Cynthia Ozick - April 17, 1928
I have no doubt that Nazi’s threw children into electrified fences. I have no doubt that they did far worse things to children. I’ve seen movies, documentaries of the atrocities...with the knowledge that similar atrocities are still occurring today and will continue – forever.
Evil exists and will continue.
Joyce Carol Oates - June 16, 1938
One of the reasons why I enjoy reading Oates so much is that she writes with just the right amount of rawness that leaves you to question if you should be reading what she has written.
Sometimes the raw nature comes though the entire theme of the short story – sometimes in a sentence, a paragraph, sometimes it’s just a word, placed ever so perfectly within a dialogue.
The passages that pulled me out of my rhythm of reading are below.
Now Oates and other writers that I enjoy, really do wonderful things why they employ their little tricks like the underlined passages above illustrate.
Stilton cheese – her introduction of this cheese into the scene pulls you into the room with the mother and daughter. Stilton is a cheese with a smell that stays with you –forever-.
Next, as a male, the mention of female body parts hits a part of the brain that awakens certain reactions within most men. Oates casually places those sentences causing stimulations where interesting connections develop in the brain.
Oates does this quite often in her writing. The reader is cruising along at a nice pace, having become comfortable with the story – even if it is of the “disturbing” type, you’ve adjusted - and then, BAM! - she picks you up and drops you into another part of the room, slaps you across the face and forces you to look at something that was hidden from you before – and what you see, shocks you for a moment – perhaps because it is something that you have never read before – or perhaps it causes a reaction in you that you may find disturbing – a physical reaction – a skipped heartbeat, a pulse quickened, skin tightening, a thought of the sexual nature...
Does she do this for “shock value”?
I don’t necessarily think so.
Her style of writing over the years has been pretty well defined, and she includes enough violence, perversion and death in her stories not to draw the conclusion that she is just writing about the above to “shock”.
I think that regular readers of Oates come to expect to read the perverse, the violence or death contained within her writing, - and those that happen to stumble across her in a magazine are either turned on by what they read or are repulsed.
I enjoyed this short because Oates does a fine job of lifting the sugary gloss off our lives and showing us what really exists under all the sweetness. The early 1980s turned into a nice dip tank to peel off the sweet innocence of American life. Sure, it had been going on for some time, the peeling, but bubbling to the top was the drugs, the greed, the sex, and the deviant that ride along beside us daily... just out of sight.
Other writers can do this, but not the way Oates does it (see above).
I’ve certainly been in situations, and I think you could draw a similar conclusion, where I have come across a bit of information concerning a family member or a friend, and the acquisition of that knowledge causes a radical shift in what I think of that person. That information usually exists in the realm of the taboo, which makes it even more disturbing – exciting?
Looking inward at our own scars and paper cuts - We all have weaknesses, and Oates peels the bandage off those little cuts and drops a bit of salt into each - drawing just the right amount of recognition to them. She causes us to see ourselves, our families our friends and lovers in a new light – an honest and sharply focused light – a blazing raw 150 watt bulb in the face light.
And what is so wonderful about this is that it needs to be done more often – by more writers. We need to be lifted out of our Soma daze.
This woman will jack your junk up!!!
Alice Munro - July 10, 1931
In “Wood” I think I have found another tale that points me towards the importance of seeing the world, situations, problems etc. from different vantage points. The value of doing so will allow you to make better decisions, clearer decisions, decisions that may have been influenced by powerful external forces such as love, jealousy, pride, envy, greed...you get the general drift.
Again, the value of a cataclysmic event can be a wonderful first step on a ladder towards awareness – not just self awareness but an awareness of a given event.
An accident, a statement, a promotion, a job loss...anything that refocuses our “reality”.
One of the many reasons why I run, and push myself to the distances and to the pain of running those distances is to find the true reality that I live in.
There is a clarity that surfaces after miles and miles of running and thinking.
I listen to my breathing, I hear my footfalls, I feel my heartbeat, I strain against the pain in my legs, neck and shoulders – all of this reminds me that I am alive – .
But how alive?
Where am I?
I really appreciate Munro in this selection. I have held, and still hold something deep within me against her for a reason that I’m not quite sure of.
I think it is my lack of appreciation for her writing. I feel that still has something to prove to me before I place her on my favorite list.
Amelia Mosley – ???
And yet another mysterious woman writer.
I love a story that pushes the bounds of reality. A story that does so while also maintaining readability...one that pulls the reader in and does not push him away with the attitude of “holier than thou” weirdness. Does that make any sense?
I’ve come across a few stories in these collections where it seems too obvious that the author fell victim to a certain popular genre or style of fantastical writing, and they tried too hard, and they were told that they did a good job by an editor and in the end, the story is a tough read aliening the reader, but propelling the author even higher in the lit-world because he is misunderstood so he must be a genius ------ bullshit.
You write and are read and appreciated because what you write is... good.
It’s like everyone saying Bjork is a genius.
She has a few good tunes, but most of her stuff is rubbish.
Absolute crap that can be created by a 13 year old with a Powerbook. She knows it and plays the role. Why? Because we feed her and she gives us what we think we want.
This little dance has happened quite often in literature, and it continues today.
I love artists. But I love smart artists that know their place. Artist that produce for their pleasure. Artists that are true to themselves. Artists that struggle for years in silence just to please the voice in there head...and are not appreciated until they have disappeared – like Mosley.
A story like the one Mosley wrote is refreshing because it is a little hiccup in our reality. It reminds us that things as they are today may not be what they could be tomorrow. It just takes a shift or a bump in the universe to throw everything off.
