Our Research

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    Being Human Festival and ENSFR

    In collaboration with core members of the ENSFR team, Ed Hogan (Open University) delivered an event called ‘Writing Your Work’ on the premises of Arka Original Funerals, in Brighton, as part of the Being Human Festival [beinghumanfestival.org]. The event, which featured a number of bespoke writing activities, was attended exclusively by staff of Arka, and…

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    CFP: “American Shorts” University of Lisbon, Portugal, October 29-31, 2026

    The contemporary American short story lives in a context where ‘short’ has tended towards the increasingly economic. Alongside a renewed interest in flash fiction, the 21st century has witnessed an explosion in literary terse forms extending within the web of the digital age, such as twitterature and nano-fiction. Beyond the written form, YouTube launched its…

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    Podcast: A Small Good Thing

    A series of interviews from Andrea Marzocchi at the University of Surrey. Andrea discusses the short story form with academics, writers, publishers, and anyone who shares a passion for short stories. Previous episodes have included Michael Collins, Tom Conaghan,  Michael Basseler and short story author Heuijung Hur.  In the latest conversation he talks to Andrew…

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    Spotlight PhD/ECR Interview Series: Emma Kittle-Pey

    1. Can you remember the first short story you ever read? I remember thinking Kafka’s The Metamorphosis was ridiculous. Later I fell in love with short fiction and thought differently about Kafka’s work, considering story but also themes related to society, working life and family. Ideas or moments in reading often inspire my writing. For…

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    New Small Pleasures Episode

    Small Pleasures podcast: In the latest episode, Livi Michael and Sonya Moor look at two marvels of short fiction – Sarah Hall’s ‘Mrs Fox’ and Jackie Kay’s ‘My Daughter the Fox’. Hall and Kay use elements of realism to ask outrageous questions: What happens when a man’s wife becomes a fox? Or when a woman…