Sherwood Anderson

Much of Anderson's 'Winesburg, Ohio' expresses the decline of expression in urban-industrialized America. His language throughout the novel, common and plain, reflects this struggle to articulate the inexpressible: qualities of the human condition.

I think the writing comes out of an era in which philosophy art are becoming increasingly indifferent to the masses. There's not a lot that the average hotel can get out of 'Ulysses.'

Anderson is writing about the human condition, to give a voice to the general proprietors of that disposition: the common people, struggling in the factories to maintain the economy that supports those French critics who would embrace the novel as an early work of humanist realism.

Simplicity is key in this text. Not simplicity as a reductionist technique, to qualify the general public as a sad brewing lot of helpless ignorants subject to the great capitalist machine, but simplicity as an expression of the most rudimentary forms of human catharsis.

"The windows of the house were high and he wanted to look at the trees," Anderson says of the writer.

That he bothers to record this motive exemplifies Anderson's interests in the story. He is not interested in bemoaning the condition of the old writer, and obviously sympathetic character; instead Anderson intends to portray the consistency of his character: The subtle intuitive drives that compose 'the writer''s motivations, convictions, and general humanity.

Anders on is interested in the intuitive not the cerebral.

"The grotesque" are abstractions, Anderson does not interpret or project some great meaning onto the nearly prophetic manifestations of the writer's unconscious, instead he portrays them as a spectacle. Each grotesque is treated with a visceral but delicate measure of perception by Anderson. He is a master of constructing these abstractions without reckoning through any reductive interpretation.

I love this story.

More on this tomorrow.

Where a more traditional author may approach dialogue and discourse as a means of connecting plot elements, Hemingway disregards regards plot for discourse, preferring to examine the dynamic of a relationship conflict rather than its circumstantial context. His dismissal of description emphasizes his choice of included details, implying that each of these rare glimpses into the narration's setting and scenery contains a signifier that relates the author's thesis: Hemingway's purpose in recording the conversation of a couple over drinks.

The waitress' character most lucidly exemplifies my statement on the Hemingway style: a relational examination of 'the surface,' of circumstance.

Though the waitress is only a brief presence, an analysis of her portrayal will serve as a template for my examination of Hemingway's style. Without any political, moralizing, or sentimental statement about the 'subservient disposition of the working class,' Hemingway chooses to portray the character of 'the woman' as she is referred. 'The woman' receives no description. Her role within the action of the story is merely to serve the drinks that induce the two central character's dialogue. However, without consciously constructing her character, readers are left with a distinct impression of her demeanor.

Here 'the man' addresses the waitress, then he digresses to ask 'the girl':

"The woman came out from the bar.

'Four reales.' 'We want two Anis del Toro.'

'With water?'

'Do you want it with water?'

'I don't know,' the girl said. 'Is it good with water?'

'It's all right.'

'You want them with water?' asked the woman.

'Yes, with water.'

The waitress' presumption when she ask her question a second time, 'You want water with them?' interrupting 'the girl's' slow indecisive dialogue, reveals the entire mode of the waitress' routine. Hemingway's portrayal of this interaction with customers, not snappy but to the point, evokes a premier impression of 'the woman,' a portrait of a character that transcends the imagery of dispassionate description or a sentimental inquiry. She is not cute and perky; she is not new to the job and taciturn; she is not wise and patient; she is middle aged, not particularly attractive, not particularly unattractive -perhaps slightly over weight, but only slightly- she's worked in restaurant's before, but not this particular one long enough elicit sense of proprietorship, and she probably has a few kids and thick eye brows.

This I imagine when I read the text. I infer it as a reader. I construct this fluent visage of a character despite the author's decline to describe her. It is my interpretation of an excerpt from Hemingway's 'Hills like White Elephants,' and as the author Hemingway delegates his readers with a unique capacity to maintain their own interpretation of the text. He does this with paratactic prose, but through emphasis on specific details, Hemingway manipulates the ostensibly paratactic language into a hypotactic, linear structure that reveals plot.

Perhaps here lies the great secret of Hemingway prose; that each reader maintains their own personal, fabricated impression of the naked plot elements that Hemingway lays in print before them.

