Forty Stories (Penguin Classics)
Donald Barthelme
Language: English
Pages: 272
ISBN: 0142437816
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
William H. Gass has written of Donald Barthelme that ?he has permanently enlarged our perception of the possibilities open to short fiction.? In Forty Stories, the companion volume to Sixty Stories, we encounter a dazzling array of subjects: Paul Klee, Goethe, Captain Blood, modern courtship, marriage and divorce, armadillos, and other unique Barthelmean flights of fancy. These pithy, brilliantly acerbic pieces tangle with the ludicrous, pose questions that remain unresolved, and challenge familiar bits of language heretofore unexamined. Forty Stories demonstrates Barthelme?s unrivaled ability to surprise, to stimulate, and to explore.
Q: Well, what is she doing now? A: Removing her jeans. Q: What is she wearing underneath? A: Pants. Panties. Q: But she’s still wearing her blouse? A: Yes. Q: Has she removed her panties? A: Yes. Q: Still wearing the blouse? A: Yes. She’s walking along a log. Q: In her blouse. Is she reading a book? A: No. She has sunglasses. Q: She’s wearing sunglasses? A: Holding them in her hand. Q: How does she look? A: Quite beautiful. Q: What is the content of Maoism? A: The content of
you collapse in Rodrigo’s arms, complaining of stress. He slowly begins loosening your stays, stay by stay, singing the great Ah, je vois le jour, ah, Dieu, and the second act is over. —You taught me that, Rhoda. You, my mentor in all things. —You were apt Hettie very apt. —I was apt. —The most apt. —Cold here in the garden. —You were complaining about the sun. —But when it goes behind a cloud— —Well, you can’t have everything. —The flowers are beautiful. —Indeed. —Consoling to have
deviations are disallowed, where innovations in style are seen as a sign of disengagement. When reading contemporary work with distinctive styles, some readers become impatient and most critics become enraged. Tell us the story, they say. Just tell it to us, get it across and get it over with. Spare us the frills. In fact, if Donald Barthelme were to appear today, wearing corduroy and denim and a felt hat, it would be surprising if he were to find a publisher anywhere anyhow. He would be
because of the extra- page given to Edwina’s opening layout, in which she wore a Mary McFadden pleated tube and looked, in Penfield’s phrase, approximately fantastic. The Catechist IN the evenings, usually, the catechist approaches. “Where have you been?” he asks. “In the park,” I say. “Was she there?” he says. “No,” I say. The catechist is Holding a book. He reads aloud: “The chief reason for Christ’s coming was to manifest and teach God’s love for us. Here the catechist should
stacked at the back of the car. There is someone inside the car, behind the wheel. This person is named Mitch. The exhaust from the car irritates the lion, whose head rolls from side to side, yellow teeth bared. In front of the tied-down red Camry, a man with a nosebleed holding a steel basin under his chin. The basin is full of brown blood, brown-stained blooms of gauze. He holds the basin with one hand and clutches his nose with the other. His blue-and-red-striped shirt is bloody. “Hello,” he