In Praise Of The Short Story

"For me the short story is a place to try new ideas and see if they work or not. A single line of dialogue may come into my mind. I don't need a structure or a form. I only need to see how that fragment fits into the story. The beauty of the short story is that you can test anything - a piece of conversation, a haunting memory, a dream, or something overheard in a restaurant."

- Haruki Murakami, in a talk at the Reischauer Institute