The prize winners were as follows:
FIRST PRIZE Ralph Henry Barbour of Manchester, Mass., and George Randolph Osborne of Cambridge, Mass., joint authors of “Thicker Than Water.” SECOND PRIZE Harry Stillwell Edwards of Macon, Georgia, author of “The Answer.” THIRD PRIZE Dwight M. Wiley of Princeton, Ill., author of “Her Memory,” and Redfield Ingalls of New York City, author of “Business and Ethics.” This prize was divided.
This book is now offered to the public in the confident hope and the firm belief that it will be found a valuable contribution to the literature of short fiction, in addition to the interest it also merits because of the stories themselves.
One final point should be emphasized. This book is not, in the very nature of the case, a book of uniform literary style; it is not the polished expression of the highest literary art. It is the best of thirty thousand attempts to write a short story, by all sorts and conditions of minds—a fair proportion of them amateurs, a fair proportion writers of considerable experience, and a small proportion excellently skilled craftsmen. In their final selection of these stories, the readers and judges were governed, not so much by the question “Is this superfine literary art?” as they were by the question “Is this interesting?” By this touchstone the book certainly justifies its existence.
T. L. M.
N. B.
By Joseph Hall
Lieutenant Ludwig Kreusler glanced hurriedly through the mail that had accumulated during the month that the X-8 had been away from base. At the bottom of the pile he found the letter he had been seeking and his eyes brightened. It was a fat letter, addressed in feminine handwriting, and its original postmark was Washington, D. C., U. S. A.
“His Excellency will see you, sir.” The orderly had entered quietly and stood at attention.
With a slightly impatient shrug the Lieutenant shoved the letters into his pocket and left the room.