Page 49 - February 2021

ALL ABOUT EY – MUSINGS ABOUT
ALL ABOUT EY – MUSINGS ABOUT
ALL ABOUT EY – MUSINGS ABOUT
LITERATURE, THE SHORT STORY AND
LITERATURE, THE SHORT STORY AND
LITERATURE, THE SHORT STORY AND
THE CURRENT STATE OF LITERARY
THE CURRENT STATE OF LITERARY
THE CURRENT STATE OF LITERARY
AFFAIRS
AFFAIRS
AFFAIRS

You may find in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_sale:_baby_shoes,_never_wor
n, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” is the entirety of what
has been described as a six-word story, making it an extreme
example of what is called flash fiction or sudden fiction.
Although it is often attributed to Ernest Hemingway, the link
to him is unsubstantiated and similar stories predate him. The
claim of Hemingway’s authorship originates in an
unsubstantiated anecdote about a wager between him and
other writers. In a 1992 letter to Canadian humorist John
Robert Colombo, science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke
recounts it thus: While lunching with friends at a restaurant
(variously identified as Luchow’s or The Algonquin),
Hemingway bets the table ten dollars each that he can craft an
entire story in six words. After the pot is assembled,
Hemingway writes “For sale: baby shoes, never worn” on a
napkin, passes this around the table, and collects his winnings.

With reference to https://rcgale.com/2012/05/02/the-worlds-
shortest-short-story-is-only-8-words-long-titled-el-dinosaurio,
Augusto Monterroso is a Guatemalan short story writer best
known for his 8-word story titled “El Dinosaurio”: When I woke
up, the dinosaur was still there. You might imagine a young
girl who wakes in the morning to find her pet Dino faithfully at
her bedside.

Likewise in poetry also, there happened debates over shortest
poetry. Lines on the Antiquity of Microbes, also known simply
as Fleas, is a couplet commonly cited as the shortest poem
ever written, composed by American poet Strickland Gillilan in
the early 20th century. The poem reads in full:

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litterateur February 2021