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In Defense…and Celebration of the Short Story

December 15, 2020

I had the good fortune to read Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge before most people, having been assigned it for review by The Boston Globe. I remember sitting with the galley on vacation in Florida over my winter break, often placing my finger on a page to mark my place before closing the galley to look up and ponder some poignant line or observation, or just to marvel at Strout’s brilliance. I’d read and admired her work before, but OK is, to me, her best.

But I took issue with the way her publisher had marketed the book as “a novel in stories.” No, I wrote in my review—it is, like Sherwood Anderson’s classic Winesburg, Ohio, a unified cycle of finely observed tales focusing on characters inhabiting a single town.  A collection of tales, no matter how closely the characters overlap or intrude on each other’s stories,

Jessica Treadway

are not chapters contributing to a single narrative arc. A collection of tales does not a novel make.

“Linked stories,” to use the vernacular more in vogue now, is a better description. I’ve just finished writing a collection of these myself: independent, standalone stories with occasionally recurring events and characters, including a Russian fabulist writer most famous for her own story about a housewife who converses regularly with her sugar bowl. None of these stories depends on another for its meaning, although I do hope that my loose “links” do provide some Aha! moments of resonance for the reader encountering, as Love False or True goes on, a familiar name or setting.

 

Elizabeth McCracken, a fine writer of both, says that a short story is a blow to the solar plexus, whereas a novel is a lingering illness you might never recover from. These are two very different conditions, and they do not usually mimic one another. The first wants you to have to catch your breath a little, upon reading the final sentence. The second moves in a slow build toward an ending that makes you sigh. I’ve sighed at the ends of a few stories and gasped upon finishing a novel or two, but those are the exceptions. To invoke an alternate metaphor to McCracken’s, the two forms are disparate species within the same literary genus.

It’s an important distinction because as the marketing of Olive Kitteridge demonstrates, novels sell better than stories, but I’m not convinced that collections can’t make a comeback. To do so, stories need to be understood and celebrated for what they, uniquely, do: distill the experiences of their characters into an essence that will come sudden and sharp upon the reader, a fresh and welcome—if fleeting—scent in the otherwise ordinary air.

 

Filed Under: General

The Language of Alison Lurie

December 4, 2020

It’s a rare privilege to work with an author whose work you’ve admired your entire life.  This was the case with Alison Lurie, who died on December 3rd, 2020, at the age of 94.

I first read Lurie’s novel, Foreign Affairs,  as a young man on an airplane crossing the Atlantic.  I’d heard that it involved love affairs between  American and English academics, and thought what better way to prepare myself to enter a foreign country.  They may speak our language in England, but the customs and attitudes there are different–foreign by a considerable degree.  Lurie was able to capture the nuances of these differences and, I imagine, was helped by the fact that she spent part of every year in a part of London called Maida Vale.

Many years later, when I learned that Alison had a manuscript reflecting her views of architecture on offer, I contacted her agent.  I’d heard the book was called The Language of Houses and at once realized it was probably a follow up to her famous book, published in the 70’s called The Language of Clothes, which is a delightful disquisition on fashion. After acquiring the new book, I worked closely with Alison on its content and was delighted that a revered and established novelist such as she was not only open to my editorial suggestions, but actually followed most of them.  Once published, her book delighted critics and readers alike, and she was called upon to comment upon the architecture of various American cities. The Language of Houses has already appeared on the syllabus of college courses seeking an introduction to architecture by someone with a gimlet eye, someone like Alison Lurie.

Alison was one of the few writers I met who would go to great lengths not to talk about herself.  It wasn’t because she was pathologically private; on the contrary. “I know my own life,” she would say, “And because I know it, it’s not interesting to me.  I’d much prefer to learn about other people.” Rare among writers, most of whom would prefer to talk about themselves and their ideas and, perhaps to a lesser degree, their work, Alison was genuinely curious. She asked a lot of questions, candidly commented on the answers, and gave her opinion about what she heard or suspected she didn’t hear about and still wanted to know.

