Influential Short Stories, for five hundred

[rolanni]

All righty, then! A challenge! Which shorter works still influence you/are you trying to answer/come to peace with after having read them?

This is my list, unranked:

"All Summer in a Day," Ray Bradbury

"Those Who Walk Away from Omelas," Ursula Le Guin

"The Lady or the Tiger," Frank Stockton

"Day Million," Frederik Pohl

"The Game of Rat and Dragon," Cordwainer Smith

"To Think that I Saw it on Mulberry Street," Dr. Seuss

"Automatic Tiger," Kit Reed

"Casey Agonistes," Richard McKenna


...what's yours?

Comments

[grassrose.livejournal.com]

All Summer in a Day is on my list as well, but The Cold Equations ( http://www.spacewesterns.com/articles/105/ ) is the one that most messes with my mind.

Zenna Henderson's "People" stories were a significant part of my childhood. I like to think that they still influence me in a positive way, but they don't provoke an emotional reaction when I think of them, the way that "Equations" does.

I don't have a long list, because I'm not a huge reader of short stories.

ETA: Oh, and O Henry's "The Gift of the Magi." :o)

[amm-me.livejournal.com]

Ursula K LeGuin "The Manuscript of the Acacia Seeds"

[amm-me.livejournal.com]

Grassrose, how did you edit your comment? Is that something you can do with a paid account? I was tying to figure it out because LeGuin's story is The *Author* of the Acacia Seeds, not manuscript. I believe it's in the Compass Rose collection.

[magda-vogelsang.livejournal.com]

That story would be on my list as well.

[amm-me.livejournal.com]

Yay, Magda, I've never talked with anyone else that had even heard of it!

Abigail

[grassrose.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... I had an edit link. I think it only lasts for a few minutes.

[keristor.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's paid account only (at least, it's not on the basic account, I don't know about the plus one). I can't do it...

[(Anonymous)]

The Witches of Karres - James H. Schmitz, before he expanded it to a full length novel.

Requiem - Robert A. Heinlein

A Beautiful Friendship - David Weber

Brom

[lagilman]

There's a story i read, years and years ago when I was devouring short fiction as a teenager, that struck me in some way I didn't realize at first, but has colored my feelings about war and those who fight them (and those who send them to fight) forever after.

I'm convinced it's a Joe Haldeman story, but since all I remember is the basic plot and my emotional reaction to it, I've never been able to be certain.

[elektra.livejournal.com]

"The Marching Morons," C.M. Kornbluth - especially given what's been going on all weekend.

I'm also going to second "The Cold Equations," which hit me like a sledge hammer and has never diminished.

"The Persistence of Vision," Gaul Baudino - the sense of wonder it inspired has never faded.

[(Anonymous)]

There's one story that has stuck with me for years (probably since I was in junior high), but I have no idea of author or title. Basic plot is that human explorers come across a planet with the remains of an advanced civilization that was ended when their sun went supernova. (Don't ask me how the planet survived a supernova.) The scientists determine that the light from the supernova would have arrived at earth and been visible - as the star over Bethlehem.

I also loved the People stories by Zenna Henderson - I always wanted to find that Canyon and meet them!
Mary

[threeringedmoon.livejournal.com]

Arthur C Clarke's The Star

http://lucis.net/stuff/clarke/star_clarke.html

Thanks!

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, that's the story I was thinking of. Thanks for the link.
Mary

[janni.livejournal.com]

Met The Cold Equations as an adult already writing, and it merely irritated me hugely, because it seemed an exercise in how to rig your world to make your point.

Omelas is arguably just as rigged, but that's actually the point--and the writing is better. Been thinking lately about how in Omelas the point may not be (only) the price that's been set up and whether it's worth paying, but the fact that as readers we don't believe in the world of the story until we're told what it's price is. That says something about us, too.

Bradbury's Zero Hour creeped me out as a teen just discovering short SF and stayed with me for years, though I think about it less often now.

Sherwood Smith had a lovely short story in one of the Bruce Coville anthologies a decade or so ago, "Visions," that my thoughts still return to in stray moments.

[caoilfhionn.livejournal.com]

"All Summer in a Day" is on my list, but Bradbury's "There Will Come Soft Rains" made an even bigger impression. Someone made a short animation based on it, and I couldn't get through. I couldn't face the bit with the dog. Dead or dying animals as a plot point get me so hard sometimes that I resent the author for punching that button, even as I acknowledge that it's a useful writing tool because it works so well.

I still can't get through Tiptree's "The Screwfly Solution" without feeling ill.

[threeringedmoon.livejournal.com]

All Summer in a Day would be on my list, but I think the Cordwainer Smith story would have to be The Dead Lady of Clown Town.

[(Anonymous)]

I'll second the "All Summer in a Day" story. Isn't it amazing how certain stories stay with you for so many years?

The other one that I can't forget is something along the line of car wars - a father's vengeance for his son's death on the dueling highways. I don't remember the title or author. I remember this one every time I drive in Austin!

And I loved Zenna Henderson's stories too. I always wanted to be one of The People.
Barbara in Texas

[(Anonymous)]

Oops - one more; "Nine Billion Names of God"

Barbara in Texas

[(Anonymous)]

This is bad. I loved Clarke's "The Nine Billion Names of God". I even love Tom Godwin's "The Cold Equations" (which was originally submitted with a happy ending, but changed at John W. Campbell insistence, by the way), Theodore Sturgeons's "It!", and much of Frederick Brown's writings.

Guess I'm strange.

-Eta

oops

[(Anonymous)]

That was Fredric Brown. And was it really Arthur C. Clark who wrote "The Nine Billion Names of God"?

My mind's going...

-Eta

Re: oops

[keristor.livejournal.com]

That was indeed Clarke, and quite a few of his short stories are on my list (although I forget most of the story names). One which still creeps me out whenever I read it is a series of messages from a telepathic observer who gets progressively disappointed by the human race, until he encounters a small child...

[hapaxnym.livejournal.com]

Oh, so many. I echo a lot of those mentioned above, and would add
Martin's SANDKINGS and Vonnegut's HARRISON BERGERON; out of the genre, Bierce's INCIDENT AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE and Wilde's NIGHTINGALE AND THE ROSE. (BIRTHDAY OF THE INFANTA might be up there, too)

Huh, I think I see a theme there. Oblivious cruelty? Will-to-be-stupid?

And I don't generally *like* short stories...

[grassrose.livejournal.com]

Grrrr... I wish I had remembered Harrison Bergeron, especially since it occasionally pops into my mind in daily life.

[(Anonymous)]

Two short stories we read in high school English class which still influence me:
"Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes
"The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson

I'll play

[(Anonymous)]

I don't read much short fiction so my list is sparse. I'm taking your lists as my should-reads
for the future - I hope y'all don't mind.

Borders of Infinity - Lois McMaster Bujold (I had
NOT met Miles Vorkosigan prior to this - my initial reaction was, hey, it's the chick who wrote Falling Free!) Now I think of it as a case study in defusing mob-like mentalities. This isn't
a very typical Miles story, IMHO.

Accidents Don't Just Happen -- They're Caused - Elizabeth Moon because I was in NASA software testing during Y2K and this REALLY spoke to me.

Catherine Asaro had one that I thought was a great ficionalisation of a mathematical construct...I
think it might have been Roll of the Dice.

Novella-length: Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes

Lauretta@ConstellationBooks