In her introduction to Best American Short Stories 2013, Elizabeth Strout writes that what she wants from a short story is"the news that is kept secret, the unsayable things that occur in the dark crevices of the mind." When you wander into territory of a Charles Baxter story, you find older men confronted by the desires of an adolescent girl; guilt that permeates a middle class; a stranger-substitute-teacher who brings equal shares of hope and misery; a woman whose childhood understanding of gender damns her future relationship. Do these stories surprise you with their wandering in the territory of the uncomfortable? Do the babies in the Loreto chapels of Prague take away your breath with their gaudy little faces? Do you feel as if you were hit by a tram while traipsing around a new city? Pay attention to the passage in "Bravery" where Susan is watching TV. Does she seem lost to you?
Wednesday, August 27, 2014
Charles Baxter Is Brave
In her introduction to Best American Short Stories 2013, Elizabeth Strout writes that what she wants from a short story is"the news that is kept secret, the unsayable things that occur in the dark crevices of the mind." When you wander into territory of a Charles Baxter story, you find older men confronted by the desires of an adolescent girl; guilt that permeates a middle class; a stranger-substitute-teacher who brings equal shares of hope and misery; a woman whose childhood understanding of gender damns her future relationship. Do these stories surprise you with their wandering in the territory of the uncomfortable? Do the babies in the Loreto chapels of Prague take away your breath with their gaudy little faces? Do you feel as if you were hit by a tram while traipsing around a new city? Pay attention to the passage in "Bravery" where Susan is watching TV. Does she seem lost to you?
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I find this to be an interesting piece. One particular moment that really catches my eye is early when Sarah mentions that she doesn't like troublemakers, preferring nice boys. This forms an interesting bookend with the end when Elijah gets into a fight, an act that can be attributed to be a 'bad boy' but only did it to protect someone else, showing that he's still a nice guy, and this is when Sarah seems to get over their previous fight and they reconcile. It's also a good show of bravery, displaying the overall theme of the work.
ReplyDeleteI’m not sure exactly what these blog comments are supposed to entail, but I thought I’d give it my best shot. So, here goes it. One of the aspects of Baxter’s works that I found most intriguing and compelling is his introduction of characters that are comfortable with going against the grain. In “Gryphon” this character is Miss Ferenczi. In “Westland” it’s Jaynee or Earl, and in “Shelter” it could be James, Estelle, or Billy. In “Bravery” I would argue that Elijah, Susan, and the old woman all contain some of this character inside of themselves. Each story uses this character or these characteristics to induce a sort of mental “wandering,” not only for the other characters in the piece, but for the reader herself. Whether it’s Elijah’s “collection of unusual adjectives” or Susan’s variance between pragmatic thoughts about subjects such as dating – i.e. “trouble comes home. It moves in. It’s contagious.” – to her imagined version of the old woman’s shouted prophecy, these characters challenge the rigid manner in which we are sometimes forced to see the world. In the last passage of “Gryphon,” the students’ return to memorizing lists and being tested on their knowledge of somewhat useless information seems inconsequential next to the way in which Miss Ferenczi taught them to use their imaginations and consider subjects deeply. Maybe half-truths and lies make us think more than simple fact. Baxter’s stories are driven by his characters and their unique ways of viewing the world. These characters reach out in a way designed to keep us from becoming complacent. Personally, I was also impressed by his ability to make large swaths of dialogue that might have seemed unnatural and out of left field read as plausible, especially the speeches made by Billy in “Shelter”.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I have read of Baxter's short stories, the problem is not often something overstated and precise, but something internal, and something fundamentally against what is the general consensus, the ordinary, or what "should" be. "Bravery" is subtle in that it does not directly state the conflict, nor does it ever completely resolve it; most of it happens internally, within Susan's own mind, and the reader is never completely exposed to what she is feeling. We are aware that she is disturbed, we are aware that she is uncomfortable, perhaps dissatisfied, even, but we are never given an exact reason. This is likely because even Susan herself does not understand the cause of her own feelings. She is adamant about her preferring "sweet", nice guys, guys who will provide for her, who will use adjectives that most guys would not be comfortable with, who will care for her children and treat her respectfully. Troublemakers will bring trouble to the home, will cause problems later on. It is obvious to her that she should want a sweet husband, a husband who will continually tell her she is beautiful, that she is loved, that he wants to raise a child with her. She wants a man who is not obsessed with sports, who is caring, kind, considerate, who is different from the boys who she teased before, the kind of boys she has written off as "the same as the rest". Elijah is not like the rest. He is unique, something she believes she cannot find in any other man. He is exactly what she should want, what she tells herself she wants, and what she is looking for.
