Last year fewer than 25 books of short stories were produced by mainstream publishers. And two thirds were by writers from abroad. Where are all the good British short stories? Are we witnessing the death throes of an entire genre? In the first of a two-part instalment, Debbie Taylor, Editor of women’s writing publication ‘Mslexia’, charts the parlous state of the literary short story in the UK
According to our research, more people are writing short stories than any other literary form. Over two thirds of the 1,238 women writers who took part in our survey are producing short stories, making it by far the most popular genre – way ahead of poetry, novels and journalism. What’s more, the majority are writing literary short stories.