Flash In All Its Blinding Possibility (Part 1?)

I was a little hesitant to choose They Could No Longer Contain Themselves to feature for July, not because I'm hesitant about the writing in any regard. The book astounds on so many levels in that regard. Each writer brings something really incredible to every page of this book. But because it's yet another collection of flash fiction, and I don't want to pigeonhole myself. Next month, I'll likely snag a novel or if another short fiction collection, then longer form. But, while we're on the topic, I wanted to talk about flash a bit.

Flash seems to be new to a lot of people. Even I didn't really know of its existence as a "thing" until later in undergrad, around '04-'05. To me, it was a natural fit. As a writer, I've always hovered between fiction and poetry, so when my professor introduced me to flash fiction as a form, it was simply that I had finally found a space in which I felt comfortable. It was a form that let me stretch and blend and write the sort of cross-genre play I've always known as a sweet spot.

When people come to my Vouched Books table, I get asked "What is flash fiction?" a lot when I point them to a book like Easter Rabbit by Joseph Young, We Know What We Are by Mary Hamilton, or Cut Through the Bone. I start basic, "It's writing, usually narrative however loosely, usually under 2,000 words. The word count shifts a bit depending on who you're talking to--some believe 500 is the limit, others 1000, etc."

After that, it gets murky. One of the things I really love about They Could No Longer Contain Themselves is how well it highlights the possibility of the form. The book's jacket copy says it best, "The uncontainability of the writers and characters in each of these remarkable collections suggest the exuberance of the flash fiction form itself, including the way in which, despite its small size, it pushes past its own borders and into the territory of something larger and impossible to confine."

And its true: in this book, you have the singsong, surrealism in Lovelace's "Coffee Pot Tree," to the simple, sparse realism of Mary Miller's "Misled." People often ask what my favorite kind of flash fiction is, and I never really know what to say. Last time someone asked, I told them if you don't know what you're reading flash fiction or prose poetry, you're probably reading good flash fiction. But that's not necessarily true either. I would never consider Miller's work "prose poetry," but her work remains some of my favorite of the form. I don't know what constitutes "good" flash fiction. What constitutes a good novel? What constitutes a good poem?

I've come across a lot of people the past couple years who seem to think flash fiction needs a definition, something by which to judge it against not only other flash fiction, but by other genres. This whole concept baffles me. But usually, these people don't really even seem to know they're calling for this definition. To me, it exists as subtext beneath other conversations regarding how much "bad" flash fiction is out there, how people are growing tired of the "fad" of flash fiction.

Yes. Both of these things are true. There is a lot of bad flash out there. There's a lot of bad poetry, too. A lot of bad novels. These people indict the entire form based on its demerits, but yet refuse to see its enormous possibility. No one challenges the novel anymore, nor do they attempt to box it into some tidy definition. Despite their enormous differences, Blake Butler's There Is No Year is considered just as much a novel as Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice; there is no great debate regarding the form.

People seem uncomfortable by flash because it exists to them as something new, but of course, it's nothing new. Sean Lovelace at times quips about the late Jesus Christ being one of the forerunners of the flash fiction form, citing his parables. Hemingway played with flash. Widely regarded as a prose poet, I've heard debate about Russell Edson's role as a flash fictioneer.

Which is perhaps another reason why there is debate, this underlying uncomfort. The need for clear lines, clear labels. The question hangs loose: why is Edson considered a prose poet and not a surrealist flash fiction writer? With such a wide definition, what's to stop a novelist who writes with a particularly poetic flair from writing a "novel-length narrative prose poem?" Why is this poetic piece that doesn't necessarily have a clear narrative arc considered flash fiction? The form hovers on this strange plane that seems to upset prior systems in a way that makes people want to put it in a box.

Of course, to put it into a box, like all forms of art or writing, is to kill the form altogether. Where would the novel be if public outcry declared Ulysses something else? Where would poetry be if the world called bullshit on vers libre?

I guess I'm out of thoughts. I mean, I have more thoughts on the subject, but they don't fit neatly into this ranting.

I want to say how sick I am of people blaming the current "fad" of flash fiction on people's attention spans. I want to say how sick I am of people seeing flash fiction as a fad. I want to say how sick I am of writers who seem to think flash fiction is an "easy" form to write. I want to say how sick I am of the publishers who are willing to publish scrap-rate flash fiction. I want to say how these things ruin the form, but that's of course not true. Just because publishers publish shitty novels doesn't mean the novel is a shitty form. And the same goes for any genre or form, really. Why such scrutiny for flash?

But now, I'm sick of what I have to say. I want to hear what you have to say. How do you define flash fiction? What do you think of it? Do you have a favorite style of flash--more poetic, more narrative, more surreal? Do you think it is a silly thing, a playground for half-baked short story ideas? Do you think people should just write what they want to write without thought of form or label?