- Paperback: 704 pages
- Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition (May 16 2000)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0375724427
- ISBN-13: 978-0375724428
- Product Dimensions: 13.2 x 3 x 20.3 cm
- Shipping Weight: 499 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #26,348 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon.com
Think of John Cheever's fiction, and a whole world springs to mind--a world of leafy suburbs, summer houses, commuter trains, boarding schools, and inevitably, his own chosen territory, the cocktail hour among WASPs. But it's a mistake to approach Cheever as if he were merely some sort of anthropologist documenting the customs of an obscure and vanishing tribe. Nostalgia and class issues aside, his true subject is the darkness hidden beneath the surface of postwar American life. A case in point is his famous story "The Swimmer," in which an ebullient Neddy Merrill decides to swim home across the backyard pools of his neighbors. In the course of his journey, however, summer gives way to autumn, his neighbors turn against him, there are troubling intimations of disgrace and financial ruin, and he arrives to find his house both locked and empty.
Though these stories deal with bright, prosperous, ostensibly happy people, a cold wind blows through them. Age, illness, financial embarrassment, sex, alcohol, death--all of these threaten his suburban Eden. (Is it himself Cheever is mocking in his ironic "The Worm in the Apple"? "Everyone in the community with wandering hands had given them both a try but they had been put off. What was the source of this constancy? Were they frightened? Were they prudish? Were they monogamous? What was at the bottom of this appearance of happiness?") Inanimate objects carry the residue of their past owners' unhappiness and cruelty ("Seaside Houses," "The Lowboy"); expatriates long for but cannot quite find their way home ("The Woman Without A Country," "Boy in Rome"); children vanish or turn out badly (too many stories to count).
All of this is conveyed in prose both graceful and tender. No one is better than Cheever at describing a character's appearance: "He was a cheerful, heavy man with a round face that looked exactly like a pudding. Everyone was glad to see him, as one is glad to see, at the end of a meal, the appearance of a bland, fragrant, and nourishing dish made of fresh eggs, nutmeg, and country cream." Given his uncanny eye (and ear) for realistic description, it's easy to forget how experimental Cheever could be. His later stories pioneered authorial intrusions in the best postmodern style, and from the beginning, he wrote what would much later be called magical realism. (Think of the sinister broadcasts in "The Enormous Radio," or the phantom love interest in "The Chimera.") A literary event at its publication and winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1979, The Stories of John Cheever remains a stunning and enormously influential book. --Mary Park --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
"John Cheever is an enchanted realist, and his voice, in his luminous short stories and in incomparable novels like Bullet Park and Falconer, is as rich and distinctive as any of the leading voices of postwar American literature." —Philip Roth
"As stories go, as compellingly readable narratives of a certainsort of people in a certain time and place—our time and place—John Cheever's stories are, simply, the best." —The Washington Post
"Profound and daring...some of the most wonderful stories any American has written." —The Boston Globe
"Not merely the publishing event of the 'season' but a grand occasion in English literature." —The New York Times
"As stories go, as compellingly readable narratives of a certainsort of people in a certain time and place—our time and place—John Cheever's stories are, simply, the best." —The Washington Post
"Profound and daring...some of the most wonderful stories any American has written." —The Boston Globe
"Not merely the publishing event of the 'season' but a grand occasion in English literature." —The New York Times
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the all-time greats,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Stories of John Cheever (Paperback)
John Cheever is one of the greatest writers ever to come out of this or any other country. He's incredibly unsung and my suspicions are that in twenty years we'll be singing his praises the way we do Fitzgerald and Hemingway. Few stories in this collection will disappoint, my favorites being "The Enormous Radio" and "The Swimmer." Still, read them for yourself and judge. Would also recommend Jackson McCrae's "The Bark of the Dogwood" for another excellent read.
2.0 out of 5 stars
over-rated,
By
This review is from: The Stories of John Cheever (Hardcover)
Wanting to have good national writers is a powerful motivator. I think that this has happened with John Cheever, from the retrospective praise of his work to our fascination with his bisexuality and persistent alcoholism. Indeed, his personal demons are far more interesting than his prose. While I read isolated stories in mags and liked them, reading them in a lump like this makes his weaknesses seem very plain indeed. His stories almost all revolve around a common plot: things in the suburbs don't turn out the way we want, and most often, a lot of alcohol does little to soften the blow of deteriorating reliationships, alienated children, and nothing to do in retirement. When you read 20 stories like that in a row, Cheever appears as a feeble writer indeed. This a throwaway magazing writing, not some timeless achievement that should enter the pantheon. Not recommended.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Stories of family and friends,
By
This review is from: The Stories of John Cheever (Paperback)
Stories of family and friends that incorporate life's normal occurrences and provide a feeling that we all experience the same things.
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