Here’s my personal connection to the complex relationships I felt this story played with, even if not very effectively. I live right next to Newark, New Jersey. Now, Newark is not as bad as this region in Nigeria, thankfully. But over the past forty years it has been pretty awful and is only marginally better now. I have a lot of contact with good people who live in Newark and Irvington (another impoverished place overran by drugs and gangs), so I know that great people live in these areas. However, most people who live around Newark and Irvington don’t venture in — there is some deep mistrust. The man’s statement at the end — “You know, we need to start trusting each other” — hit the mark for me. Newark’s desire to become better is hindered, in part, by a severe amount of understandable but also ridiculous mistrust. Each year there are arguments about why the kids from Newark, if they want to compete in sporting events, must always travel to the suburban schools. Why can’t the suburban schools travel to Newark? Well, for some very good reasons. And I frankly have no desire to send my children to Newark. But those reasons aren’t helping to solve any problems. The division doesn’t go away. People who live in Newark understandably feel some shame and resentment at being treated this way. And a society that evolves under those kinds of feelings doesn’t evolve well.

I’m a part of this too, though I do go to Newark, always uncomfortably. I’ve been there several times in the evening, and I have to admit I don’t feel like trusting anyone who’s out on the street. It’s both understandable and ridiculous to feel that way. Bad things happen frequently enough that one assumes they happen all the time everywhere. The man who is offering to help you is obviously doing it only to rob and then kill you. One can see why such assumptions do little to strengthen relationships between towns and regions.

But it’s easy to say we should trust one another. Putting that into practice is incredibly difficult. After all, there are real reasons for the mistrust. Bad things do happen. Your chances of getting robbed in Newark are significantly higher than if you were in my hometown. We hear about bad things happening all the time. There is a need to go in, to soften the border, to have better relationships with the majority of the population who is living there and wants to do so in peace. But how to do this? This story doesn’t answer that question. I don’t know if anyone can really answer that question.

Now, I realize that I’m not talking about the exact same thing this story is talking about. But I do think that the general subject of this story applies.

Of course, just because a story contains this pathway of thought for me doesn’t make it a well executed story. I still don’t think it was great. But I did think it was interesting, and it did cause me to think.

I was annoyed at the implausibility of it. Why would this priest, who knows how dangerous the place is he is going into, risk it by going by himself in an unreliable vehicle? There was mention that he could have gone more safely if he waited for the weekend. In the end, he probably lost all of the money he collected, and again, that is something he would have foreseen.

The “bad guy” being a baddie didn’t ring true either – if all he wanted was the car, why would he seek out the priest, even pay people to find him? I’m afraid the priest’s thought processes (and therefore the author’s) did not make sense.

I’ll be interested to see how we all feel about “Safari.” I’m almost finished with it, but it’s not doing much for me right now.

I will certainly carry on with this project, and look forward to further installments.

Also, thanks for asking some interesting questions about short stories in general. I’ll do my best to add to it, and I hope others will come and give their opinions and experience.

Well, you’ve picked a difficult short story to serve as a comparison piece. I think Ozick’s “The Shawl” is a superlative short story, and in many ways it does stand alone. Rarely have I read anything as impactful in such few words — or in many words, to be truthful.

However, I do think short stories vary greatly, and while there are some limitations to their form, there are also some advantages. This story, for instance, to me was very impactful because of the abrupt ending. After all, all of the priest’s build-up was quickly cut off when he realized it was for nothing, that his mistrust (while understandable) wasn’t called for. So we experience that sudden epiphany with the priest, and it does end quickly because that’s as far as we need the story to take us. The rest of it — ruminating on the fact that this type of mistrust is one of the major problems in these types of communities but also that this type of mistrust is entirely understandable — is up to us. The author hopes that we have come to a realization along with the protagonist.

I wouldn’t say that this is a necessary formula for short stories, though. I think James Joyce pioneered this type of story (lenghty build-up, quick resolution or “epiphany”) with Dubliners, and many have seen that it is indeed a great way to subvert readers’ expectations. Build up, get the reader to go down one pathway, and then cut it down in a quick paragraph showing how wrong we were to be going down that pathway with the story’s protagonist. While Joyce’s “epiphanies” were primarily about stasis and paralysis, others have used this type of form to explore other themes. One of my favorites of this type, besides Joyces masterpieces, is Jhumpa Lahiri’s “A Temporary Matter.” It’s a beautiful build-up, as well constructed as most novels, and the realization at the end left me silent and withdrawn for the next few days after my first reading (which was not a bad thing at all).

But I think there are many other types of short stories, ones that develop a clearer narrative arch more like a novel. I’m thinking of one of my favorites from last year’s The New Yorker, “A Tiny Feast,” a story about Titania and Oberon’s attempt to parent a mortal child with leukemia.

Other short stories use the exploit the form to render a deeply impressionistic piece that would be unbearable in a longer form. For example, the short form gives the author the chance to experiment with voice and tone in a way that would be too grueling drawn out in a longer work. My example here is George Saunders’ “The Victory Lap,” also published last year in The New Yorker. To read this type of writing for much longer would be exhausting and ultimately more burdensome than beneficial; but to read it for a few pages is invigorating and effective. Even from the quintessential maximalist, David Foster Wallace’s “Wiggle Room” would get old after too many pages, but the short form is perfect to capture an intense moment of this man’s suicidal frustration at his job. While much of this type of writing can make up a part of a longer work, in short form it comes undiluted.

So short stories are often ways to give quick bursts of feeling, whether in a single paragraph at the end of a long build up or in one lengthy anti-climactic rant. I love the best of them as much as I love the best of novels, though they are entirely different experiences to read.

Sorry if this sounded pedantic. I do hope you’ll respond to this quick summation, and that others will feel free to expand or refute what I’ve said above.

At any rate, Colette, I hope that though you didn’t particularly enjoy this piece (and while I liked it, especially when I saw what the author was trying to get us to consider, it was not one of my favorites), you’ll continue with us for a while to see if something hits the sweet spot!