Poem and Short Story
Critics are of the opinion that during the depressing decades of the 19th
century, the short story found its inner and authentic voice. It is preferred for its special feature; that
of motion of remembrance. Though, the
writers are often great novelists; and the novelists, a great story writer but
the short stories and novels are at par with each other. We often find that a story is read in one
sitting so its effect is sudden, powerful and revealing; whereas novel involves
readers at a more leisurely pace, slowly illuminating complexities as it takes
days to read.
Moving
forward towards novel, which is a marvelous fiction, its real beauty lies in its
characterization and plot development.
It has several twists in the main story, and the reader often feels that
the main story has been deviated and affected by the involvement of different
sub-stories and sub-plots or by the involvement of new important
character.
Notwithstanding, its importance, it is gratifying to note that the novel
is a living and evolving literary genre, and is trying, in the hands of its
practitioners, a fusion of form, substance and expression, especially that
Indo-Anglian bearing the marks of universality. In the words of K.R.S. Iyengar,
“The novel is a means of expression for the writer, and it is ultimately
born of understanding and love. The
novelist understanding (of man, of Nature, of God) has to be as total and as
integral as possible; and his love (or compassion) has to be a total power
too. Such understanding and power will
forge their own appropriate means- language form, technique-for communicating
the totality of the vision and the whole power of the love to the readers. Whatever the subject- a patch of past
history, a segment of contemporary life, a problem in ethics or politics, a
revolutionary eruption in the body politic-the novelists understanding and love
will make his writing transcend the merely local and controversial, and attain
the vitality and dignity of creative literature.”(2)
Coming
to the composition, it is deliberately noted that, on one hand in a novel the
author takes time to present the protagonists, through physical and
psychological descriptions. On the
other, these characters aren’t so numerous and their features are less
developed in a short story. The
atmosphere is also different. While
context is described precisely in a novel, it is not the case concerning the
short stories. All those minute details
are not brought to the surface.
Furthermore, the plot is often simple and unique in short stories while
that in the novel can be multiple and include new developments. Also, there is a difference between the
events and episodes in both of these fictions.
In the novels of Dickens and Thackeray,
for example, there was a story element episode; each part of the serialized
publication has to be complete in it and also prepare the ground for what was
to follow. In a short story on the other
hand, there is nothing to follow, nothing to look forward to. The end of the story is the end. It is self-contained. It is marked by the sense of finality, of
definiteness, of tautness from beginning to end.
Also the short stories are written in a limited number of words with a
focused attention. We cannot skip any of
the description which is very often done in a novel –that is skipping of the
settings. Some of the fantasy, horror or
science fiction novels are of greatest lengths.
Some famous books like ‘The Lord of Rings’ series and
the ‘Harry
Potter’ series have set the trademark of having the most
words. Similarly, the stories of Jonathan
Swift and Rudyard
Kipling and in Indo-Anglian Mulk Raj Anand, K.A.
Abbas, R.K. Narayan, M. Isvaran, have given a new
dimension to the short story collections.
The novel was the first to take into shape in the Indo-Anglian
fiction. ‘Rajmohun’s Wife’
(1864) by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee was first to be published
followed by ‘Durgeshnandini’, ‘Anandmath’ and ‘Devi
Chaudhurani’.
Though the novel is rather more enterprising and richer in content but
in present days people are inclined more towards short –stories as they are
interesting and less- time taken. This
short fiction with its concentration, brevity and sensitiveness can better
record moments than the broader canvas of the novel.
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