Echoes from elsewhere: Gordimer's short fiction as social critique

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Periodical article

Title:	Echoes from elsewhere: Gordimer's short fiction as social critique
Author:	Huggan, Graham
Year:	1994
Periodical:	Research in African Literatures
Volume:	25
Issue:	1
Pages:	61-73
Language:	English
Geographic term:	South Africa
Subjects:	literature short stories
About person:	Nadine Gordimer (1923-2014)
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/3820037
Abstract:	Nadine Gordimer's novels have done much toward 'articulating the consciousness' of contemporary South Africa. What is not often realized is that her short stories also contribute to this articulation, and that the short story is just as well-equipped as the novel to attempt it. In this paper the author looks first at some of the propositions put forward by Gordimer in her essay 'The flash of fireflies' (1968) and compares them to later statements made in her introduction to the 1975 'Selected stories'. The author goes on to suggest how Gordimer's short story theory may be applied to her fiction, beginning with a detailed analysis of the early story 'Six feet of the country' (1956), and continuing with brief, comparative comments on three later stories: 'A company of laughing faces' (1965), 'Livingstone's companions' (1971), and 'Keeping fit' (1992). Bibliogr., notes, ref.