The Best Of O Henry

"The Gift of the Magi" is a short story by O. Henry first published in 1905. The story tells of a young husband and wife and how they deal with the challenge of buying secret Christmas gifts for each other with very little money. As a sentimental story with a moral lesson about gift-giving, it has been popular for adaptation, especially for presentation at Christmas time.

This is a collection of short stories from the vast corpus of work that O. Henry has left behind. These selected stories not only give the reader a chance to read some of the best known of his works but also bear ample evidence of the wide range of his writings.Humorous and energetic, O. Henry s stories are marked by coincidence and surprise endings. They offer an insight into human nature and the ways it is affected by love, hate, wealth, poverty, gentility, disguise, and crime.O. Henry s depiction of his characters and their unique situation continues to weave their magic over readers almost a hundred years after the author created them. This is a must-read for all short story lovers as well as for those who want to take a dip into the world of classics.

Includes over 100 superb short stories from America's most popular short story writer. Drawn from his most famous collections, these stories make up the essential O. Henry -- funny, moving, romantic and with a sting in the tale! There are South American tales of beautiful Senoritas and fiery revolutionaries such as Rouge et Noir; small-town stories of benevolent millionaires and lovelorn burglars such as The Discounters of Money; shady tales of business life, of conniving cooks and fainthearted kidnappers such as The Ransom of Red Chief; wild west adventures such as The Pimienta Pancakes, &, from the city streets, such stories as The Copy and the Anthem -- plus more.

Now celebrating its centenary, this prestigious annual anthology gathers the twenty best new short stories published in the previous year. An Anchor Books Original. The O. Henry Prize Stories 2019--continuing a century-long tradition of cutting-edge literary excellence--contains twenty prize-winning stories chosen from the thousands published in magazines over the previous year. The winning writers are an impressive mix of celebrated names and new, emerging voices. Their stories evoke lives both near and distant, in settings ranging from Jamaica, Houston, and Hawaii to a Turkish coal mine and a drought-ridden Northwestern farm, and feature an engaging array of characters, including Laotian refugees, a Colombian kidnap victim, an eccentric Irish schoolteacher, a woman haunted by a house that cleans itself, and a strangely long-lived rabbit. The uniformly breathtaking stories are accompanied by essays from the eminent jurors on their favorites, observations from the winning writers on what inspired them, and an extensive resource list of magazines. List of 2019 winners: Tessa Hadley John Keeble Moira McCavana Rachel Kondo Sarah Shun-lien Bynum Stephanie Reents Alexia Arthurs Valerie O’Riordan Patricia Engel Kenan Orhan Sarah Hall Bryan Washington Isabella Hammad Weike Wang Caoilinn Hughes Souvankham Thammavongsa Liza Ward Doua Thao Alexander MacLeod John Edgar Wideman Prize Jurors 2019: Lynn Freed, Elizabeth Strout, Lara Vapynar

William Sydney Porter (1862 1910), better known as O. Henry, led a life similar to those of his own fictional characters. Convicted of embezzlement, he drew inspiration from his prison experiences. This volume includes "The Ransom of Red Chief," "The Last Leaf," the classic, "The Gift of the Magi" and 13 more.