The Penguin Book of the British Short Story

Edited and introduced by novelist and journalist Philip Hensher, The Penguin Book of the British Short Story celebrates the diversity and energy of British writers. Here, Hensher introduces the collection. 

What do Britain’s short story writers do most characteristically? In some ways, I came to think of the exemplary British short story as Arthur Conan Doyle’s masterpiece ‘Silver Blaze’. It is extraordinarily playful with the conventions of its own genre, beginning with an indication of the murderer that could hardly be more explicit or blatant. It is concerned with a huge range of significant and interesting physical objects, including the elaborate dress that is never seen and its owner never identified. It is about the actions of the overlooked and misunderstood. It is about social class, of course. Like many great short stories from Britain, it revolves around a general social gathering with its own rituals – William Sansom’s wonderful…