50. The Four Million by O Henry

In 1892 Mrs Caroline Astor was throwing a party, and asked the New York socialite and tastemaker Samuel Ward McAllister to draw up a list of people to invite. She asked him to limit his choice to 400 names, because that was the maximum that would fit into her ballroom. McAllister obliged, and later was heard to remark that the number 400 was fortunate, since there were not more than 400 socially significant people in New York in any case. The remark was picked up by the press and caused outrage. Soon the controversy came to the attention of a young New Yorker who had already made his name as a short-story writer and chronicler of the lives of the poor, the hard-working, the struggling masses... i.e. William Sydney Porter, a.k.a. O.Henry. O. Henry’s book of short stories The Four Million, although not making it explicit in the text, was intended as a riposte to McAllister, reflecting the actual number of living, breathing - and, most importantly, working - people in the city. ‘I,’ he said in a letter to a friend, ‘am going to make the four million step into the shoes of the four hundred.’

Henry had history on his side, and became one of the best-loved short-story writers of the early 20th century, with an influence extending to writers such as Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, James Thurber and PG Wodehouse.

Who remembers McAllister?

Consulted:
Nolan, Jeannette Covert: O. Henry: The Story of William Sydney Porter (2007)

See a clickable index of all titles covered