The Art of Revision in the Short Stories of V.S. Pritchett and William Trevor

A pioneering critical study of the short stories of V.S. Pritchett and William Trevor, drawing on hitherto unpublished archival materials and exploring manuscript revisions and other transformations, from life to art, from initial idea to magazine and book publication that analyzes the craft of this relatively neglected genre.

'Dr. Bloom has done a great service for our understanding not only of V. S. Pritchett and William Trevor, but of the way short stories work, and the ways in which their authors polish, recast and revise them. He understands to perfection the subtle means by which the best short stories blend the art of narrative with the art of poetry, each, as it were, drawing just the right attention to the other. His own concluding chapter - 'English Fantasy and Irish Entrapment', is itself a masterpiece of afterthought and sympathetic analysis.' - John Bayley, Oxford University

'Here is a serious, scrupulous and fascinating piece of scholarship that examines the working methods of two modern masters of the short story, V. S. Pritchett and William Trevor, using their drafts, revisions and correspondence with editors to take you to the heart of the imaginative process.' - Claire Tomalin, Whitbread Prize winner for Biography

'Jonathan Bloom has written a valuable appreciation of two of the world's very finest short story writers, an insightful close reading focusing purely and respectfully on the stories themselves.' - Jhumpa Lahiri, Pulitzer Prize winner for Fiction

'By invoking a range of complementary approaches-critical, textual, and occasionally biographical - and combining general assessments with detailed examinations of particular works, Jonathan Bloom succeeds not only in celebrating the work of Pritchett and Trevor themselves but also in reinforcingthe status of the short story as a major literary genre.' - Michael Millgate, University of Toronto

Autorentext

JONATHAN BLOOM holds degrees from the universities of Princeton, Paris, and Oxford. He has taught at the universities of Paris and Oxford and his work has appeared in the Sewanee Review and the Journal of the Short Story in English. He has been a Harry Ransom Center Fellow and is currently working on an edition of the letters and diaries of V.S. Pritchett. He lives in Paris.

Inhalt
Introduction Fanfare for the Common Man Revision as Transformation: The Making and Re-Making of V.S. Pritchett's You Make Your Own Life William Trevor's 'Distillation of an Essence': From 'Meeting Mrs. Faraday' to 'Cocktails at Doney's' V.S. Pritchett's Ministering Angell Real Incursions in Fictive Worlds Living on the Other Side of the Frontier The Roads Taken Make All The Difference: Comic Spirit and Tragic Comedian English Fantasy and Irish Entrapment