Moore explores point of view in her stories, fearlessly changing perspective as a way of making her characters distinct. She does not shy away from bringing the reader close to a character that strains the boundaries of “likeable.” In “You’re Ugly, Too,” Moore explores notions of relatability even as the narrator exists in her own mental world, allowing the reader to glimpse in themselves something of her even as they ponder the madness behind some of her thoughts. In “How to Become a Writer” the reader is presented with a narrator that speaks distantly even as she is drawn close through concretely defined details and clearly recounted life wonderings. In “People Like That Are the Only People Here” the reader feels a perspective shift. Though the point of view creates more of a distance than existed in the previous stories, especially through archetypal nomenclature, the artfully described details of “the Mother finds a blood clot in the Baby’s diaper...startling against the white diaper, like a tiny mouse heart packed in snow” pull the reader into the story with a vengeance.
Moore allows for a little craziness to shine through in her stories. In “Referential,” the narrator is made to feel somewhat left of average through both her complicated thought processes and interactions with her son. Everything from her smooth contemplation of jam jars as a present to her need for physical touch that draws her unnecessarily to beauty salons, Moore embraces the peculiarities in her narrator. At the same time frustrating and captivating, the narrator of this story moves the story along through the way that she navigates the complex relationships she has with the men in her life. Even as the reader questions the significance that she places on the more subtle details of her life, the reader nonetheless accepts these obsessions and uses their presence as indicators of the deeper meanings that exist behind her mounting tragedies.
I read Referential after having read two of Lorrie Moore’s pieces already in 3x33 and I enjoyed all three of the pieces for separate reasons. The voice in How to Become a Writer captured from the beginning and for the first time I didn’t notice it was written in second person until later on. I could tell so vividly that Lorrie was a part of that piece. Sadness and hopelessness were more prominent themes in You’re Ugly, Too and Referential. I was interested in the story of Zoe but was almost taken aback too much by her strange character that I wasn’t able to completely understand her quirkiness and the meaning of that story. Narrators of Moore’s pieces are a prominent character in her writing when navigating tough subjects like suicide and cancer.
ReplyDeleteReferential to me had a lot of great details and captured me from the beginning. I think this story is extremely devastating and I wanted to know what happened to the son’s father. Why was this woman raising this son on her own? One of the most devastating parts of the piece that hits the reader is when she talked about going down to the hair salon for a wash just for the simple touch of a human. She also chose the pat down at airport security. This narrator has such a sense of the physical touch and objects that it really draws the reader in to understand that this narrator needs human contact, as we all do.
I wonder if there is a deeper meaning with her keeping Pete around for 10 years when he would wander off for weeks at a time when she has a son in the hospital with mental illness. I think she lives from visit to visit with Pete by her side so she doesn’t have to face it alone. Maybe she’s afraid of what her son will do if he realizes that he’s gone, because maybe his own father left them too. I don’t think however that this question needs to be answered. It’s my personal curiosity that I have these questions when reading. I think though that the fact that this narrator is alone is a simple fact of life. Moore somehow manages to add subtleness to tragic situations in people’s lives and I look forward to reading more of her work.
I think this was one of the most interesting stories we've read so far. Referential seemed to be about coping in various ways. In the story the narrator initially focuses upon the gifts that she can bring her son and that was one of the moments that seemed to really stand out to me within the piece. With the narrator placing so much focus upon these details it seemed to me that it was her way of coping with the situation that was going on with her son and the other men in her life. This seemed to be reinforced to me at the end when she makes up the lie about the person who was on the phone to Paul. Although she discovers the truth, it seems that it still pertains to what has happened to her within her life.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, it seemed that the mother may have some of the similar interests that her son has towards the end when she is trying to determine what will be on the other end of the phone after the lie Paul has been telling her was revealed.
There are a lot of interesting facets to Lorrie Moore’s writing: her play with words, her constant use of figurative language, and the odd and disconnected ways her characters reason through things. Speaking as a kind of “third party,” I can acknowledge that her ability with words is impressive and her style is consistent and persistently unique. I just can’t stand it as a reader.
