The Short Stories of Conrad Aiken

Conrad Aiken is that rare phenomenon today, the genuine man of letters. Novelist, critic, and poet, whose verse has been honored by a Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award, and the Bollingen Prize; he is also a story writer of the highest rank, unerringl y adapting his poetic genius to the purposes of fiction. This collection of forty-one first-rate stories by a master craftsman represents his finest achievement in this literary form. The scope of these stones is as broad and familiar as daily life-and as mysterious. From a bizarre conversation with an aging, amateurish prostitute ("West End") to a stag-dinner account of a shipboard romance ("The Professor's Escape"), these stories, i n Mr. Schorer's words, progress "from the mundane into the mysterious, into hysteria, horror, hallucination, phobia, compulsion, dream, death, and, more often than not, back again into the mundane. " Conrad Aiken writes in the tradition of Henry James, Wa lter de la Mare, Katherine Mansfield, and Guy de Maupassant, but each of his stories is infused with his unique form of imagination and poetry, his own highly original talent. "He explores and records the bumbling ambivalences of his timid souls with tact, delicacy, and skill of the highest order. " Saturday Review "No library which does not contain this volume can ever hope to have a representative, much less complete, selecti on of important American literature. These haunting, poetic forays into the subconscious and shadowed peripheries of everyday reality are highly recommended. " Library Journal "His best stories are of a very high order.. And they are a pleasure to read; few literary telescopes show the dark side of the moon as vividly. " Time "The range of method in these stories-or at least the author's virtuosity in handling a wide range of material-is striking." Christian Science Monitor