William Trevor, Beyond the Pale

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When

Beyond the Pale and Other Stories

was published in 1981, William Trevor was already well recognized both as a novelist and as a short story writer. He once said in an interview: “I’m a short-story writer, really, who happens to write novels.” (Stout 143), and it is above all the short story genre that over the years has given him the reputation of being among the very best. In

William Trevor: A Study of His Fiction

Schirmer

claims that “Trevor’s work in this genre can hardly be overestimated” (7), and Ormsby-Lennon and Boerner argue in

Fools of Fiction: Reading William Trevor’s Stories

that his “true achievement is as a writer of short stories and of novellas” (Loc 80). Trevor wrote in a long tradition, with predecessors such as James Joyce, Frank O’Connor,…

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Citation: Berg, Mari-Ann. "Beyond the Pale". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 06 November 2017 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=10334, accessed 25 November 2024.]

10334 Beyond the Pale 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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