novella 的词源

“短篇小说或长短篇故事”，1901年，源自意大利语；参见 novel (n.)。

It is not quite so clear as to when and where a piece of fiction ceases to be a novella and becomes a novel. The frontiers are so vague that one is obliged to recognize a middle species, or rather a middle magnitude, which paradoxically, but necessarily enough, we call the novelette. [W.D. Howells, "Some Anomalies of the Short Story," The North American Review, vol. CLXXIII, August, 1901]

关于一部虚构作品何时何地从中篇小说转变为小说，这一点并不十分明确。它们之间的界限如此模糊，以至于我们不得不承认存在一种中间类型，或者说一种中间规模，矛盾但又必然地，我们称之为小小说。[W.D. Howells, “Some Anomalies of the Short Story,” The North American Review, vol. CLXXIII, August, 1901]