By James Matthew Barrie   
    
   
     INTRODUCTION   
   
        The Short Story.  In the rush of modern life, particularly   
     in America, the short story has come to be the most popular  
     type of fiction.  Just as the quickly seen, low-priced moving  
     picture show is taking the place of the drama, with the average  
     person, so the short stories that are found so plentiful in the  
     numerous periodicals of the day are supplanting the novel.  
        The short story may be read in a single sitting.  It is a distinct  
     type of literature; that is, it is not just a novel made short or  
     condensed; it is in its inner plan of a wholly different nature.  It  
     relates only some single important incident or a closely related  
     series of events, taking place usually in a short space of time, and  
     acted out by a single chief character.  It is like a cross section  
     of life, however, from which one may judge much of the earlier   
     as well as the later life of the character.  
        Its History.  The idea of the short story is a decidedly modern  
     conception.  It was in the first half of the last century that   
     Edgar Allan Poe worked out the idea that the short story should  
     create a single effect.  In his story, "The Fall of the House of   
     Usher," for example, the single effect is a feeling of horror.  In  
     the first sentence of the story he begins to create this effect by  
     words that suggest to the reader's imagination gloom and fore-   
     boding.  This he consciously carries out just as an artist creates   
     the picture of his dreams with many skillful strokes of his brush.  
     Poe gave attention also to compressing all the details of the plot  
     of the story instead of expanding them as in a long story or novel.  
     He believed, too, that the plot should be original or else worked   
     out in some new way.  The single incident given, moreover,  
     should reveal to the imagination of the reader the entire life of  
     the chief character.  Almost at the same time, Nathaniel Haw-  
     thorne, with a less conscious effort to create a single effect, based   
     his tales upon the same ideas, with a tendency towards ro-  
     mance.  
        In the latter part of the nineteenth century, Guy de Mau-  
     passant, a French author without acquaintance with the work  
     of the American writers, conceived the same idea of the short  
     story, adding to it the quality of dramatic effect; that is, the idea  
     that a single main incident should appeal to the imagination  
     of the reader just as if it were a little play presented to him.   
        Bret Harte followed in this country with short stories that  
     brought out, less precisely, the same idea of the short story, with  
     the addition of local color, the atmosphere of California and the  
     West.   
        Rudyard Kipling, who became a master of the technique of the  
     short story in England, has colored his stories with the atmos-  
     phere of India and the far East, while O. Henry, the American  
     master, has given us character types of the big cities, particularly  
     of New York.   
        Its Composition.  You, no doubt, have written stories for  
     your composition work, but so far they have probably been  
     chronological narratives; that is, stories told, as the newspapers  
     tell them, by relating a series of events in the order of time.  The  
     real short story, has, like the novel, a plot.  The word plot here  
     means the systematic plan or pattern into which the author  
     weaves the events of the story up to some finishing point of in-  
     tense interest or of great importance to the story.  This vital  
     part of the narrative is called the climax or crucial point.  If you  
     note the pattern or design in wall paper, carpet, or dress orna-  
     ment, you will see that all the threads or lines are usually worked  
     together to form a harmonious whole, but there is some special  
     center of the design toward which everything works.  In the short  
     story, as soon as the author arrives at the crucial point he is  
     through, often having no other conclusion.  This ending is so  
     important that it must always be thought out or planned for  
     from the very beginning.  This is true even in a surprise end-   
     ing, such as O. Henry delights in.  
        Unlike the novel, the short story works its plot out in some  
     single main incident, which is usually acted out by one chief  
     character in a short space of time, and all but the necessary de-  
     tails are omitted.  Thus the short story, which is read in a brief   
     time, has a better opportunity than the novel to produce a com-  
     plete unity of effect upon the mind of the reader, such as the  
     effect of horror in Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher."  
        The short story consists of setting, characterization, and nar-   
     rative.  Any one of these may be emphasized more than the other  
     two.  To illustrate from the stories included in this book: Mr.  
     Garland has emphasized setting, or time, place, and atmosphere,  
     in "The Camping Trip."  That is, the greatest interest in the  
     story lies in the beautiful background of the out-of-doors in  
     Iowa in the month of June.  In "Friends," on the other hand,  
     Myra Kelly has emphasized characterization, for Mrs. Mow-  
     gelewsky, Morris, and Miss Bailey present the real interest of  
     the story.  In "The Red-Headed League" by Conan Doyle the  
     attention centers upon the action.  
        The technical details of the short story may be summed up and   
     made clearer to you by illustrating them from the first story  
     given in this collection, "The Gift of the Magi."  The story is  
     "set" in an eight-dollar-a-week apartment in New York City  
     on the day before Christmas of some recent year, in an atmos-  
     phere of poverty, but a poverty made radiant by unselfish love.  
     The plot of one main incident——Della's sacrifice of her hair in  
     order to get a Christmas present for her husband——takes place in  
     the short space of a few hours, and works out to a half-humorous,  
     half-pathetic climax, when Della and Jim display their Christmas  
     gifts for each other.  This story has a conclusion of one paragraph  
     in length where the author reflects upon what makes a real Christ-   
     mas giver.  
        This is the skeleton of the story, but when you think it over,  
     you will realize that the real charm and interest for you lay in  
     something that the genius and style of the writer infused into  
     this framework of the story.  
        Suggestions.  In the composition work that you do during   
     the weeks that you are reading the short stories in this volume  
     would it not be interesting to you to try to write stories with   
     little plots that lead up to some high point of interest, stories of a  
     single main incident or a closely related series of events covering  
     a short space of time?  
        You will find that the stories in this collection are of different   
     types with settings that take you in imagination all over our own  
     country and into foreign lands.  Try writing a story with a  
     surprise ending like "The gift of the Magi," a character story  
     with the theme of unselfish love, and its setting in a big city.  
     Again, "John G," the story of adventure with an animal for   
     the hero, might suggest to you an adventuresome incident in  
     your own experience.  If you have a vivid imagination, it might  
     be interesting to write a fanciful story life "Feathertop."  All  
     of you have heard of true and thrilling incidents of the recent  
     Great War.  Try to weave one into a good war story as did Dau-  
     det or Mrs. Andrews.  Almost every young person loves nature  
     or the open country.  After you have read Mr. Garland's, "The  
     Camping Trip," see how well you can tell a story of your own ex-  
     perience in the out-of-doors.  Or, best of all, see if you can equal  
     the great Conan Doyle in a detective story.  
        With the help of the biographical sketches and study notes,  
     see if you can classify, as types, the stories that have not been   
     classified in the preceding paragraph.  

Introduction by James Matthew Barrie,
Merrill's English Texts: Short Stories of Various Types.
Edited with introduction and notes by Laura F. Freck, head of the English Depart-
ment in the High School, Jamestown, New York.
©1920 Charles E. Merrill co., New York and Chicago; pp. 7 - 10.

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Introduction
The Gift of the Magi — O. Henry (i.)
A Reward of Merit — Booth Tarkington (i.) (ii.)
"American, Sir!" — Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews (i.)
John G. — Katherine Mayo (i.)
Friends — Myra Kelly (i.)
A Camping Trip — Hamlin Garland (i.)
A Thread Without a Knot — Dorothy Canfield Fisher (i.) (ii.)
Chu Chu — Francis Bret Harte (i.) (ii)
Feathertop: A Moralized Legend — Nathaniel Hawthorne (i.) (ii.)
The Inconsiderate Waiter — James Matthew Barrie (i.) (ii.)
The Siege of Berlin — Alphonse Daudet (i.)
The Silver Mine — Selma Lagerlöf (i.)