Comments on: Richard Yates: Eleven Kinds of Loneliness

By: KevinfromCanada

KevinfromCanada — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:58:03 +0000

I was very heartened by the election results — it is nice to have the USA back in the world community. And I certainly salute the American black community for this achievement.

As for Shadow Country, it is proving to be a difficult sled — I’m almost halfway through book two so I am approaching the halfway point. There is no doubt that it is a signficant book but the writing is dense and plot development is very complex. I’ll also say that the Florida Gulf Coast and Everglades are about as far from my experience as you can get, so I don’t bring a lot of local knowledge to the reading, which makes it even more difficult. I could see it winning, mainly on the basis of the author’s very lofty goals in attempting it, but wouldn’t advise you to put everything else aside to read it before the announcement. I’ll post more detailed comments on the NBA site when I finish it. I am glad I took the break yesterday and will probably take another one along the way.

By: Trevor Berrett

Trevor Berrett — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 15:28:27 +0000

I’m glad you liked this one so much, Kevin! And I’m likewise sure you enjoyed the elections from last night!

By the way, I’m very anxious for your views on Shadow Country, a book I haven’t gotten my hands on yet and don’t feel I have the time to tackle between now and when the National Book Award is announced.

By: KevinfromCanada

KevinfromCanada — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 22:22:03 +0000

I took a break from Shadow Country today and read Eleven Kinds of Loneliness — and what a wonderful break it was. Yes, these stories may have come from early in his career but they certainly indicate a brilliant writer. My comparison would probably be Salinger, who I think used the Glass family stories in a similar way to explore the America of his time — which is actually only a few years on. Builders would probably be my favorite, but that might just be a reflection of my mood as I read them (it is particularly interesting to be reading this on Election Day, waiting to watch the cable channel for what I hope is the most hopeful American election result since I was a teenager). I did like every single story and can’t wait to go back for a more careful read. I can’t thank you enough, Trevor, for putting me onto Yates — I would never have picked him up without your initial review and now I have already read two wonderful volumes. Thanks again.

By: Trevor Berrett

Trevor Berrett — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 03:08:14 +0000

Thanks for filling in the middle, zhiv. I can never get everything I mean to in these posts – that is even if I manage to catch things in the first place.

That makes these comments the perfect place to fill in gaps (the many) as well as get different perspectives.

As for Miss Snell being like Mrs. Givens, I don’t think so. They may be similarly pathetic and similarly unlikeable, but I think the reasons are very different. Miss Snell is a perfectionist when it comes to self-denial, and she expects that of her students. She’s trying to teach industry and it’s costing a lot. Mrs. Givens, on the other hand, was at least a bit personable as she attempted to manage relationships. Neither are flattering women.

I definitely look forward to reading the biography. I checked it out a few weeks ago only to return it unread. I decided I might go through the novels first, which means it will be a while before I get to the bio!

By: zhiv

zhiv — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:46:19 +0000

Not that this comment thread should be about Richard Russo. I like your points about the two school stories and Builders very much, and Builders seems to mark an obvious breakthrough to more mature work. But you leave out the middle, it seems, and a lot of very interesting stuff, male-female relationships that prefigure RevRoad, the one about the wife’s infidelity as she visits her husband in the TB ward, the weird, building, violent, impotent rage in the B.A.R. man. And I really like Jazz Piano, which seems to be Yates’ most Fitzgerald-Hemingway story, the type of thing that Frank Wheeler would have wanted to try to capture if he and April had made it to Europe. There’s an echo of the relationship of Frank and Shep there, as I recall, with interesting issues of artistic appreciation and race, and the ugly American dilettante and aesthete. Jack O’Lantern is a great introductory story, and “Fun” is a great character study–I haven’t thought much about the stories here “prefiguring” RevRoad, but isn’t Miss Snell a bit like Mrs. Givens? When you get to the biography, you’ll enjoy reading about Yates writing the stories and working at his craft in Europe, and struggling to find a story big enough to write out as a novel.

By: zhiv

zhiv — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:31:02 +0000

I read somewhere–no idea exactly where–that Russo is working on a screenplay based on three of Yates’ stories. No idea what the stories are either. Easter Parade has been in development as a movie for some time. In the introduction, as in Richard Ford’s intro to RevRoad, you get a clear sense of that “writer’s writer” thing that you often hear with Yates. They read his work back in the 60s and 70s, and it was very influential in their approach to writing fiction.

I read a couple of Russo’s early books, but haven’t looked at or thought about reading his books for a long time now.

By: KevinfromCanada

KevinfromCanada — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 16:18:21 +0000

John: I do quite like Russo but will admit that is more because of the geography and society where he locates his books than the writing itself. I wouldn’t compare him Irving who, at least in his better books, focuses more on his characters, with the world they live in serving more as a context. Russo on the other hand explores what the economic decline (mainly of small town, upstate New York, although Empire Falls moves into New England, where he lives) means to the people who live there and have no real chance of escape. I’m not sure how relevant he would be to you — to me he captures a part of North American experience that is worth the effort. He is not a “great” but for me is well worth exploring. I would not call him sentimental, neither would I say he is dramatic.

By: John Self

John Self — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 15:40:15 +0000

Now this is interesting, Kevin. We all have our prejudices – where they come from we don’t know – and I’m afraid that I had, with no evidence whatever, pegged Russo down as ‘not for me’. For some reason I think of him as a poor man’s John Irving (and if some of Irving’s recent output is anything to go by, that’s poor indeed) – a sort of widescreen sentimentalist.

Shall I take it from your comments that I’m going to have to rethink this unthinking view?

By: Trevor Berrett

Trevor Berrett — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:44:18 +0000

Thanks, Kevin. Russo's Empire Falls is one of those books that I've picked up from the bookstore's shelf many times only to put it back thinking I'll get to it soon. I'm sure I'll get to it even sooner now with your recommendation. After all, the same thing has been going on with Gilead and I finally bought that one a week ago. I'm anxious for your thoughts on Yates's short stories. While there are similarities with Revolutionary Road, it was not close to the same experience for me. That said, it was still a good experience.

By: KevinfromCanada

KevinfromCanada — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 21:42:39 +0000

I’ve ordered this (actually cheated — ordered the complete short stories in what looks like quite a nice St. Marten’s volume) and noticed that Richard Russo wrote the intro for the volume I ordered. And I see no reviews for Russo on your site when I search, so I’m suggesting you consider him.

All his work that I have read (which I think is everything but his short stories) is set in upstate New York, so it isn’t far from your neck of the continent. Empire Falls won the Pulitzer, The Bridge of Sighs is the most recent. I would have a tough time choosing between those two — EF is probably the better written, for me Bridge of Sighs has a better story. And I have enjoyed all the other novels, although they are less complicated than these two. Put Russo down for a future read — like Yates, once you read one, I’m pretty sure you’ll want to keep on going.

I’ll comment on this most interesting review once the book has arrived and I have read it. Keep up the good work.