrait"EpochDorothy Livesay"The Glass House"The Northern ReviewRobie Macauley"The Wishbone"The Sewanee ReviewBernard Malamud"The Prison"CommentaryEsther Patt"The Butcherbirds"The American MercuryJ.F. Powers"Death of a Favorite"The New YorkerPaul Rader"The Tabby Cat"QuartoJean Stafford"The Nemesis"The New YorkerRay B. West, Jr."The Last of the Grizzly Bears"EpochTennessee Williams"The Resemblance Between A Violin Case and a Coffin"Flair
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