The story once again explores relationships and ones that exist between men, women, brothers, mothers and lovers. The labels are removed and barriers we have in our world are breached.
Breaching barriers can be good. Breaching mental and barriers of perception can be quite healthy, and this story is a wonderful exercise to remind us to shift our vantage point in this world from time to time.
Elizabeth McGrath - ???
So here we are again with another great story, and all of my searching skills have failed to turn up anything on the author.
This was a surprisingly wonderful story. It was filled with such emotion, raw feelings and quite relatable.
I have found the past several stories that Calisher chose to be quite refreshing. We go from a male dominated collection from Elkin to this volume which is split nicely so far between the genders. I enjoy reading about women. Insights to the mysteries that they are can be divined from authors who choose to represent them in all of their complexities.
I enjoy attempting to “figure out’ women. It’s a challenge and a challenge that morphs in its structure from woman to woman. It is absolutely impossible in my opinion to lay a blanket set of characteristics across a woman. And, I feel this especially so in this day and age.
McGrath does a fine job of introducing us to the woman of the 1980s.
we are presented with a women, a mother who is lonely, depressed, overeducated, unfulfilled by her husband (which she chooses to leave) and generally depressed. (Is there some foreshadowing to Prozac Nation here?)
A character that has no problem polishing off half a bottle of booze, smoking a pack a day, kissing an old acquaintance in an airplane and generally making an attempt to figure out where she fits in this world...a bit too late.
She was probably forced into the position of wife/mother by her husband, a husband who later also struggled with his place in the world – and lack of direction – a realization that when it surfaces causes her to gain consciousness from the coma of her miserable life with him.
This story brought me back to a time in my life where I felt that I had no direction. I was fortune not to have baggage such as a family that could be damaged by any sudden movements I made. I was able to strike out on my own, change my reality and create one that suited me.
I too was “Fogbound”. But who isn’t in life at one point or another?
So, what happened to Elizabeth McGrath?
Did she see what the future held for her and decide that her best bet was to disappear?
Joseph McElroy – 1930 –
It’s a tough subject to write about.
The relationship between a mother and a son.
It seems to me, much easier to write a bout the relationship between a father and a daughter or a father and a son – mostly I suppose because I think fathers are pretty cut and dry. The influence that a father has on his children is much more subtle and it is a powerful influence that they don’t even realize they are exerting. Problems and deviations from the norm that exist in a father can set the children up for all sorts of behavior – and further, it seems, that a father is a bit more reckless with his life inside of the family structure.
The mother’s influence is a more of “in your face” influence. It’s right out there in the open.
It seems that a mother (a high percentage of them) tend to fall into the traditional role that one would expect of them.
And I base this on what?
Well, nothing more than my own experience – so, one could say, that my observations are only a result of what I have lived with, and so they are not to be applied to all familial relationships.
Yes?
Correct!
I’ve written plenty here about my father and my relationship with him. I touched briefly on my relationship with my mother. I’m too lazy to link back to those posts. – Sorry –
My mother worked hard to raise my sister and me. She was left in a better position than other mothers during the 1980s after a divorce. We still had a roof over our heads, and my father paid child support until we were adults.
My mother and father (from a distance) raised two kids without any discipline problems.
Overall, we were good kids.
I had a good relationship with my mother. She set down the law, and I followed it.
I was lucky in most cases.
A mother, as she should have, accepted me in whatever form I came in. My phase where I wore combat boots and shaved my head was accepted. My phase where I had long-term girlfriends and evidence built that we were “serious” was accepted.
I didn’t do drugs, and I didn’t drink. I think she felt some relief in this and so my fence of freedoms was enlarged.
The only bumpy part of the road in our relationship was during my college years. She was accepting of my desires for freedom and independence. She didn’t hold on too tight. There was some questioning surrounding our communication during my time at
Overall, she did a good job.
My problem though is that I rarely tell her this. I feel that I don’t need to tell her this, but it goes against my thoughts on praising people when they “do good”.
I take comfort in her knowing that she did a good job by looking at my life and the decisions that I have made and continue to make.
The life I am leading now, with all the successes and the happiness that is in my life, and I know that she has to feel some credit for this.
She’s a good mom, was a good mom and continues to be a good mom and I love her.
Bobbie Ann Mason – May 1, 1940
In
There is a fine balance that we must all walk in life where personal development and growth lie ahead as a reward and detachment or loss lie behind us – or rather- to our side.
It is important to recognize this see-saw type of relationship we have with others and ourselves because if one side is too heavy, we risk so much.
It will be ten years this summer that M and I have been married. Early on in our marriage, she blamed me for being “selfish”.
I fought her on this label but I the end, upon refection, she was 99% right in its application.
I have learned to balance out what I enjoy doing in life to the time spent in our life “together”.
The reward to making compromises to a friend, wife or family member is usually worth it.
Both of us over the past ten years have sacrificed for each other. It’s called “being married”.
Why would we deny the other the happiness that would come from the pursuit of something we wish to work hard for?
She has come to understand the importance of me running for hours at a time – the therapy that it provides. She also understands how important reading and the collection of books is to me.
I recognize that she has to go against her better judgment sometimes, but when she does, it is a sacrifice that makes me happy.
The perspective that another can provide to you in your pursuit of your wants can be beneficial as well. Others keep us in check – they make sure that our dreams aren’t too lofty – or doomed to fail. They also can provide encouragement when we feel that our dreams are out of reach.
When I was reading and writing here more frequently, I remember the feeling when the story delivered a surprise. I’m not talking about...