ReplyDelete“How to Become a Writer” strikes me as just another writer trying to insist, “Writing is special! As a writer, I’m going through an ordeal only another writer can understand, and my pain is poetic and incomparable to anyone else’s.” I’m tired of this mantra in the writing world in general, and her “story” doesn’t seem to be reaching for anything new. The main characters in all of her stories are neurotic and fucked-up in exactly the same ways, and their thoughts are so whimsical and out-of-reach that I can’t feel sympathy for any of them. Her wordplay is nice in short spurts, but by the end of each story, I’m just tired of it. Particularly in “People Like That Are the Only People Here,” I noticed that there were entire sections devoted to the writer’s cleverness. Look what I can do! They seem to add little to nothing to the story and just alienated me further as I was reading. “Referential” feels empty. Pete is just a man. I don’t see him; I don’t feel him. I see the narrator in this story as a carbon copy of the narrator in “You’re Ugly, Too”—tiny, pale, and obscure. I feel like the writer throws us some bones—“Look at these jars of jams! Aren’t they pretty? Bet you they mean something…” but never really gives us a concrete idea of what we’re reading. I can go back, analyze, and guess at some of the narrator’s psychology, but she didn’t make me feel invested through the first reading, so I don’t see why I should.
I found myself liking "The Referential" quite a lot. I really admire female writers who put grit and don't shy away from the bleakness of everyday life. I have stated time and time again that I am against censorship especially in writing, if something is horrible I should read about how horrible it is and if the topic is a gruesome subject it should come across that way in every page. I was a big fan of Bonnie Joe Campbell when she came to visit our college mostly for the same reason.
ReplyDeleteLorrie Moore does this all with a quirky yet nonchalant voice, similar to the way Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino direct a film. They show the ugliness for all it's worth yet they are not disgusted or bothered with the idea of showing us what's real, even putting some humorous spins on a lot of it. I think Lorrie Moore is very similar in this sense. The troubled character in this story is quite tragic yet the situation isn't handled with eyes closed, it is clear and out in the open, the way things should be.
The way she phrases her titles grabbed me as well. It actually made me want to read more that wasn't assigned to us, mostly due to reading the names of the titles. If they are similar to "The Referential" then I'm aboard. All her stories were interesting and I liked them all, but there was something about "The Referential" that made me like it the best. Perhaps it was because it dealt with the troubled adolescent character out-of-place in society topic that I like in so many movies I go out of my way to see. I find these stories understandable, even if my background and youth differ from that of the protagonist. Most of us were troubled at that age and I think it is very easy to relate to and even more so when the writer understands too and puts it all out there without censorship and fear of disturbing the audience.
I agree with Caroline in that the story gripped me immediately. I loved all of the little details that added up to her son and his condition in “Referential”. It was those details that seemed to matter the most rather than that of the other characters.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I kind of agree with Audrey in that I don’t really see Pete. But, I think that may be the author’s intent. The narrator just wants her son to be ok. She has lost her husband and has had to deal with the fact that her son is in a mental institution and has these mental issues. I don’t think that Pete is meant to be a fully formed character because I feel like the narrator is simply using him as a place holder or as someone to turn to. The story doesn’t focus really at all on him, but rather on the son. I would go a step further and say that she only keeps Pete around because she knows her son cares for him and just deeply wants him in her life and to be ok.
This just felt really real to me. The details such as the boy using the craft paper to cut the bottoms of his feet or the way we don’t really see how the boy tried to kill himself because all we get from the doctor is that there was blood everywhere. We don’t really learn much else because the narrator can’t bring herself to say what it was. Still, I am sort of curious about Pete’s character. While it makes sense for the story that he be flat, does that make it a useful tool to use in writing? Or, does it have too many risks involved?
One of the first things I noticed when reading Referential was how the author Moore chose to represent the boy character. With mystery. We learn next to nothing about the boy. No name. No concrete age (although it is likely either teenage or past teens). No understanding of his illness (though it might be a variation of a God complex, seeing as he believes that he needs to transcend the world). No idea what his last suicide attempt was like, even though the author perks our morbid curiosity with the line that it was "morbidly ingenious." By doing this, the author keeps the boy an enigma; a puzzle. We the readers get the sense that we really are unable to understand him.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I'm not quite sure how this mystery extends to the other two characters. Well, to Pete, anyway. We know the mother as a woman who is so worn down and lonely from dealing with her son that she'll go to great lengths to obtain even the most basic human contact from others. Pete however... the author seems to imply that maybe Pete has a past. That Pete has a "deep good side." That said, I do not get the impression that Pete is good or bad, so the mystery seems pointless. Is the author saying he's bad for not taking on the responsibility of being the boy's stepfather? Unless having a father is going to fix that boy, I'd say avoiding him is a pretty normal and morally ambiguous gesture.
