> as lemmas

1877 Independent 17 May 9/2 His various books have been eminently readable, in the highest sense of the adjective, and some of his short stories have been almost without a flaw in their glittering beauty.

a1882 A. Trollope Autobiogr. (1883) I. viii. 182 I had..written from time to time certain short stories, which had been published in different periodicals.

1887 Harper's Mag. Feb. 482/1 We are tempted to claim a national primacy in short-story writing.

1887 Harper's Mag. Feb. 483/2 A short-story motive or a long-story motive.

1898 Daily News 13 Oct. 6/2 Any really good short story writer.

1902 H. Belloc Path to Rome 140 Terror..is half the plot of their insane ‘short stories’.

1923 J. M. Murry Pencillings 82 Mr H. G. Wells's definition of the short story as a fiction that can be read in a quarter of an hour.

1929 Sci. Wonder Stories Nov. 485/1 A few years ago, a short story was anywhere from ten thousand to twenty thousand words. Of late the short, short story has gained ascendency in a number of magazines. A short, short story is one that runs to not more than fifteen hundred words.

1936 E. Bowen Faber Bk. Mod. Short Stories 17 H. E. Bates has, as a shortstoryist, already a substantial body of work to his name.

1940 G. V. Martin For our Vines have Tender Grapes iv. 32 Unemployed unemployables..typing endlessly the Great American Saga..cannot sell a short-short to the Chicago Daily News.

1957 R. Hoggart Uses of Literacy vi. 166 The magazines go beyond the stories to the ‘short short stories’ or the ‘one-minute stories’.

1962 ‘E. Lacy’ Freeloaders vi. 106 An airmail letter from my agent telling me he'd sold a short-short of mine.

1972 J. Symons Bloody Murder xiii. 164 The ‘short short story’ of 2,000 words or less.

1977 V. S. Pritchett Gentle Barbarian vi. 90 From a short-story writer's point of view, the timing..is perfect... Turgenev is a master of his craft.