ReplyDeleteAnd yet, some of her still yearns for what she claims she doesn't want. Even though there is seemingly no reason for her to be dissatisfied, she finds herself shaken by the old woman who, under normal circumstances, shouldn't bother her at all. Since the old woman cannot speak English, what she says is completely of her own creation - she will be jealous of the "woman inside of him". Elijah does not act like a stereotypical man. He takes on the role of the stereotypical woman and nurturer, he cares for woman, he is openly affectionate. All of their arguments relate back to stereotypical gender roles, whether it be saying affectionate things or nursing their child. She knows she shouldn't want the troublemaker, the stereotypical man. She shouldn't want the gruff "manly man" that will not care for her, that will watch sports more than their child, who will never use adjectives such as committed and devoted. But she wants it anyway, and even she cannot put it into words. When she says she loves him first, it is after he gets into a fight - when he comes back bloodied and beaten, something that is a very stereotypical male thing to do. She does not believe he bravely saved a girl from two men, but she still cleans him and nurtures him and puts off the argument for another day. She does not know why she is drawn to this, but she is.
Susan finds something attractive about troublemakers, in the manly man, in the masculine, but she knows that she wants the sweet, the affectionate, the gentle. She is unhappy with either, and unable to find the middle, because it likely does not exist. She goes for the sweet because it upsets her that she wants the other half of the coin, even if she can't put it into words. She knows what she "deserves" and what she wants, but her actual wants, desires, and thoughts do not always coincide. There is something incredibly human about that, and something we can all relate to. We don't always want what's best for us. Sometimes, we're not even entirely sure what that entails, and the concept might not exist at all.
I really like this story. I thought following Susan and Elijah's love was sweet and comforting. Even if at times it worried me that they would meet some kind of disaster. They did in a way but not the one I thought. When she was hit by the tram, I saw the story ending with her death or some kind of physical harm but Susan's problems ran far deeper that that. I think the part where Susan said in the beginning that she likes the men that are sweet and unassuming was her not being entirely truthful with herself. She has a relationship with her husband that is seemingly perfect. Though there are some things that do not sit well with her, the two times that they argue it is about things that relate to the stereotypical male and female roles in a relationship. The first is about her not saying I love you back to him. Something that is usually seen in the reverse order (the girl being the one that is left waiting for the I love you to be returned). After that she is in a constant state of avoidance, always going back to getting lunch even after she gets hit by the tram which is something that you would think she would be a little more concerned about. Instead she is still fixated on what the old woman said, or really didn't say about, but what she believed her to. The thing that she had been avoiding in her own mind, the thing that she could confront by putting them in the old woman's mouth. That she would be "jealous ... of the woman in him!"She really does not like his paternal and almost motherly nature. When they fight agin, it is because she dos not want him nursing their son. The image that she sees there is not one that she really wants. She feels like her territory is being encroached upon. Then when he goes out and get into the fight she says that she does not believe what he is saying but she is still seeing to his wounds and that is when she says "I love you". Only after he goes out and gets into a fight like a bad boy would does she feel better. She goes to sleep thinking that is the kind of person she would want her son to be. As much as she knows that a bad boy would be one to bring unbalance into her life and even though she has a strong and loving relationship with her husband, she does not like his soft side as much as she thinks she is supposed to. She can't help wanting what she thinks she should not want. I think it speaks to what it means to know yourself. How keeping with what is seen as the good or simple or less trouble is not always what will make you happy. That it is okay to wander into yourself to see what it is you want, not just what is said to be wanted.