She was blunt in conversation, she was sometimes ornery, but these qualities were accepted, even appreciated by people who knew her well enough to know that she had no tolerance for artifice. This intolerance extended to her view of contemporary literature as well as to other acclaimed writers whose work she not always admired.  She was part of a group of writers who spend part of every year in Key West, and was generous to them as well as the literary community.  The last time I saw her was at her home there, when we were having an editorial discussion about her most recent book, called Words and Worlds, the paperback of which was published earlier this year.

Although it is populated with essays about literature for children and young adults with disquisitions on Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia and the real story behind Pinocchio, the book begins with a very personal account of what life was like for a student attending Radcliffe during the second World War. Lurie explains that women who took co-educational classes were expected to remain quiet and defer to men; they were also expected to knit garments for the war effort.  There is another touching essay about Lurie’s first attempts at writing and how she was discouraged, not just by her own early failures, but also by people she knew who doubted her talent. She goes as far as to describe a moment by the Charles River in Boston when she was seriously considering giving up.  But obviously she persevered.

The book also turns on her various friendships with other writers and artists and intellectuals like Barbara Epstein (who launched the New York Review of Books), the famous cartoonist Edward Gorey, as well as her friendship with the poet, James Merrill.  What these essays reveal, beyond indelible portraits of these noted friends, is the author’s capacity for friendship, her devotion to it, and how she reaps the benefits as we, the reader, reap the benefits of her careful and measured observations.

Worth noting is the last essay of Alison Lurie’s most recent book that discusses how, having once been a fashionista, she, after passing the age of sixty, felt liberated to no longer care about tarting up in order to keep up.

“Already I had saved the two hours a month I had spent trying to turn my hair into a dull imitation of its original color and then cleaning up the mess in the sink afterwards. Next, with my husband’s encouragement, I saved more time by throwing away my makeup. Powder and foundation and eye-shadow tend to cake in wrinkles, and an aging woman with bright-red lipstick, especially when it has leaked into the little, otherwise invisible lines around her lips, can look like an elderly vampire, or worse. She can become the sort of terrifying figure that the Ancient Mariner saw on the death-ship:

Some of my friends made similar changes, all individual and all in defiance of Fashion. One gave away all her skirts and went into pants and jeans for the duration; another disobeyed the rule that dresses are now for formal occasions only and began sewing herself loose-cut casual smocks and muumuus in an unfashionable mid-calf length: she is a serious gardener, and points out that it is much easier to wash your knees than to wash a pair of slacks. Another friend decided that she would simplify her basic wardrobe to basic black, with accents of purple or green or scarlet.

All of us realized with joy that we could now wear whatever clothes we liked best. There was only one rule: we had to be reasonably neat. It may be true that, as the poet Robert Herrick put it, “a sweet disorder in the dress / Kindles in youth a wantonness,” but in old age what it kindles is the suspicion that you are starting to lose your mind. Spiky, confused-looking hair of the sort that goes to fashionable clubs, ragged hems, torn-up jeans, and unraveling sweaters no longer look appealing. Realizing this, even the most charmingly untidy of my friends have now reformed. We do still see some unfortunate contemporaries who haven’t learned this rule—and also, alas, some who are still worshipping at the altar of Fashion, who has forever turned her back on them.”

This writing is vintage Alison Lurie, who, despite what she says above, aged gracefully and was as sharp at the age of 94 as she was at the age of 58 when her novel, Foreign Affairs was awarded the Pulitzer-prize for fiction.

