《英美短篇小說精粹：從司各特至�？思{》選材突出經(jīng)典，選文全是英美短篇小說大師的作品，有的作品幾乎是所有短篇小說集必不可少的選文，特別適合初涉文學的英語專業(yè)學生學習。
選文內(nèi)容豐富，可讀性強，既可作為文學教材使用，也可作為語言訓練的閱讀教材。每篇小說后面都附有閱讀思考題，便于教師上課使用或?qū)W生自學。另外，《英美短篇小說精粹：從司各特至�？思{》主編還可提供教學課件供廣大教師朋友參考。
作家介紹部分盡量涉及作家在短篇小說發(fā)展史上的貢獻，從理論上強化讀者閱讀小說時所獲得的關(guān)于短篇小說發(fā)展脈絡的感性認識。
《英美短篇小說精粹：從司各特至�？思{》設定的閱讀對象為全日制英語專業(yè)大學二、三年級學生，英語專業(yè)自考生，已經(jīng)通過大學英語四級考試的非英語專業(yè)學生，以及相當程度的其他英語文學愛好者。
短篇小說（the short story）是用散文創(chuàng)作的虛構(gòu)類敘事作品，通常只限于寫單一背景下的一個事件，牽涉到一兩個人物的活動，一般認為長度應在l000-20000字，少于l000字的叫做小小說（short short fiction，short shorts或者flash fiction）。多于20 000字的就是中篇小說或者長篇小說了。但有人認為純粹以字數(shù)來分類沒有道理，愛倫·坡就提出短篇小說作為一個文類區(qū)別于中、長篇小說的應該有其自身的美學特征，他在《創(chuàng)作的哲學》（“The Philosophy of Composition”）一文中指出短篇小說應該具備這樣一個特征：要人坐在那里一口氣可以讀完（One should be able to read it one sitting），要具有一種長篇小說所不可能具備的“印象的統(tǒng)一性”。有人認為短篇小說做到了法國古典戲劇未能真正實行的三一律：表現(xiàn)一天之內(nèi)一個地方所發(fā)生的一個行動，短篇小說處理的是單一人物、單一事件、單一情感，或者由單一情境所引發(fā)的一連串情感。
Unit Ⅰ Sir Walter Scott
Ⅰ.Brief Introduction to the Authol
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. Death of the Lairds Jock
2. The Tapestried Chamber
Unit Ⅱ Washington Irving
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Widow and Her Son
2. Rip Van Winkle
Unit Ⅲ Nathaniel Hawthorne
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Ministers Black Veil
2. Young Goodman Brown
Unit Ⅳ Edgar Allan Poe
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Tell-Tale Heart
2. Thou Art the Man
Unit Ⅴ Charles Dickens
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Childs Story
2. The Detective Police
Unit Ⅵ Herman Melville
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Readings
1. The Lightning-Rod Man
2. The Bell-Tower
Unit Ⅶ Mark Twain
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. Running for Governor
2. The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Unit Ⅷ Robert Louis Stevenson
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Touchstone
2. The Song of the Morrow
Unit Ⅸ Oscar Wilde
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Sphinx without a Secret
2. The Nightingale and the Rose
Unit Ⅹ Joseph Conrad
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Lagoon
2. II Conde
Unit Ⅺ O. Henry
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen
2. Gift of the Magi
Unit Ⅻ Stephen Crane
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Duel That Was Not Fought
2. The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky
Unit ⅩⅢ Virginia Woolf
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The String Quartet
2. The Mark on the Wall
Unit ⅩⅣ James doyce
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. Araby
2. A Mother
Unit ⅩⅤ Katherine Mansfield
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. The Woman at the Store
2. Mr. and Mrs. Dove
Unit ⅩⅥ William Faulkner
Ⅰ. Brief Introduction to the Author
Ⅱ. Selected Reading
1. A Rose for Emily
2. That Evening Sun
Appendix A Brief History of the Short Story
Poe was a complex person， tormented and alcoholic yet also considerate andhumorous， a good friend， and an affectionate husband. Indeed， his painful life，his neurotic attraction to intense beauty， violent horror， and death， and his senseof the world of dreams contributed to his greatness as a writer. In the practicalaffairs of everyday life， in many of the common amenities， in the domestic circle，and in the general give and take of earthly existence， Poe was greatly lacking andfrequently a complete failure. He could not and did not in any sense of the words"get along" with his fellow men. But he certainly was a charm and fascination， amagnetism and a reverse power of antagonism which caused him to be greatly lovedby a few， hated by many， and memorable to everybody.
As a man Poe wasabnormal， and as a genius unique.Poe was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living throughwriting alone and he was one of the earliest American practitioners of the shortstory and is considered the inventor of the detective-fiction genre.
He alsocontributed to the emerging genre of science-fiction. His skillfully wrought talesand poems convey with passionate intensity the mysterious， dreamlike， and oftenmacabre forces that pervaded his sensibility. His characters are either grotesquesor the inhabitants of another world than this. Being a master hand at writing theshort story， he is especially "clever at dropping foreshadowing hints at what wouldhappen later and keeping the reader in suspense for as long as possible. He likesto use learned words， which makes reading his stories a little difficult for theaverage reader. But the fulfillment of gaining insight into human psychology givesthe reader enough compensation for the hard labour of "cracking the nut" of hislanguage.
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