ReplyDeleteCharles Baxter he does the unexpected in such a way that you aren’t surprised when he takes you into uncomfortable situations. I noticed that the four stories of his that we read all have a similar structure. We are introduced to the main character either through a description or scene of their exploits, and then a new person enters the character’s life and the character must cope with the all of the things that the new person brings to the table. In the case of “Gryphon,” Tommy is introduced to the substitute teacher; in “Westland,” Warren becomes involved with Jaynee and her family; in “Shelter,” Cooper has a lot of contact with the people on the streets and in the shelters, even taking one home; and finally, in “Bravery,” Susan meets Elijah, and they begin a life together. I’m not surprised that Baxter takes us into uncomfortable territory. What is a story without conflict, and what conflict is comfortable? Baxter takes us into sticky issues like gender and class and leaves us there, flailing along with his characters, as we try to sort through our own opinions while trying to understand the protagonists’.
ReplyDeleteIn “Bravery,” Baxter does a terrific job of making you see the cherubs in the Prague chapels. I especially like how he implied that the overwhelming theme of babies rendered the cross on the alter almost irrelevant and trivial. It gave me a sense of magnitude of the presence of the babies. But in contrast, I didn’t feel like I was hit by a tram. I was following Susan’s thoughts more, as she seemed to be in a kind of trancelike state when she was listening to the madwoman. The actual hitting I didn’t feel, but I could feel the aftereffects. All of the people around me, hovering over me, that I could feel, and that’s what made it real and not just something Baxter threw in at random.
In regards to the passage where Susan is watching TV, I’m at a loss. Susan specifically puts it on mute so that she doesn’t get sucked into a storyline. It’s as if she just wants something to look at while she thinks things through. But then, almost in spite of herself, I think, she does get lost in it. She follows the storyline of the show and commercials, seems absorbed and lost in them, trying not to think about the argument she had with Elijah while at the same time trying not to be too mindless that she forgets about her anger. It’s a kind of contradiction that fits in her character, though. From her childhood on, she is depicted as always liking the “sweet guys,” the kind of guys who care enough to wave. As is said, this is the guy she ends up marrying. And yet, it is that sweetness, that nurturing tendency that so attracted her is what in the end tips her over the edge. All in all, while “Bravery” was not my favorite of the Baxter pieces, it is still thought-provoking.
Compared to his other three short stories, I felt the tension of Charles Baxter’s “Bravery” acutely, the first of his works to discomfort me. The subtle magic of Baxter is his ability to say outright the character’s problem without actually revealing anything. In “Gryphon,” Tommy acknowledges the lack of mystery without Miss Ferenczi’s erratic teaching. Warren plainly states his ambiguous depression in “Westland,” and Cooper rightly identifies the guilt caused by his own satisfaction. The most extreme example of telling-nothing, however, incarnates in Baxter’s character Susan. We are told that Susan prefers the nice boy, the one who will wave, and in the same breath we watch her paint her nails, though none of the men she dates even notice. But despite this obvious friction in personal taste, the true conflict is in Susan herself, who cannot understand her place in the world or how to relate to those closest to her. She is uncomfortable with emotional intimacy, unable to tell Elijah she loves him at Prague or accept his concern when she is hit (“nudged”) by the tram. She fears her role in life and rebels against her initial self. Gone is the girl who teased men with her beauty; in its place is the woman who spills white wine upon first meeting Elijah, who throws her glass into the street and shatters it without care. Yet in rebelling against traditional gender roles, she sacrifices a part of her identity. She becomes enraged when she sees Elijah, a pediatrician, feeding milk to their son. In forfeiting the traditional role of a mother, she becomes isolated, adrift. She cannot article the source of her rage except that her husband has stolen her place, her role, and what does she have left? She is the distant figure on television, the woman on the autopsy table, breasts covered, vulnerable, on view for the medical examiner, the audience. She dreams of the tram, of an older woman being hit, presumably the madwoman who prophesized her jealousy. When Elijah returns from the fight, she is momentarily stabilized, comfortable now that he has performed a traditionally “masculine” action. This new security is tenuous, however, as this is not the nature of their relationship or how they interact with the world. The air, the voice of reason, whispers that this facade cannot last. When she looks in the mirror, she does not recognize herself, losing her smile in Elijah’s, in his victory in the fight. Susan is trapped within herself as she rebels against her instinct, restraining her nature and losing herself evermore.
