Fathers are often domineering or formative presences in fiction, and the following classic short stories all focus on the important influence of fathers on their children, even though, in at least one of the stories listed here, the father is absent from the story itself.
These stories are among some of the best – and best-known – shorter stories to explore the themes of fathers and fatherhood. They range from science fiction to detective stories, from realism to modernism; from late Victorian to contemporary; from British to American (and Argentinian). But all of them are about fathers in some way.