If we set H. E. Bates’s best tales against the best of Chekhov’s, Graham Greene declared, I do not believe it would be possible, with any conviction, to argue that the Russian was the finer artist. The sampler of H. E. Bates stories presented here shows the merit of that praise and displays the range and aspects of Bates’s work from his first published story, “The Flame,” to one of his very last, “The Song of the Wren.” In his long and prolific literary career, Bates (1905-1974) produced twenty-five novels, a three-volume autobiography, nine books of essays, several plays and...

If we set H. E. Bates’s best tales against the best of Chekhov’s, Graham Greene declared, I do not believe it would be possible, with any conviction, to argue that the Russian was the finer artist. The sampler of H. E. Bates stories presented here shows the merit of that praise and displays the range and aspects of Bates’s work from his first published story, “The Flame,” to one of his very last, “The Song of the Wren.” In his long and prolific literary career, Bates (1905-1974) produced twenty-five novels, a three-volume autobiography, nine books of essays, several plays and...