Filed Under: General

My Rage Against the Epidemics

November 30, 2020

Lazarus RisingWhen I talk to anybody about my forthcoming novel, Lazarus Rising, I say that had I not written my memoir, In the Shadow of the Bridge, published last year, I would not have been able to write Lazarus Rising.  In the previous book, I wrote about my extensive and intimate experience of the AIDS epidemic, about volunteering at Saint Vincent’s Hospital to take care of nine people who died, plus my lover.  In this way, I was able to re-immerse myself in the epidemic.  Once I finished In the Shadow of the Bridge, I went back to a novel that I had written ten years ago and put in a drawer— because I couldn’t make it work.  When I wrote the novel originally, the situation was the same as it is now in the published book.  Then as now, I tapped into my rage against the AIDS epidemic, a rage expressed in the book’s epigraph.

When I originally conceived of Lazarus Rising, I wanted to expand the general experience of the epidemic and not limit it to the gay community.  I came up with the idea of a painter, a feisty woman who ends up becoming a drug abuser and gets infected by sharing needles.  And then I tried to imagine a man who would be the most interesting yet the least likely person she could be involved with.  I came up with a New York City firefighter, a young, passionate Irishman called Johnny Donegan. The way I write, I present an idea to my imagination and then it either works for me or it doesn’t.  Ten years ago it didn’t work and that’s why I put the book away.  But recently, when I went back to it, I saw something very important in the earlier draft that I didn’t make use of: that the main character was responsible for the death of her new-born son, that she participated in his death because of her infection that she passed on to him.  And once I realized this, I was able to go back and rewrite the book that is published on December 1, 2020, World AIDS Day.

I’ve been asked to frame the AIDS epidemic in two ways. The first—is there any kind of redemption that has come from it, any silver lining?  And I answer that there is none.  Nothing redeems the suffering of the epidemic.  Nothing good came of it.  I wrote my novel in a rage against people who thought there was or would be anything that redeemed the suffering.  When my main character takes a ferry from lower Manhattan to Staten Island, she thinks about all the things that could happen to her before she dies: seizures; dementia; pneumonia, incontinence.  She reflects that, with the nature of the disease, one never knows when any of these things will happen.  And Johnny, the firefighter who falls in love with her says, “If it took the epidemic to bring us together, we never should have met.”

The second question I am asked is how the current epidemic of COVID compares to the epidemic of HIV.  And I say that the current epidemic is worse.  With AIDS, at least you could be with people who were dying, you could take care of them, you could show your love for them, you could ease their passage into death.  With the current epidemic, you can’t take care of anybody who has COVID.  You can’t be with them when they die.  You can’t touch them with a loving hand.  Sadly, this epidemic prevents the fulfillment of love.

Filed Under: General

Jennifer Acker talks about writing The Limits of the World

November 17, 2020

Jennifer Acker talks about the inspiration behind her début novel The Limits of the World. The Limits of the World, published by Delphinium Books, is a 2020 MA Center for the Book honoree.

I wrote this novel because I married into a fascinating family.  A family that moved four continents in as many generations. When I was seventeen, I lived in Kenya for a short while…

To hear more of Jennifer Acker’s story in her own voice click https://vimeo.com/460178619

Filed Under: General

#LazarusRisingGiveaway

November 17, 2020

Lazarus Rising***PRE-RELEASE GIVEAWAY***
November 14 & November 21, 2020

Enter to win a pre-release hardback of Lazarus Rising and paperback reissue of In the Shadow of the Bridge both by acclaimed author Joseph Caldwell. Books will be shipped* to you free of charge direct from @DelphBks.

*free shipping is limited to addresses within the USA.

Lazarus Rising tells an unexpected love story. Love, kindness, and the journey to health sometimes have unanticipated consequences. Loss isn’t always what we imagine it to be.

It’s easy to be a part of this moment.

TO ENTER: tag someone you love in the comment box below our announcement on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter then feel free to check our other offerings at DelphiniumBooks.com.

You may enter as often as you wish. Each unique tag will count as a new entry.

Each week, one participant will be picked at random and announced on the following Monday morning.

