In the following excerpt, Walsh examines Stafford's depiction of older, mature women in her short fiction.

In this essay, Leary relates Stafford's personal experiences, particularly her tempestuous relationship with husband Robert Lowell, to the short story "The Interior Castle, " stating the story "may be viewed as a metaphor of Stafford's own battle for survival."

In the following essay, Ryan discusses Stafford's depiction of women and children in her short fiction.

In this essay, Walsh examines the role of women and girls in the western stories in The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford.

In this essay, Leary relates the story "A Slight Maneuver" to the break-up of Stafford's marriage to Robert Lowell.

In the following essay, D'Erasmo gives an overview of Stafford's career, providing insights into why she stopped writing .

In the following essay, which focuses on three of Stafford's novels and many of her short stories, Vickery examines how Stafford's integration of psychological, humanistic, and Christian concepts contributes to her ironic vision of the world.

In the following essay, Oates finds Stafford's style conventional but concedes that many of her short stories are powerful and terrifying.

In the review below, Davenport discusses the major themes in The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford, focusing on her portrayal of American women.

In the following review of Bad Characters, Tracy calls Stafford a "brilliant writer" but finds some of the stories in the volume too contrived.

In the following review of The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford, Dickstein compares Stafford's style and themes to those of American writer Henry James.

In this excerpt, Bawer places Stafford's short fiction in a genre he calls "New Yorker stories. "

In this review of Bad Characters, Perry finds Stafford's villains enthralling but notes that a "nagging, sometimes boring, similarity surrounds her 'good' characters."

Below, Malin examines three of Stafford's short stories, noting that her "poised, beautiful style" is a "perfect frame . . . for the hideous withdrawals, self-deceptions, and perversions of her heroines. "

In this favorable review of Bad Characters, Curley praises Stafford's characterization and narrative technique.

Certainly the stories [of Jean Stafford] are exquisitely wrought, sensitively imagined like glass flowers, or arabesques, or the 'interior castle' of Pansy Vanneman's brain ("Not only the brain as the seat of consciousness, but the physical organ itself which she envisioned, romantically, now as a jewel, now as a flower, now as a light in a glass, now as an envelope of rosy vellum containing other envelopes, one within the other, diminishing infinitely")…. Dramatic ...

In the following review, Jones finds the stories in Children Are Bored on Sunday masterfully written, but sometimes to a fault

Peden is an American writer, critic, and educator. In this review of Children Are Bored on Sunday, he finds the stories beautiful, sad, and complex.

[Jean Stafford] combines an intellectuality somewhat similar to that of Mary McCarthy with a sensitivity and a style reminiscent of Katherine Anne Porter. She has published three very good novels—Boston Adventure (1944), The Mountain Lion (1947), and The Catherine Wheel (1952)—all of which deal with the theme of the adjustment of children or young people to the adult world, as well as [several volumes of short stories]. (pp. 312-13) Miss Stafford's critics have noted that her stories of...

What makes [Jean Stafford's] work so rewarding is in part her flair for the particular, the vivid detail…. Stafford's dialogue often shows a quirky perfection, like the student at Harrow who announces, "I'm a fauna man, not a flora man." Yet her greatest gift, and what made her a nonpareil of sorts, was her complex yet seemingly effortless use of language. Her language was an odd, unpromisingly heterogeneous mix: homespun colloquialisms ("chockablock,"...

A sense of life's disappointments is everywhere felt in [the Collected Stories of Jean Stafford], which often have autobiographical overtones. Although they suffer kindred sorrows, Stafford's people do not excessively resemble either her or each other because every story, plotted with mischievous skill, differs in vivid details.

What strikes one first in a Stafford story is the language—exact (though sometimes unusual), correct, extremely controlled. The tone is correspondingly cool, no matter how disturbing or impassioned the story. Stafford avoids dialogue, much preferring interior monologue or indirect discourse. Consequently, a good many stories are set in a past remembered by the central narrator. Her range is, however, hardly narrow; she can create an idyllic college love story in "Caveat Emptor," describ...