“Dietrologia”
by Paul Theroux
from the December 7, 2020 issue of The New Yorker
It feels like it’s been a while since we’ve had anything by Paul Theroux show up in The New Yorker. I’m a fan, so “Dietrologia” is most welcome.
The story begins with an older man, Sal Frezzolini, sitting in a rocking chair telling a group of kids the following:
Listen, in the debris field otherwise known as my life, I recall one funny thing — but when I say funny I don’t mean it was funny chuckle-chuckle. It was horrible and obvious, but I didn’t have the capacity to see it then — that was a gift I developed later.
Much like the children Sal is talking to, I am somewhat intrigued but lost at this point. Sal himself seems only partly present and admits to being confused.
I have not finished the story yet. I am interested, but I had something else I needed to do at the time. I’ll be honest, I’m not as hooked as I hoped to be, but I’ll get back to it.
In the meantime, please feel free to leave any thoughts you have below!
Why do I feel sorry for stories that don’t get comments? I can see why, though, as this was perfectly tolerable, but kind of bland and lacking much drive. It’s about a contemplative person who is “on the periphery” but how to dramatize this? It’s certainly a well-intentioned sympathetic look at the ruminative types among us (including most writers I’d imagine) but only in the sort of projected ending does it get up on its feet and start to go somewhere.
I enjoyed this story, but I agree that it doesn’t have much drive. Otoh, I liked it more than some stories with drive we’ve had recently that basically drove off a cliff.
I like the easy way the story — and the chief character — get to the point of realizing that sometimes it’s better to move your energy in one direction rather than another. That’s its better to stop struggling with another person in your life and accept basic emotional realities — the truth behind external events. Dietrologia.
I agree that the story seemed to amble along slowly and I did get lost in the narrator’s musings at times. What I found particularly unique about this piece though was the indifference of the narrator, especially towards the end as major events are quickly listed in a few paragraphs. The narrative started familiar with an older man musing about his past to the neighborhood children, while passively resisting the move to a retirement community that his wife has facilitated. His one attempt to actually do something in the present, rather than just sitting with his past, (confronting the children’s father on his abuse) results in both him and his wife being rejected from the retirement community, him being forbidden to see the children any longer (was he accused of molesting the kids?), and his wife leaving him. Yet he shows the same indifference as in the beginning of the story, as if all of this has already happened and is no longer important (if it ever was). I enjoyed reading this piece, even if it did lose me at times with it’s prose, which honestly may have been purposeful. I look forward to reading more of Theroux’s work.