Twitter literacy – or twitteracy as I now shall call it – gets mixed reviews. On the one hand there are lots of fears out there that L33T and 140-character writing are destroying our brains and bodies. On the other hand, people are writing and reading more than ever on social media, and people like Austin’s own @VeryShortStories on Twitter are encouraging people to recognize and create literature out of those 140 characters.

 

And @VeryShortStories has now gotten a shout out from literary maven Margaret Atwood.

 

Atwood opened my mind to a great world of speculative and incisive social science fiction when I read “The Handmaiden’s Tale” in my early teens. (The friend from whom I borrowed the book was also responsible for introducing me to Star Wars, Ouija, the concept of Buddhism, the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Piers Anthony. Basically, I owe her for almost all of my cultural and pop cultural sensibilities and someday when I have a pile of money, I’ll make it up to her.)

 

So when Margaret Atwood says that Twitter has literary merit, I stand up and take notice.

 

In an interview with the CBC (the Canadian cousin of the BBC) on Monday, Atwood said she classifies the internet and social media as literacy drivers because, “kids are given the tools and the incentive to learn the skills that allow them to access (the Internet.)”

 

In the CBC story, Atwood noted that she has recently added to the few twitterers she follows “a guy out there who is writing 140-character short stories — I just followed him today…but that's the exception. It's sort of like haikus [and] prose.”

 

@VeryShortStory is that guy. Sean Hill, the writer behind @VeryShortStory in fact has a book coming out next week with a collection of 300 of his best pieces of twitterature. (Don’t worry, we’re working on getting a hold of him for an interview about all this.)

 

 

 

His 140-character stories run the gamut from witty and complex (“I want you to love me,” said Edith, looking into his eyes. The Devil hesitated, calculating how to come out ahead on this deal.") to sad and funny ("I found a puppy in my mailbox with "I'm sorry" written on it. Kim wanted to make up, but her laughing when I took my pants off still hurt.") If you are on Twitter and want a roughly daily injection of literary gold in brief in your life, you could do worse than follow Atwood's lead and follow @VeryShort Story.

 

 

 

Of course, Twitter is not the first to appreciate and encourage the value of extremely brief literature. Ernest Hemingway espoused simplicity in writing and is widely credited for writing the following six word story: “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.” While Snopes lists it as undetermined whether the legend of Hemingway writing this story in response to a bet is true, the “Six Word Story” has become its own movement in literature.

 

And in fact, Atwood herself contributed her own six word story to Wired, along with several other modern literary legends. “Longed for him. Got him. Shit.” - Margaret Atwood