I would like to find a good online database of short story titles, hopefully
with live links to more info about each one, author, where it appeared
in print, part of a collection, etc, etc.

bonus to anyone who can explain the dynamics of copyright on short
story titles i.e. it seems at times short story titles are used for
titles of other kinds of works . . . example:  years ago there was a
short story called Big Love (don't remember the author; wish I could)
and now there is an HBO series by the same name.


***

Hello again, timespacette! Thanks for accepting my remarks as your
official answer. I've reposted the material below, with one additional
suggestion.

Regarding the titles, a title cannot be copyrighted under U.S. law.
This is true not only of short stories, but of books, movies, and
such. This can cause a lot of confusion. I once ordered a videotape of
a movie, and when I received it, it was a totally different movie than
the one I wanted. Turned out that there were three films by that name,
all unrelated except for the title.
 
An interesting article about duplicate titles:

KnoxNews: Books
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/books/article/0,1406,KNS_306_4637974,00.html
 
Most online short story databases are genre-based (science fiction,
mystery, and such), but here's one that is not genre-specific, and is
well annotated:

Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database: Short Story
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/lit-med/lit-med-db/webdocs/webgenres/short.story.genre.html

LitFinder is normally a subscription database, but I found an online
trial offer which enables you to use this impressive service for free:

LitFinder Trial Login
http://www.litfinder.com/login.asp?UserName=galetrial&Password=simon&submit=true

More on LitFinder:

Thomson Gale: LitFinder
http://www.gale.com/LitFinder

Best regards,
pinkfreud

---

Clarification of Answer by pinkfreud-ga on 30 May 2006 10:47 PDT

I just stumbled onto this nice little index of classic short stories
that can be read online:

ReadBookOnLine.net: Short Story Index
http://www.readbookonline.net/shortStory

---

Request for Answer Clarification by timespacette-ga on 30 May 2006 17:47 PDT

Hi Pink,

I tried that last link, ReadBooksOnline.net, and the page comes up but
all the information is missing!  I mean there is a very nice colorful
title but the rest of the page is blank and none of the links work. Do
you think you could find a work-around to get to these?   Or
something.  It looks very interesting!

ts

***

---

Clarification of Answer by pinkfreud-ga on 30 May 2006 17:52 PDT

That is very strange. The links on that page worked for me earlier
today, and I just re-tried them, and everything seemed fine. Have you
tried accessing the page with a different browser (just grasping at
straws here)?

---

Clarification of Answer by pinkfreud-ga on 30 May 2006 19:09 PDT

Curiouser and curiouser: two of my colleagues have tried that link,
and the response is split: one GAR had no difficulty with it, and the
other said that most of the content was missing. Maybe some wonky
coding on that page is responsible.

---

Clarification of Answer by pinkfreud-ga on 30 May 2006 19:46 PDT

A third GAR has made a suggestion that sounds good to me: she says
that you may be able to see the content of the page if you scroll
down. Apparently some browsers have pixel width issues with Google
advertising. Lawsy, my colleagues are smarter than me. I have no clue
what is meant by "pixel width issues," but I trust the GAR who gave me
this info.

ah . . . finally got it!  (Never thought to just scroll down . . .)

and I too have never heard of 'pixel width issues'

what a great resource!  thank you.

****

Regarding the titles, a title cannot be copyrighted under U.S. law.
This is true not only of short stories, but of books, movies, and
such. This can cause a lot of confusion. I once ordered a videotape of
a movie, and when I received it, it was a totally different movie than
the one I wanted. Turned out that there were three films by that name,
all unrelated except for the title.

An interesting article about duplicate titles:

http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/books/article/0,1406,KNS_306_4637974,00.html

Most online short story databases are genre-based (science fiction,
mystery, and such), but here's one that is not genre-specific, and is
well annotated:

http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/lit-med/lit-med-db/webdocs/webgenres/short.story.genre.html

Once again, Pink, thank you . . . those are good.  And please DO post
it as an answer!


****