ReplyDeleteA section of "Bravery" that really intrigued me was when the woman was shouting at Susan in Czech, and although she does not speak Czech, Susan could "understand" her. I believe that Susan used an active imagination to make up what the woman was saying, and created an outlet for her desires and anxieties about her relationship with Elijah.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that the woman said was that they would conceive a child in Prague, and it would be a boy. Susan and Elijah already had plans to conceive a child in Prague, so it is no wonder that this is in her mind. Something else that the woman says, that is not so evident, is that Susan will become jealous of Elijah. One of the first hints of this is when through out the story, Susan notices Elijah's many loving words and actions, but doesn't pay much attention to the love that she is reciprocating. She even neglects to return the "I love you" that Elijah has offered in the chapel with the babies. Another time that Susan seems jealous of Elijah is when he is feeding Raphael, and she insists that he is holding him wrong and should not be feeding him. One can assume that with his pediatric training and seemingly innate ability to be a doctor all the time and comfort people, something Susan recognizes on the flight to Prague, Elijah is probably feeding and holding the child correctly. But, Susan may be frustrated that Elijah can perform a more motherly task better than her, the actual mother between the two. This desire for Elijah to immediately understand some of her more abnormal outbursts, like who should feed Raphael, and her ability to understand a foreign language that she has never studied, makes it seem like she is almost trying to prove that Elijah can understand everybody, except her.
The thing that draws me into Baxter’s stories is the elements of strangeness, the slightly absurd, that permeates throughout his stories. The very strange substitute teacher, speaking of imaginative and wandering stories. The girl in the vaudeville-length overcoat sleeping in the zoo and her gun. The strange red-haired boy with shaky hands and a bakery robbery. The crazed old woman in the streets of Prague and the message gathered from her inane ramblings. All of Baxter’s stories carry at least some hint of the strange. But also, and perhaps more relevantly, they all possess characters who seem to be lost, and wandering. In “Westland”, there are many of these characters. First of all the narrator, who we first find at the zoo, watching the lions when he should be out getting groceries, confused by his ‘American Anger’ and shooting vainly at the nuclear plant. Then we have the young girl spending a night in the zoo, physically lost and wandering. Her father, lost in how to handle the raising of his rebellious daughter. In “Shelter”, we see Cooper seemingly lost in his life, seeking to help these homeless wanderers he sees in the city, in the hopes that it will somehow help him find his own kind of shelter. We see it again in “Bravery” where by the end, Susan seems to be lost in her marriage. Watching TV she falls asleep and we aren’t sure how much of it is dream and how much is real. Her thoughts are wandering between a genderless figure shot down by a man to a woman on the examining table, akin to the way her husband would use sex as an excuse to give her a doctorly examination. And lastly being hit by the tram in Prague. She’s lost in her thoughts about her marriage, jealous of the woman in her husband until he comes home bloody and beaten, like the stereotypical man.
ReplyDeleteI saw in Charles Baxter’s stories a theme of the discomfort of really being noticed—the way the Czech woman looks directly at Susan, when the substitute teacher in “Gryphon” watches him struggle to spell balcony, when everyone around Cooper seems to draw conclusions about his life out of nowhere—his wife telling him he’s a latent vagrant, the homeless woman pointing out his guilt. Baxter’s characters make assumptions about the people around them, too. But it’s true that everyone wants to be seen until they realize how clearly others can see them—when they begin to feel vulnerable and a little scared.
ReplyDeleteIn “Brave,” Susan looks for the shy boy and gives him a smile to hold on to. But these are just fleeting moments. She enjoys her power and says she doesn’t want a troublemaker. Then, when she finds a man who couldn’t be closer to her ideal—a man who says “I am undone” regarding her beauty and carries a handkerchief, she becomes self-conscious and scared. Elijah’s romantic trip to Prague and his talk about babies unnerves her—has her goal all this time been to find a feminine man? When she imagines the woman warning her, she is then hit by a slow-moving tram—I see this as the inevitable tap of her past catching up with her, all those girls flirting in gaggles and telling her what kind of man to look for. This is an uncomfortable topic but again, relatable—girls start out looking for a sensitive type, a romantic, but when they find one, they become wary of the same differences they had set out to find. I had never thought to discuss this as jealousy the way Baxter does.
