novella
Americannoun
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novellas,
plural
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novelle
plural
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a tale or short story of the type contained in the Decameron of Boccaccio.
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a fictional prose narrative that is longer and more complex than a short story; a short novel.
noun
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(formerly) a short narrative tale, esp a popular story having a moral or satirical point, such as those in Boccaccio's Decameron
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a short novel; novelette
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of novella
From Italian, dating back to 1900–05; see origin at novel 1
Compare meaning
How does novella compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
Short novels are called novellas. If you don't want to write a novel, but have more to say than a short story, you could try writing a novella. You've surely heard of plays, poems, short stories, and novels. But novellas? They're not as well known, but pretty simple: nothing more than short novels. Sometimes novellas are called novelettes, but whatever you call them, you'll probably read a few in English class. Sometimes it's easier to squeeze in a novella than a whole novel, so maybe you could start with Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" or Franz Kafka's "Metamorphosis."
Vocabulary lists containing novella
Brand Spankin' New: Words with Neo- and Nov-
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Literary Genres - Introductory
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Reading: Literature - Fiction - Introductory
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Editora 34 publishing house told AFP that its sales of the novella, one of Dostoevsky's earliest works, had jumped 463 percent year-on-year.
From Barron's ● Sep. 4, 2026
Based on his 1997 children’s novella, this economical piece of autofiction chronicles a life-changing cross-country flight in 1962 from Travolta’s childhood home in New Jersey to the sunny streets of Los Angeles.
From Salon ● Jun. 2, 2026
More than 80 years after he was created in Albert Camus’s 1942 novella “The Stranger,” Meursault is still the same chilling prophet of alienation, a walking caricature of emotionlessness who is nevertheless spellbinding.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 2, 2026
It’s astonishing that Mr. Ozon is the first to make a French film of the novella, which previously yielded only two feature versions, one Italian and the other Turkish.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 2, 2026
Not since her week in Primrose Hill, typing out the novella, and what a foolish excitement that seemed now.
From "Atonement" by Ian McEwan
The novellas are composed of nested stories inspired by Scheherazade’s tales in “One Thousand and One Nights.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 8, 2026
Martin’s Dunk and Egg novellas also questions whether those who inherit rulership deserve that duty, reflecting their cravenness in shining gleam of its heroes’ virtue.
From Salon ● Feb. 23, 2026
These are novellas that have existed for 30 years.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 22, 2026
Another spin-off, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, adapted from a series of novellas written by Martin, launched last month.
From BBC ● Feb. 18, 2026
According to www.nobel.se/literature/laureates/1910/press.html, Andrea Delfin, written in 1859, is part of a series of novellas, which Paul Heyse had published between 1855 and 1862 in four volumes.
From Andrea Delfin by Michael Pullen
Included in the novel's 496-page sweep are three brilliant novelle: Ensign Woodbridge's encounter with the hypocritical missionaries, the story of the Irish monk and the satanic trader, Parker, and Seaman O'Connell on a berserk rampage.
From Time Magazine Archive
She intended to give a Decameron of one hundred stories—the number comes from the Cento novelle antichi, before Boccaccio—but only got so far as the second novel of the eighth day.
From The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 by William Painter
Other writers besides Sacchetti produced songs of the sort, but in all alike the strictly pastoral element was accidental, and merged insensibly into the more delicately romantic of the novelle themes.
From Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration Stage in England by Walter W. Greg
Readers of the novelle will remember the discussion on the subject by Pietro Fortini in his Novelle de' Novizi, xxxi.
From Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration Stage in England by Walter W. Greg
I refer to the novelle or nouvelles, in which, although pastoral subjects are occasionally introduced, the treatment is entirely independent of conventional tradition.
From Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration Stage in England by Walter W. Greg
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
