SOURCE: Tillinghast, Richard. “‘They Were as Good as We Were’: The Stories of William Trevor.” New Criterion 11, no. 6 (February 1993): 10-17.

In the following essay, Tillinghast discusses the defining characteristics of Trevor's short fiction through an examination of the pieces in Collected Stories.

American readers of William Trevor's fiction may find themselves at something of a loss to decide precisely what nationality or ethnic identity to assign to this acknowledged master of the short story. The usual epithet for Trevor is Anglo-Irish, which, particularly for readers unfamiliar with Ireland, roughly places him, because he was born and raised in Ireland, went to school there, attended Trinity College, Dublin—and because a quarter of the eighty-odd pieces in his Collected Stories are set in Ireland or are peopled by Irish characters living abroad, usually in England. He himself has for many years lived and written in Devon.

The term “Anglo-Irish...