The stories also address the discomfort of sexuality—when Elijah examines Susan as a doctor would, when Warren can’t stand to be around Jaynee in “Westland.” Cooper’s wife in “Shelter” describes how he was sexually “ambitious” in law school and how she likes him better now. I thought this was a great window into the fears of the characters, what they’re running from. These stories begin with discomfort and wander deeper into the fear and chaos, and their characters confront their own insecurities in the form of other people.
In Bravery, Susan doesn't feel lost to me so much as she is trying to deny what her subconscious mind is telling her. She has always known what she has wanted in a man: a kindhearted and sweet, good-looking man. She recognizes those who are handsome but not sweet, and ignores those who are neither. When she meets Elijah she knows that he is exactly what she has been looking for. Consciously, he is perfect for her. However, during the trip to Prague, when the old woman is shouting at her and she could understand, a piece of her subconscious thoughts floats to the surface: "I am going to have a child with this man, this man who is so much like a woman." She loves that he is sweet, and appreciates him for his gentleness, but with such feminine qualities (as she understands them) from him, her significant other, where is the place for herself? If he is the ultimate caregiver, what point is there in her being there? The balance to the relationship was disrupted and she became torn between her conscious love and subconscious fear of displacement. It is in that final scene, wherein Elijah acts with masculine traits: rashness and violence, that Susan is able to lose some of her fear and to relax.
ReplyDeleteThese points aren't blatantly obvious throughout the story, but run as an undercurrent, the space between the lines and the words and the letters that speaks directly to our minds and skips our eyes. I find Baxter's ability to do this rather impressive when it is done with such simple language.
Something that I’ve noticed about Charles Baxter’s stories – his characters display some very odd coping mechanisms when confronted with the parts of the world that make them uncomfortable. Rather than attempting to conform to the rest of society, they throw caution to the winds and go off on their own tangents.
ReplyDeleteIn “Bravery,” Susan encounters evidence of the craziness in the world in the form of a madwoman who rambles at them in Czech. She speaks very rapidly and invades their personal space by poking their shoulders. Most people would hightail it out of there, but Susan does not (her husband has to pull her away). In a sense, she throws herself into the craziness by imagining she understands the woman and that she is telling them about their future, becoming obsessed with the message she thinks she has recieved. And then we have her husband Elijah, who is portrayed throughout the story as the strong, yet loving, doctor. But he is not immune to the internal demons, first seen as insecurity when Susan doesn’t say that she loves him back and then again when she says that she doesn’t want him to feed their son because it is her job. And instead of being calm and rational like he usually is, Elijah leaves and gets into a fight that leaves him feeling refreshed and like he did something useful.
We see examples of this in Baxter’s other stories as well. The substitute teacher Miss Ferenczi in “Gryphon” does not approve of the students’ unchanging routine and the facts they are made to memorize, but she neither passively accepts the lesson plan nor tries to plainly tell the students that there is more to thinking than regurgitating information that they are handed. Instead, she tells them that when she is in the room six times eleven equals sixty-eight, that angels live beneath the clouds of Venus, and that Beethoven only pretended to be deaf. In “Westland,” Warren finds that his unhappy life is made better by carrying a gun under the seat of the car, and rebels against a nuclear power plant by firing at it from far away, not even caring if he hit anything. Cooper from “Shelter” tries to assuage his (unknown until Billy points it out to him) guilt over his good life by going a step beyond volunteering at a shelter and giving out meals and money. He attempts to lift Billy’s spirits by bringing him home, an action that backfires with his wife and son.
By following their own path, these characters risk being shunned in society as well, and yet they decide not to conform anyway. In a way, they are being brave by choosing to show off the little bit of crazy that they carry inside them that other people would choose to hide.
There is a large gap between Susan's past and her "present" in the narrative as we're given. There is only a glimpse of what kind of person she was when she was younger, and then the rest is focused on her adult life, who she has become, even more so the trip (the wandering) to Prague, that is where she is able to take perspective on her life like never before.
