Classics of Short Fiction: Reading the Novella

Harvard FAS

Short enough to read in a single sitting, but more complex and absorbing than short stories, novellas give us some of our most intense reading experiences. In this discussion seminar, we will read some of the enduring classics of the novella from around the world, including Anton Chekhov, Henry James, Herman Melville, Bohumil Hrabal, Katherine Anne Porter, Leo Tolstoy, James Joyce, Eileen Chang, and others; we will also consider how the novella’s compression and acceleration of plot make it…