Flash Prose

Flash prose, also called flash literature, is brief creative writing, generally between about five hundred and fifteen hundred words long. It is also an umbrella term covering various short format works, including prose poetry, short essays, and other works of creative fiction and nonfiction, with the word flash signaling something fast, impromptu and short. The term is generally used in the context of writing competitions and other public showcases of skill with language, such as blogs or non journalistic writing in a newspaper, journal or other periodical. According to writer Dinty W. Moore, Judith Kitchen and Mary Paumier Jones helped start the form moving with their 1996 anthology In Short, published by W. W. Norton, which had an immediate influence on nonfiction writers and is still widely taught.