ReplyDeleteGoing to Prague took her out of her comfort zone and also took the man she just got married to out of the context of the everyday--where she was a social worker and he was a pediatrician--where things were 'normal'. Prague took all of that and cast it aside, leaving Susan with Elijah on an entirely different level, and where their personalities clashed on multiple occasions. This trip was a journey for both of them to understand and get to know each other on a deeper and more personal level that they may have underestimated back amongst the norm. These conflicts of character start with disagreement of where to visit first in Prague, when to eat, and how much to say "I love you", which in a sense shows the flaws in the relationship, but how they are able to go back at the end of the day and in a way act like nothing happened is interesting. I think that for both of them, they know that they need each other, even though there are many differences between them. Prague acted as the catalyst for this conflict, but it also gave them the chance to see how they could adapt and develop, to realize that what they thought they wanted might not exactly be what they expected.
Again, their child becomes yet another journey for them, one that they can't get away from, and it is here that Susan is able to take charge of what she wants and does not back down. But by the end of it, I feel that she comes to some sense of peace after Elijah comes home from stopping a rape, how all of her expectations become somehow fulfilled.
The line "What will you do with another day?" (45) struck me especially, then the final scene with her looking at herself in the mirror and recognizing herself, she takes possession of that, particularly her smile. She doesn't recognize her face though, which is interesting, like she has become someone she didn't expect, but at the same time she has parts of herself that she is almost proud of, that she takes claim as hers. And to just expand on that a bit more, both of the things she recognizes about herself--her "swollen tender breasts were still hers, and the smile" (46), each of these parts of her are actually and extension of herself to her son (breastfeeding) and her husband (the smile), and maybe because she has become so involved with those that she loves, she lost herself in a way (since she doesn't recognize her face), having taken in all the flaws and moving on just to continue loving her family took so much out of her own person that she lives for them. Something to think about.
I didn't really feel surprised by the uncomfortable territories in these Baxter stories. Actually, I felt something really haunting in each of them, especially "Bravery." The way he contrasts images of his characters' lives with those of the strangers they encounter is fascinating and beautiful. In "Westland" how you feel like Warren has a good life; he has his two kids and a wife, a job. It seems like the American Dream, but then he watches Earl, a clown fumbling to figure out how to raise a daughter who is fast becoming a women, succeed in something that, maybe, Warren doesn't have --the love of his children. Though Jaynee pities Earl, she still loves him. In "Bravery," too, Susan has married the doctor and has had a healthy son, and yet, she admits to herself that "she had done her best not to be scared" of her love (35). She could lean out of a car and ask if she was cute, but she was scared of love because she had never felt it before. She doesn't automatically affirm her love, when her husband expresses his. By the end though, she says it first.
ReplyDeleteI even wonder what kind of love they have. Elijah acts like he has to say how much he loves her all the time to make it seem real. It’s like he’s suffocating her with it. The image though of how he made love to Susan only to make sure she hadn’t been injured by the tram was so vivid. It made me wonder if he really loved her or saw her as a patient, as someone needing his care. Even his son, he doesn’t act like he loves him necessarily. He treats him like a child in need of a doctor. He “know[s] how to hold babies. It’s what [he] does” (41).
Susan sees all of this. She isn’t lost at all. She’s noticing male authority figures on the screen because she is feeling her husband’s authority over her. He’s right; she’s wrong. Even in Prague, he makes the decisions of where they go. He picks which baby in the Loreto is theirs. Then she sees a woman panicking on the screen. The woman is not in control like the men. Then she sees a woman on an autopsy table, who has been shot. This connects to the first image of the man shooting “a gun at a distant figure of indistinct gender” (43). This is the scene that shows how good Baxter is because at first you think it’s random, but then you notice how Susan reacts to the genders of the people on the screen. You realize it’s not random at all.
Baxter does this in all his stories in a way. The clown race, again, in “Westland” feels random, but the reader can tell it means something. In “Shelter,” Billy’s speech and robbery are random on the surface, but the reader feels the words and reasoning behind the action. They know it’s really a statement on Cooper’s life. Strout says when we read a story, it’s like answering a phone. We’ve asked, Hello? And Baxter has answered with a voice guiding you through scenes where you wonder what it all means. What it all has to do with each other. But the way he does it, you only wonder for a second before realizing it’s the point of the whole story. It’s been building to that moment for a reason, and suddenly, the reader just knows. Baxter is answering on the other end of the phone line, and this is what he has to say.