Reading the comment that is directly above where I am typing, I can see that Virginia has compared Moore's writing to that of Scorsese and Tarantino. I respectfully disagree with this statement. The entire tone of the piece is extremely heavy; at least two of the characters are undergoing crippling levels of isolation, loneliness, and/or doubt. The humor, when it does appear, seems to range more as black comedy than quirky humor. The point where the boy says they'll have to blind themselves with cake icing since there was no other way to injure themselves is an example of this.
As a final note, this is actually the second time I've tried to post this thread and the first time I've had to retype it. So forgive me if this seemed rushed/impatient/what have you or if there are two threads under my name.
Lorrie Moore just might be my authorial hero. Her sense of humor interspersed throughout the heaviness of the subject matter, to me, is how to deal with life. In "Referential," the narrator has son who is suicidal and extremely mentally ill, but the story isn't about her son. I wish I had more time to sit and reflect on this story, but I think it's about the idea of "transform[ing] anything into a weapon." Her son uses literally anything he can find to harm himself; Pete uses the distance he puts between the narrator and her son as weapon against them; and the narrator uses the unsettling ringing phone as a weapon, unintentionally, against Pete. I think I can agree, partly, with some others that this story might not seem to amount to anything in the sense that no isolated character feels particularly integral to the story, that these events don't line up in a cause-effect kind of way, but isn't that the point? Isn't that life?
ReplyDeleteMoore's dark humor isn't so much dark as it is realistic, which I think shows best in "People Like That Are the Only People Here." The Baby has cancer, a parent's nightmare, and the way The Mother resorts to a kind of unintentional desperate sense of humor is a coping mechanism. It's real. This quirky narrator who is maybe a little selfish but mostly overwhelmed and terrified is reacting to the events in a way similar to myself. Maybe it comes down to experience when reading Moore; maybe I can relate to this quirky narrator because I've laughed in the Oncology ward even when everything seems hopeless and unfair. That's a way to cope. And to acknowledge the thoughts that seem random and inappropriate given the circumstances is just a way to confess something we all think to some extent.
Also, I am a huge fan of the word play and humor in all four stories. The tone and voice is anywhere from self-effacing to sarcastic to being so blunt it takes you aback, and that is a stylistic choice I admire.
Lastly, to comment on "How to Become a Writer," I want to say that yes, I have heard the watered down mantra of what it means to be a writer, how it is a struggle shared by all artists unique in their own way. However, what I like about this story is that it doesn't glamorize it. It doesn't make it out to be a good life choice. Or a bad life choice. Or even necessarily a difficult one -- it is a path that changes you -- you do what "is good for your writing." The second person only emphasizes what I felt to be the truth and accuracy of the whole piece. It deconstructs the archetype of the aspiring writing student ("Be glad you are not just a writer.")
One thing that I admire about Moore's writing is that she not only has a knack for finding powerful metaphors--the image of stacked hopes like playing cards, for instance, is wonderful in how it implies a dark futility in the mother's gestures--but is unafraid to extend these metaphors for many lines, even when it might come at the price of pacing and leave the reader wondering for a moment. Granted, it does help this a lot that I more often than not liked her metaphors, but I like seeing that she acknowledges her insights and sees them through, and has the sense not to use too much dialogue, since that's easily the worst aspect of her writing.
ReplyDeleteOn the level of the story itself, though, one thing that I'm left wondering about "The Referential" is whether or not the mother might also be dealing with her own hallucinations and strange, alienating perceptions. Mostly, this is going off of the part with the repeating voiceless caller in the last scene, and I remember that there was another moment in the piece where she talks about whether or not she might be similar to her son that I think sets this up rather nicely. I could be wrong about this, but it nevertheless lingers, and I think that that creates a new dimension for this piece, if I can go back and see if it lines up.
The voice in these stories is what really captivated me. I thought they were all very unique. I particularly liked the voice in How to Become a Writer. The second person is something we don't see a lot of.
