One way to describe it is to say this book is full of the kinds of short stories they'd force you to read in school—they reek of a high school library. Another way is, it's as if the artsy fartsy kid you knew who dabbled in mythology and the supernatural and was fond of speaking in cryptic tones ended up getting pretty good at the technical aspects of writing. Yet another way, I guess, is if Flannery O'Connor actually attempted to do what William Faulkner did (according to O'Connor, she wouldn't even dare to compete with him.) Or maybe James Joyce is a better analogue. Regardless, I wouldn't go so far to say the collection is bad, but I will say that I intensely hate it. Mainly for the "it feels like the stories I was forced to read in school part." One star.
"The Golden Apples" by Eudora Welty (1949)
There's a reason this novel/short story cycle is largely forgotten, and I think it's due to its avant garde nature—Ever hear of the Russian Formalists? One of their theories was that art should make the familiar, unfamiliar, so you can look at the familiar again with fresh, naive eyes. Welty does this CONSTANTLY: off-center metaphors, angular clauses, time shifts, prismatic perspectives, flights of fancy, a flood of characters, description that teeters into the bizarre—presumably to make this story of one generation of neighbors in a small southern town seem grand, even as nothing extraordinary ever really happens. Now don't get me wrong, I think Welty is a remarkably skilled writer, and she pulls off the avant garde quite well, in the technical sense. It's just fucking irritating: even as I found some of the characters very affecting (the best relationship is between a piano teacher and her student) I simply couldn't wait to finish this god damn book; in fact, that it's all somewhat difficult to process made that speedy desire all the more frustrating. That all that is at service to a story, seemingly, about people who feel a desperate need to go somewhere but can't figure out for the life of them where that is, unfortunately, in the end, feels naggingly unsatisfying. To say the book doesn't wield a unique sort of magic would be a lie. To say that Welty knows how to use the avant garde in a Faulkner-esque way that intrigues more than it frustrates would also be a lie. Two stars.
"The Bride of the Innisfallen and Other Stories" by Eudora Welty (1955)
I think I hate Eudora Welty. I suppose I should clarify: I think I hate Eudora Welty's work. And it's not because I think she's a bad writer. In the past I've spoken about how her stories can seem old-fashioned, and about how a reader can feel they're jumping through a whole host of challenging hoops for nothing. Perhaps maybe I can equate her stories to a game of chess: each character seems to serve a specific function, and each piece moves around the board, stiffly, according to their assigned function, interacting with other pieces/functions in different ways to achieve a certain goal. Now, even though each piece may be meticulously hand carved and striking in appearance, and the board may be handsomely colored and designed, and the collisions of pieces may be somewhat inventive, the last thing you ever want recounted to you is the full picture of the ins and outs of a particular chess game, even a thrilling one. I guess what I'm saying is, the stories—with the shared theme of journeys into the unknown—don't ever feel alive to me. You can say Greek mythology essentially takes on a "chess game" form, but with one key exception: there was one captivating, unpredictable human being in there running amok, upsetting everybody's clockwork function (Odysseus actually makes an appearance here but, perhaps unsurprisingly, he comes across as boring.) Even in the most interesting story, "No Place for You, My Love," about two strangers who decide to venture south of New Orleans on a whim, the evocative and lengthy descriptions of that very unusual, very swampy, bug-clouded world eventually begin to reek of dried paint, and the people begin to feel plasticine. Eudora Welty was such a skilled writer, it's possible that this is exactly what she wanted her work to feel like: not a flowing filmreel of ongoing life, but a past rendered in swirling, melodramatic oils that's been framed and encased in protective glass. That's entirely possible. But if I die and find out that the world of death smells exactly like dried paint, I wouldn't at all be surprised. One star.
"On Writing" by Eudora Welty (2002)
I feel like we all forgot about her—sure, Flannery O'Connor wrote better short stories, and sure, Flannery O'Connor was so enticingly mean, and sure, it's a little odd that a fellow Southern writer wouldn't mention Flannery O'Connor once in her book about writing (Faulkner gets gushed upon), but Eudora Welty was still good. At the very least, Eudora Welty was more generous in her thoughts about it, even in this short, 100-page book (Flannery O'Connor's mysteries and manners kind of feels like a scolding.) What's different about this one? First, it starts from a base of: Not everybody can write. So it immediately dispenses with "Writing 101" issues. Hence, it also dispenses with the Writing 101 idea that writing should be a mirror reflection of life, and insists that good writing is really more an imitation of life, similar to how Van Gogh's sunflowers don't quite look like real sunflowers, and that's what makes it beautiful. The rest of her thoughts lie on this elevated level: how does the writer work with the reader to, together, create something beautiful? The effect is to expand your understanding of how beauty is achieved beyond, say, describing landscapes using exquisite words. And you could see her focus on beauty across each page: this is probably the best written treatise on writing I've ever read, wordsmith-wise. As I went through this I couldn't help but think that the prevailing writing advice I've received: "Just keep reading and writing," is flat-out horrible advice—yes, I've learned how to pack an enormous amount of big thoughts into one small paragraph and still make it digestible, but is what you just read beautiful? I would say no. Four stars.
"A Curtain of Green and Other Stories" by Eudora Welty (1941)
Welty is one of those writers where every story I've seen of hers, in collegiate fiction anthologies, came from this, her first book. And while those excerpted stories are great, you can also already see why her literary standing would sort of peter out. Unlike other older writers I've read recently, the bulk of this feels very much of its time, it doesn't quite transcend it. Maybe it's the tendency towards overwrought description, maybe it's the "young writer" character choices: old people, deaf mutes, freaks, slow people, hitchhikers, traveling salesmen, and adolescents, all similarly "flat"; maybe it's the overreliance on narrative obliqueness, an overreliance on simile—honestly, I can't pinpoint why it all feels so dusty to me. Stories that feel more like character sketches? That end with unexplained deaths? Too many sensitive characters who have unusually vivid daydreams? Comedy that's a tad too broad and drama that's a tad too serious? Pulp irony that might be nothing more than actual pulp? Before TV, there used to be a divide between "pop short stories" and "serious literature," and this kind of feels like it's trying to bridge that divide—it's not "Criminal Minds" and it's not "The Wire", it's more like "NYPD Blue". And who wants to watch NYPD Blue over the other two? The "complete trash" show and the "prestige serial" show are both great. Two stars.