3 Ways Short Stories Can Center Your Pandemic Brain
I’ve taken to calling days of the week “TuesdaySaturday” because every day feels both like the very start of the week, and the start of the weekend. In the midst of lockdowns, shelter-in-place, and work from home-ness, time’s become a bit of a mystery. A neither here nor there existence on the calendar, some days feeling like seconds and others stretching on into a limitless horizon.
It’s been consoling to learn though that I’m not alone. A recent internet search for the effect the pandemic has had on concentration and focus turned up article after article. And what I’ve learned is that many of us are feeling this way because our collective stress, anxiety, fear and grief is at an all-time high, our brains overwhelmed dealing with an almost daily new reality.
As a writer, this focus issue has been a slog. Some days, writing feels almost impossible. Reading too. That said, while I definitely haven’t had the capacity to read a novel, there has been one literary form I’ve been able to count on during this time—the short story. I’ve read more short stories this year than I have in a long time and as it turns out, there’s three good reasons why.
Short stories can be read in one sitting
Your mileage may vary, but for the most part, short stories run between 1,500 words to 10,000 with the sweet spot being between 5,000 and 7,000 words. Whereas a novel can get up into the tens of thousands in word count, a short story can be read anywhere between a half hour to a couple of hours depending of course, on how quick a reader you are. In the time it takes you to watch an episode of a sitcom or watch a movie, you can read a short story (maybe even a few).
Think of it like the answer to one of those old standardized testing x/y problems:
A novel is to an opera as a short story is to a punk song.
A novel meanders. It takes its time. It may have alternating narratives in each chapter. There may be a thread that’s picked up in one place then dropped for a while, then picked up again much later. And, if as it happens, your attention span and concentration are waning, you may end up losing track of a story line or a whole character. It’s possible to be reading and all of a sudden think, “Do I know this guy?” when he was introduced in chapter two. But that was days ago and I barely remember what I had for dinner last night.
These days I’m much more likely to have the capacity to read a short story. I’m in and out of a story in a sitting. Even if I pick up and put down the novel, the vibe and flow of it have been broken.
Which leads me to point number two on my list.
Short stories have a “unity of effect”
Edgar Allan Poe is famous for many of his short stories including “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Fall of the House of Usher” (and loads of others). In addition to his stories though, Poe offered us one of the earliest theories on what makes for a good short story. In his essay, “The Importance of the Single Effect in a Prose Tale,” he wrote about the importance of having all elements of a story work in service of the overall effect. He explained:
“In the whole composition there should be no word written, of which the tendency, direct or indirect, is not to the one pre-established design. And by such means, with such care and skill, a picture is at length painted which leaves in the mind of him who contemplates it with a kindred art, a sense of the fullest satisfaction.”
A short story has to stay focused (and this is particularly helpful given my lack of focus). There’s not a lot of room to dither or ramble. It’s gotta stay tight, all movements and gestures pointing the reader toward what Poe characterizes as “ratiocination” (which is a fancy word for exact thinking). Put simply, a great short story feels satisfying because the writer has made every sentence work toward a singular picture of reality.
Which brings me to my last point.
Short stories focus on something true.
Poe’s theory also includes what a short story should do. The aim of a short story, he explains, is to offer some truth and I’ll say that after reading a lot of short stories this year, the best ones have been the ones that point out some truth about the human condition. They tap into something true about who we are and how we feel our way through life.
Other writers from David Foster Wallace to Shirley Hazzard, have mused on the importance of truth in fiction as well. From Wallace we learn that
“fiction becomes a way to go deep inside yourself and illuminate precisely the stuff you don’t want to see or let anyone else see, and this stuff usually turns out (paradoxically) to be precisely the stuff all writers and readers everywhere share and respond to.”
Short stories bring me closer to others because they unveil the ways we feel similarly. They become not a means of escape, but rather, a way to feel grounded, centered in the truth of my connection to the greater whole of humanity.
I’ve learned that it’s not helpful to beat myself up on days when I’m feeling less productive or focused than I was pre-pandemic. Instead, I can manage my expectations for that day. If I’m feeling juicy, I write. If not, I pick up a short story collection. Inevitably, part way through a story I feel inspired to write, focused and centered in the knowledge that I’m not alone.
