From 1850 until the Second World War the short narrative in Slovene travelled a long and interesting path of development, affirmed its place in storytelling, attracted many readers with its thematic and formal variety, tried out quite a number of new stylistic approaches, swung between the traditional and the new, and unfolded a number of formal possibilities as executed by individual Slovene storytellers. Regardless of the fact that throughout the 20th century we constantly encounter
greater and lesser relativisations of generic categories and the need for these, and also the fact that literary studies very loosely defines narrative prose, detailed research has convinced me that it is possible to isolate certain characteristics that are relatively constant and that allow us to combine a number of narratives under the heading short narrative prose. The borders between different narrative
genres are sometimes difficult to determine, but are ultimately clear.
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