O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 | Page 2

Miramon (_Century_, August). Child, Richard Washburn, A Thief
Indeed (_Pictorial Review_, June). Clausen, Carl, The Perfect Crime
(_Saturday Evening Post_, Sept. 25). Cram, Mildred, The Ember
(_McCall's_, June); Odell (_Red Book_, May); Wind (_Munsey's_,
August). Dobie, Charles Caldwell, Young China (_Ladies Home
Journal_, August). Edwards, Cleveland, Pride o' Name on Peachtree
(_Live Stories_, Feb.). Ferber, Edna, You've Got to Be Selfish
(_McClure's_, April). Fitzgerald, Scott, The Camel's Back (_Saturday
Evening Post_, Apr. 24); The Cut-Glass Bowl (_Scribner's_, May); The
Off-Shore Pirate (_Saturday Evening Post_, May 29). Forbes, Esther,
Break-Neck Hill (_Grinnell Review_, September). Gilpatric, Guy,
Black Art and Ambrose (_Collier's_, August 21). Hartman, Lee Foster,
The Judgment of Vulcan (_Harper's_, March). Hergesheimer, Joseph,
"Read Them and Weep" (_Century_, January). Hooker, Brian,
Branwen (_Romance_, June). Hull, Alexander, The Argosies
(_Scribner's_, September). Hume, Wilkie, The Metamorphosis of High
Yaller (_Live Stories_, June). Kabler, Hugh, Fools First (_Saturday
Evening Post_, November 20). Kerr, Sophie, Divine Waste (_Woman's
Home Companion_, May). La Motte, Widows and Orphans (_Century_,
September). Lewis, O. F., Alma Mater (_Red Book_, June). Sparks
That Flash in the Night (_Red Book_, October). Marquis, Don Kale
(_Everybody's_, September); Death and Old Man Murtrie (_New
Republic_, February 4). Marshall, Edison, Brother Bill the Elk (_Blue
Book_, May). Means, E. K., The Ten-Share Horse (_Munsey's_, May).
Miller, Alice Duer, Slow Poison (_Saturday Evening Post_, June 12).
Montague, Margaret Prescott, Uncle Sam of Freedom Ridge (_Atlantic
Monthly_, June). [4]Mumford, Ethel Watts, A Look of the Copperleys
(_Ladies Home Journal_, April); Red Gulls (_Pictorial Review_,
October). Newell, Maude Woodruff, Salvage (_Green Book_, July).
Noyes, Frances Newbold, "Contact!" [5] (_Pictorial Review_,
December). Pelley, William Dudley, The Face in the Window (_Red
Book_, May); The Show-Down (_Red Book_, June). Perry, Lawrence,
The Real Game (_Everybody's_, July). A Matter of Loyalty (_Red
Book_, July); The Lothario of the Seabird (_Ladies Home Journal_,
August); The Rocks of Avalon (_Red Book_, December). Post,

Melville Davisson, The House by the Loch (_Hearst's_, May).
Redington, Sarah, A Certain Rich Woman (_Outlook_, May 5). Reid,
M. F., Doodle Buys a Bull Pup (_Everybody's_, August). Richardson,
Norval, The Bracelet (_McClure's_, July). Robbins, L.H., "Ain't This
the Darnedest World?" (_American_, May); Professor Todd's Used Car
(_Everybody's_, July). "Rutledge, Marice," The Thing They Loved
(_Century_, May). Ryan, Kathryn White, A Man of Cone (_Munsey's_,
March). Scarborough, Dorothy, The Drought (_Century_, May).
"Sidney, Rose," Butterflies (_Pictorial Review_, September). Smith,
Gordon Arthur, No Flowers (_Harper's_, May); The Aristocrat
(_Harper's_, November). Steele, Wilbur Daniel, Both Judge and Jury
(_Harper's_, January); God's Mercy (_Pictorial Review_, July);
Footfalls (_Pictorial Review_, October). Synon, Mary, On Scarlet
Wings (_Red Book_, July). Titus, Harold, Aliens (_Ladies Home
Journal_, May). Tuckerman, Arthur, Black Magic, (_Scribner's_,
August). Welles, Harriet, According to Ruskin (_Woman's Home
Companion_, June); Distracting Adeline (_Scribner's_, May). Whitman,
Stephen French, The Last Room of All (_Harper's_, June). Wilkes,
Allene Tupper, Toop Goes Skating (_Woman's Home Companion_,
November).
[Footnote 3: Listed alphabetically by authors.]
[Footnote 4: A member of the Committee of Award, this author refused
as a matter of course to allow consideration of her stories for
republication here or for the prizes. But the other members insist upon
their being listed, and upon mention of "Red Gulls" as one of the best
stories of 1920.]
[Footnote 5: Reprinted as by Frances Noyes Hart.]
From this list were selected seventeen stories which, in the judgment of
the Committee, rank highest and which, therefore, are reprinted in this
volume.
Since, as will be recalled from the conditions of the award, only
American authors were considered, certain familiar foreign names are
conspicuously absent. Achmed Abdullah, Stacy Aumonier, F. Britten
Austin, Phyllis Bottome, Thomas Burke, Coningsby Dawson, Mrs.
Henry Dudeney, Lord Dunsany, John Galsworthy, Perceval Gibbon,
Blasco Ibañez, Maurice Level, A. Neil Lyons, Seumas MacManus,
Leonard Merrick, Maria Moravsky, Alfred Noyes, May Sinclair and

Hugh Walpole all illustrate recovery from the world war. But with their
stories the Committee had nothing to do. The Committee cannot
forbear mention, however, of "Under the Tulips" (_Detective Stories_,
February 10), one of the two best horror specimens of the year. It is by
an Englishwoman, May Edginton.
Half a dozen names from the foreign list just given are synonymous
with the best fiction of the period. Yet the short story as practised in its
native home continues to excel the short story written in other lands.
The English, the Russian, the French, it is being contended in certain
quarters, write better literature. They do not, therefore, write better
stories. If literature is of a magnificent depth and intricate subtlety in a
measure proportionate to its reflection of the vast complexity of a
nation that has existed as such for centuries, conceivably it will be
facile and clever in a measure proportionate to its reflection of the spirit
of the commonwealth which in a few hundred years has acquired a
place with age-old