ReplyDeleteI thought Referential was a good story. I think I liked it so much because of all the different things it has going on, which really drives the reader forward. I think Lorrie Moore did a good job with this in all of her stories, especially How to Become a Writer. I too noticed we don't see a lot of Pete. But in the story the son didn't see too much of him either. So I like to think that this was done on purpose in a way to maybe help the reader feel for the son and understand the curiosity the boy might have in not knowing-just like the reader. I think this also moves the reader along because they might start to wonder if they'll ever get to see Pete as a character, just as the son is wondering too. I like it when I can connect with a story, it gets me more engrossed in what I'm reading and helps me understand.
There is a lot of mystery in Referential like we don't know all the details of the son. We don't know what his last suicide attempt was like, we don't know exactly what it's like for him to be in group or if he has made any friends there. I assume the patients talk to each other? However I do feel if Lorrie Moore went into too much detail the story would lose it's effect and not leave the reader thinking and wondering. Not necessarily in the cliff hanger way but the more thought provoking way, the "mind-opening" way. I also like stories that don't answer all your questions because if the reader isn't left wondering or thinking about the story, they'll forget it. Give them an unanswered question and they'll ponder it for a bit and they'll be thinking of the story-they'll remember it.
One of the things I loved the most about Lorrie Moore’s story, Referential, was the small details that she adds into the story. Right from the start the line, “her deranged son” caught my eye and made me want to read more. She has this great attention to detail like when she is talking about the marks on the sons arms from him cutting himself. How she adds the detail about “the “C” being three-quarters of a square”. She had this amazing impact of imagery in such a short story, but it enables the reader to really get inside the story and really be able to visualize things.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite parts of the whole story was the line, “There had been blood to be mopped.” In just this one line Lorrie Moore, explains so much about the incident with the son. I like that she doesn’t have to tell or do into full detail about what happened and that with just this one line, my skin crawled and was grossed out. Which I think that says a lot about the tone of the piece as well. Moore gives us all these instances of how things can be turned into weapons and that the son can and will try to turn anything into a weapon. But then we have this scene near the end where the mother says that she wants to bring the son home. She says, “I am going to bring him home this week. He needs his home back, his house, his room. He is no danger to anyone.” I think that this line is kind of heart breaking because of all that we have heard about all of her sons suicide attempts. It feels like she doesn’t want to think of her son as having something wrong with him, but that everything is fine, which I think is kind of where Pete’s character comes in. I feel like Pete looks at this situation with the son as being a lost cause and he doesn’t seem to really care anymore.
I agree that this story is not about the son, but more about the mother. Moore goes through the entire story saying “her son” and “on the ride home she and Pete”. It is almost as if someone was telling a story about her life and this is the section about her son, but the main focus is still on her. Using “her” and “she” to describe things in this story was something that really caught my eye about this story. And I like that it makes the mother feel so solitary.
*I just went to print out my blogposts for the first portfolio and just realized that I forgot to publish this one, luckily i saved a copy on my computer, but it was an honest mistake and I am not going to make excuses for not having put it up. Anyway, it is as follows:
ReplyDeleteReferential was beautiful in it's ambiguity. It is one of the best examples of the "ice-burg effect" I've read. We never truly know what mental issue her son faces, but through his past suicide attempts, cutting, strangely worded language, and family history we get enough of a sense of him that we don't need to know and I'm glad that we do not know exactly what is wrong.
Yes he plays a major role in the story since he is institutionalized, yet I agree with what has been said earlier about the son not being the focus on the story. The language is even directed at the mother, as she is the one we are supposed to focus on. Mother has been distanced from him, but I like that even though he is "her deranged son" in the beginning, he is still "her son" throughout the rest of the story. I also like this image of distance that Moore brings to the story. Each character is further from the mother than the next. The father is the farthest, then Pete seems to be the next farthest since the son also acts as a distancing from the Mother and Pete (although he has been around for years). The mother is closest with her son, although his mental issue seems to distance him from everyone, even the girls in his rehab he reads the palms of.
We are told that Pete still thinks she looks beautiful although she has stopped taking care of herself, but the Mother seems entirely concerned with her son to the point where there isn't room for Pete anymore which I think is why he moved on to another woman, not that it makes it okay that he is supposedly cheating.
Although I just realized we don't need the blog posts until the last portfolio I'm still glad I checked!
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