THE HORROR STORY IS one of the enduring genres of short fiction. With its characteristic reliance on the unity of time and effect, and on the creation of an unsettling mood or atmosphere leading to a shocking denouement, horror has proved particularly amenable to the short form, deliberately designed to be consumed in one sitting for maximum impact. A number of the greatest horror writers – Edgar Allan Poe, Ambrose Bierce, M. R. James, H. P. Lovecraft, Robert Aickman – worked almost exclusively in the short story form, while others – Nathaniel Hawthorne, Sheridan Le Fanu, Arthur Conan Doyle, Shirley Jackson, Stephen King, Clive Barker – made important contributions in long and short fiction. It is also a genre of important anthologies, which have collected the enduring moments of otherwise minor or neglected writers: William Maginn, Amelia B. Edwards, Fitz-James O'Brien, Rhoda Broughton, W. W. Jacobs, Oscar Cook and numerous others have made unforgettable appearances in a variety of anthologies of horror and the supernatural.

In his fiction and his poetry, Poe built a whole aesthetic around this intensity of effect:

In Poe's work, at least, literary theory anticipates and governs the practice of writing, always and at all points subordinated to a priori aesthetic concerns. Horror was for Poe the most suitable mode for achieving his aesthetic goals. Poe's position is a typically extreme one, yet many of his aims and concerns have been shared by other writers of horror fiction.