Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author? The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.An impossible choice. An endless feast of talents. Within these 10 stories are all the glory, the ambition and talent of authors that are now known and beloved by us all. Genius in every name.01 - The Top Ten - The English - An Introduction02 - The Signalman by Charles Dickens03 - The Lifted Veil - Part 1 by George Eliot04 - The Lifted Veil - Part 2 by George Eliot05 - They by Rudyard Kipling06 - An Unwritten Novel by Virginia Woolf07 - The Mortal Immortal by Mary Shelley08 - The Rocking Horse Winner by D H Lawrence09 - The Interlopers by Saki the pseudonym for H H Munro10 - The Informer by Joseph Conrad11 - The Old Nurses Story by Elizabeth Gaskell12 - The Fiddler of the Reels by Thomas Hardy