We hope to bring attention to WORLD AIDS DAY: Unite in support of people living with and affected by HIV and to remember those who lost their lives to AIDS. @WorldAIDSDayUS

If living in a world with COVID-19 has taught us all anything, it’s that it takes COMMUNITY EFFORT to keep EVERYONE SAFE. Be informed, Be safe, Be kind.

This promotion is in no way sponsored, administered, or associated with Instagram, Inc., FaceBook, or Twitter. By entering, entrants confirm that they are 13+ years of age, release Delphinium Books, Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter of responsibility, and agree to Instagram, FaceBook, or Twitter’s terms of use.

Filed Under: General

I’m Speaking. I’m Writing.

October 21, 2020

 

By Bina Shah

Last week during the American Vice Presidential debate, the Democratic nominee Kamala Harris said five magical words in response to Mike Pence’s constant interruptions during her responses: “Mr. Vice President, I’m speaking.” There were no apologies; there was no equivocation. Kamala Harris was clear she had the mic and she was not going to be interrupted. Every woman who has had the experience of being overridden, shouted down, or simply ignored because of her gender, clutched these words to her chest and cheered. It’s no wonder this moment went viral as it plucked a resonating chord in the hearts of so many women who have, all their lives, been longing to be heard.

Women’s writing is an extended version of Kamala Harris’s statement. When a woman writes, she is speaking. Her voice must be listened to as you read her words. There is no question of interrupting, of mansplaining, of telling her that you know better than she does. She is the authority; the story is her domain. I’m reminded of this as I think back on three pieces of women’s writing with voices so authoritative, so self-assured that all I could do was listen and be astounded.

The first is last year’s Booker winner Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo. This book, about contemporary life in the United Kingdom for Black British women, is told from many women’s viewpoints and yet the voice speaking is always Evaristo’s, warm and witty behind the scene. How inspiring to read as a woman masterfully controls a narrative which is made up of many women’s and nonbinary voices: a polyphony that delights in a world where so many men’s voices dominate.

The second is The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste. This novel, shortlisted for this year’s Booker, tells the story of the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1935. Again Mengiste’s voice is the authority: her central characters include Hirut, a young woman who takes up arms in the rebellion. Mangiste centers the women’s experiences of war in her story. There is even a Greek chorus that speaks at various points in the book commenting on the violence visited upon the Ethiopian people. In my mind, that chorus is made up of women.

The third piece of writing comes from an unknown writer from Kashmir called Saba Mahjoor. I recently read two short stories published online. “How to Love Militantly – Or How to Make Gulkand” is about a young girl who loses her first love to the violence committed by Indian armed forces. “On the Exorcism of a Married Woman,” describes how women subvert tradition and cultural constrictions surrounding fertility and childbearing by using their indirect power. I was exhilarated to read stories from a young Kashmiri woman when most of the recognized and established authors from this region are men. Her voice, quiet and melancholy, but completely assured and truthful, was speaking from the page right into my ear.

Such is the maliciousness of patriarchy that whenever a woman speaks or writes, on some level these activities are perceived as acts of resistance when they should be as natural as when men do it. Consider that women are our first storytellers: they tell children bedtime stories and sing them lullabies; they are the keepers of folklore and the traditions of their cultures. So many women are scared into keeping silent but women’s writing manages to uplift their voices, in song or verse or prose that shakes with its own strength. History is filled with women writing secret diaries, writing poetry or manuscripts published under masculine names, and even an entire language in rural China spoken only by women.

As a woman who writes there is no greater joy than the possibility of 300 pages in which my voice is allowed to achieve full throttle. This is why women push to be published and why it’s important for their writing to be read by both men and women, not banished to the questionable world of “women’s writing” and “chick lit.” The world is not a fair place when half its population is expected to remain silent and submissive. Its full potential can only be reached when this restriction is deliberately, purposefully lifted by the gatekeepers of publishing, but more importantly, challenged by women themselves in all forums.

Image: DDIworld.com/blog/intersectional-feminism, 10-21-20.

Filed Under: General

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