“A for Alone”
by Curtis Sittenfeld
from the November 2, 2020 issue of The New Yorker
I feel the same trepidation venturing into a new Curtis Sittenfeld story as I felt a few weeks ago when Lorrie Moore’s “Face Time” went up: I do not know if I can do topical fiction right now (for the record, commenters on Moore’s story assured potential readers that it was worthwhile, and not just because it addressed dying on the other side of Face Time). Sittenfeld is the athor of American Wife and Rodham, two alternate takes on prior First Ladies; learning from the interview with Willing Davidson that “A for Alone” features Mike Pence . . . I just don’t know if I can do that right now.
Sittenfeld’s story is set in 2017, so it might have enough separation from the present moment. Irene, the central character, has an art installation inspired by Pence’s rule that a married man not eat alone with another woman.
For her art, Irene has gone out to eat with many married men, all for art. At lunch, she asks them questions. Here is how the story begins:
Irene’s medium, the one in which she has exhibited at galleries, is textiles, but for “Interrogating Graham/Pence” she decides to use Polaroid photos and off-white Tintoretto paper. Even though the questions will be the same for all the men, she handwrites them in black ink, because the contrast of her consistent handwriting with the men’s varied handwriting will create a dialogue in which she is established as the interrogator. Before her lunch with Eddie Walsh, she writes:
I enjoyed this! Clever roulette-like structure: several interactions detailed, story lands on one and expands from there. Smart, if ambiguous, questions into the dynamics between men and women. And art. Worthwhile to me!
I wasn’t a fan of the story, though I’ve been a fan of hers since Prep. This short story wasn’t triggering or upsetting to read in our current politically-charged and unceasingly news-y moment; it was just insubstantial. Read it or don’t. I don’t expect either will have much impact.
I enjoyed this story. Smooth, easy to read, entertaining premise. She made very different experiences with each man. Then of course an affair. All well described in a realistic way. I love it when her husband finds out: he eats his dinner (moussaka!) then says, “Whatever you’re doing, knock it off immediately.” Those surgeons — they’re so wacky!
Maude’s last line is good: “I think it’s so odd that you’ve decided that Mike Pence either does or does not get to tell you what to do.” Yes, it’s blatant, but I think it’s earned by the flow of the story. And it generalizes the narrator’s preoccupation with the Pence/Graham Rule to a broader point: It’s a big mistake to let demagogic politicians so mesmerize us that we let them frame issues that are vital to our individual lives.
On the negative side, I think the story is truncated. What’s missing is any response by the narrator either to her husband’s indifference or to Maude’s comment.
First story I read from her, and there are many aspects I enjoyed. (Sorry, many spoilers in what follows). The narrator tells the story following Irene’s point of view: she’s created an art project she believes will address an interesting topic of modern life and of man / woman relationship. As we go on, the project seems as dull as Irene’s flirtatious interactions with the men she interviews. Her discussions, her answers, even the prose of the novel become mechanic, hollow. We start understanding that there is a big emptiness inside Irene, that she’s trying to fill. That her supposedly interesting and happy life is none of the two (watching a Netflix documentary a day, is this what it means to be an artist?). She will dive head first into the first opportunity for escaping all of this – no matter how cliché or unattractive this opportunity is. She will completely forget her project. She will finally go back to her usual life, but at least she will have a perception of its dullness.
I felt the novel went a little to fast towards the end, after Irene starts her affair. We spend pages reading about nonsense chattering (rightfully so, they set the appropriate tone for the novel), and then her affair and the description of the relationship with her husband pass as a breeze. It is as if the author, after having made her point, decided the story was not worth further exploration.
I also enjoyed Maud’s closing sentence, it makes you feel the intellectual distance between the two characters.
Very nice analysis.
I thought this was very entertaining and a page turner but it raised two interesting issues. 1. Free will vs. Fate–Would Irene have cheated anyway? Is that perhaps what she needed? Or did she start the project in fact hoping for adultery? Or did she simply mess with fate and end up with an unexpected (but mostly happy) result but based on her free choice? So…is Pence right? Ironically, his rule does seem to have some grounding even if he’s a contemptible hypocrite. 2. Each “date” seems like a possible foray into a genre she doesn’t explore. There’s a touching friendship with the older gay man story? The possible therapy of helping a man whose son has tried to commit suicide and then finally an adultery narrative. I was amused, touched, saddened, irritated by these various stories. Her friend the artist is a patronizing jerk (to me) but the man with the suicidal son is sad. And then…the great last line…after she’s made us think about quite a bit it’s a great comic toss off.
And…Trevor–I’d STRONLGY recommend you read this and it’ll not upset you I don’t think.
I loved this story. I like the deftness of the writing where so much can be said with such simple words. ‘While holding up the camera, she says, “You have a tiny bit of—” She runs the tip of her tongue between her own left central and lateral incisors.’ I loved the word “own” here. Not “her … incisors” but “her own … incisors”. At some level, Irene is (in my interpretation) imagining being intimate with Ken hence the need to emphasise that her tongue is in her own mouth. The strong political message doesn’t detract from the piece’s literary qualities and vivid descriptions.
Do I agree with William’s examples to indicate that the story is truncated? Perhaps very slightly.
Should the narrator have reacted to her husband’s indifference? Perhaps, but the story still feels complete to me.
Is it a fair criticism that we don’t learn the narrator’s response to Maude’s final comment about not letting Mike Pence
control our lives? No, not at all, in my opinion. The narrator’s response is given clearly by omission. The fact that that
stands powerfully as a final sentence tells us that the narrator agrees with it.
I enjoyed the story, which like the magazine cover “swirled” deeper into the themes of politics and personal intertwining. Maude’s final line “you’ve decided he does or doesn’t” I found so ambiguous and layered. Haven’t we all decided Pence does or doesn’t, in some way? Once “art” (even in the form of a questionnaire) or whatever made you “aware” that you had to decide… And that line I thought was nicely anticipated the prior paragraph’s “stopped clock right twice a day” (does or doesn’t) which itself draws attention to the inescapability of how time offers new worlds every second, exemplified by how every one of the planned “art encounters” goes differently, offering another multiverse of possibilities- the clock is never right once you act…