Christopher Durang

"Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You" exemplifies the dichotomy of irony; perhaps the most classic theatrical theme, if not merely an archaic motif, the inextricability of tragedy and comedy resonates through Christopher Durang's comic investigation of parochial contradiction.

That's a heck of a high style statement. What I mean, to speak more colloquially (a high style adjective for lower/middle style writing language), is that Durang's funny play is funny because it's also kind of sad, and also very true. Durang humorously exploits contradictions of biblical proportion, but ultimately investigates the grotesques of contradictions within Sister Mary Ignatius herself.

Though at first a cliche caricature of Catholic school repression, whose attributes consists of firm convictions and a pocket of cookies, a darker side of Sister Mary Ignatius's reveals itself as the character develops. These are the qualities that torture her students, the strict prejudices that she expresses through a dogmatic doctrine: Her dehumanizing treatment of even her favorite student Thomas (who she quizes for treats), her consistent mention of Sodom and Gomorrah to characterize homosexuality, and the strictly sober way in which she accounts for the crucifixion of christ as "nice of him" without any sense of irony. Each of these humorous aspects of the Durang's play contains a dark polarity, and this dichotomy characterizes the inner conflicts of Sister Mary Ignatius herself.

I have a difficult time writing critically about a dramatists' prose. Plays, consisting mostly of dialogue, give very little insight into the voice of the author himself. However, Durang's mastery of irony reveals his objective style, and he is always conscious of the character.

Dry September

Unlike a great deal of southern authors, Faulkner does not restrict the subject of his work to racism; rather, he portrays racism and the violence it propagates as the central conflict within a larger scheme of injustices and immoralities that plague southern society. Throughout 'Dry September' Faulkner exemplifies his depiction of the structurally iniquitous south. A rich range of sentence structures and consistent correlation of thematic imagery characterize his style and ultimately condemn a culture.

A darkly colorful suspensive sentence opens the narration and sets an immediately tense tone. "Through the bloody September twilight, aftermath of sixty-two rainless days, it had gone like a fire in dry grass - the rumor, the story, whatever it was." Even at the end of this long suspensive modifier Faulkner maintains the ambiguity of his subject, the "rumor" or "story." "Something about Miss Minnie Cooper and a Negro." Faulkner does not explain the 'something,' instead he employs the social inference of his reader. Obscurity is perhaps the signature 'Faulknerian;' the incapacity of characters and readers alike to determine what is 'known' or certain about the conditions of the narration. The continuity of any certainties in a Faulkner story is constantly skewed by the shifting perspectives of the narration. Hence the central plot catalyst in 'Dry September', a potential rape or mere harassment, maintains its ambiguity throughout the work. Despite all apparent evidence and the conjectures of readers, Faulkner never explicitly clarifies the accusations against Will Mayes or even the fate of Mayes himself.

Faulkner's most explicit expression of his own views resounds through the thematic correlation of the subtle imagery that distinguishes writing. An imagery in which the actions of characters symbolizes their qualities and attributes.

"The barber wiped the razor carefully and swiftly, and put it away, and ran to the rear, and took his hat from the wall." Here Faulkner describes the action of Hawkshaw, the barber and perhaps the story's central protagonist. Early in the narration 'Hawk' argues with the lynch revelers who fan the 'fire' of hysteria that emits from the 'rumor' or 'story.' Hawk defends the rights of Will Mayes, who he describes as "a good nigger," and even alludes that Miss Minnie Cooper may have conceived the rumor herself. Through Hawk, readers first suspect the innocence of Mayes and the contrivance of Cooper, and also through his description of Cooper we first glimpse a correlative civil rights theme: the displacement and desperation of older, single women in southern society.

As the band inclines to pursue Mayes, Hawk chases after them, first wiping his barber's razor "carefully and swiftly" and putting it away. With the inclusion of this subtle image Faulkner informs the reader of Hawk's moralistic intentions. The antagonist McLendon 'whirled' out of the barber shop as 'the screen door crashed behind' him. Hawk's actions correlate to his more meticulous and thoughtful approach of a matter which may be of life or death. Though he does not directly stand up for Mayes, Hawk beckons the townspeople to a meticulous consideration of the matter.

However, in Faulkner's world there are no decisive protagonist or antagonist. The only clear character role are those of victims. In 'Dry September' each character may very well be a victim. The antagonist Miss Minnie Cooper is obviously a victim of her own disposition; a state of social reproach that she projects onto Will Mayes. The treatment of Mayes is another obvious use of symbolic imagery. "They worked busily about the Negro as though he were a post," Faulkner notes in a not only dehumanizing simile, but one which evokes the symbols of crucifixion.

Even the primary antagonist McLendon, a veteran of the trenches, Faulkner ultimately portrays as an embittered, abusive, drunk; who is perhaps the product of his environment. An environment that Faulkner describes as 'dead:' his central motif. A quality of death broods in the atmosphere of Jefferson County, reflecting a withering social hierarchy that infects the deteriorating souls of the denizens themselves. "Their motion was like an extinct furnace blast: cooler, but utterly dead."

The stale air, an image that resonates from the descriptive sentence to the last and receives its ultimate reverberation in the title 'Dry September,' encompasses the frustrated fury of a stagnate society - the violent south.

Suspension Sloping Off, Stranger in the Village

I should have only taken two, but I was already high and not lending much focus to irreverent details like 'uptown,' 'downtown' signs, so it took three trains; that is three separate subway transfers to get me to Roosevelt Island on Saturday night. Resilient patience is a quality that these nights instill. Rushing between platforms to catch late night trains before they skid off into their tunnels, leaving only a fleeting gust of humid exhaust and a thirty minute interval before the next arrival, I have developed patience. L to 3rd, L back to 14th, and J uptown all the way to Roosevelt Island, a few flights of stairs, then a static escalator, and now all I have to do is find the place. I forgot to write down the address. It's starting to rain, not pour, but a light shower seems imminent. A dull blue light illuminates the phone dial, as I punch the keys in the dark; scrolling through names, noting those who might know the address, my destination. Manhattan looms between apartments to the east, as I squint at the screen and stroll without specific direction. I don't care. I'm tired. With any luck, I'll be drunk or half-drunk, within two hours and I won't have to care. Although the night skyline is really nice from Roosevelt Island, gazing from the outside in, but I don't really care: I'm tired.

Baldwin:

Though James Baldwin's tone oscillates throughout 'Stranger in the Village' between an ironic reflection and an emphatic examination of that same irony's underlying tensions; subtle narrative observations catalyze his argument by distinguishing his voice from writers who more directly and perhaps more haphazardly approach racial issues. Setting his essay within a vivid account of his stay in an isolated Swiss village, Baldwin may not only juxtapose America's race-relations to those of Europe's, but he manages to deter readers from judging his work as exclusively critical of America. Instead, early into the passage readers find themselves absorbed by its context without minding the political implications of it's content.

While Baldwin introduces the subject of 'the black man' within the first sentence of his narrative, he refrains moralizing thesis until well into the work, after he has established a humanizing precedent for the account. Much of his first two pages ironically describes the homogenous population of his Swiss setting. His account of the village's solitary Protestant church and the absence of a movie theater or even a bank, constructs a very un-American image of this locale, but ultimately Baldwin progresses to a humanizing element of the village cultural; which establishes the universality of his theme.

"There is often something beautiful, there is always something awful, in the spectacle of a person who has lost one of his faculties," Baldwin describes the seasonal pilgrimage of handicapped citizens to dip in the mountain village's hot-spring, "a faculty he never questioned until it was gone, and who struggles to recover it. Yet people remain people"

This thematic parallel occurs within the same paragraph in which Baldwin's begins transitioning the tone of his narration by recalling the first encounter with European reaction to race. "Neger! Neger!" the children proclaim as Baldwin passes on the street, though he professes their innocents, he admits his own frustration with their disposition; and so as the fourth paragraph of his essay begins, Baldwin recalls his reaction and first begins his juxtaposition of 'the American Negro' with 'the black man' abroad.

A historical and moralistic narration ensues. His account questions not only race-relations in America, but the significance of those relations within the global discourse on race. By writing from a neutral nation, Baldwin frames his story beyond the scope of national politics, implying that race-relations are a transcontinental and essentially human controversy. As a writer, Baldwin emphatically and with some reasonably palpable rage, states his thesis for the rights of 'the black man,' worldwide and in America, but as a stylist Baldwin also empowers his ironic tone and setting to mediate his message in a means that surpasses the limits of language.