New Essays on F. Scott Fitzgerald's Neglected Stories. - book reviews

NEW ESSAYS ON F. SCOTT FITZGERALD'S NEGLECTED STORIES, edited by Jackson R. Bryer. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1996. xi + 367 pages. $49.95.

Although I have always admired The Great Gatsby, Tender is the Night, and The Crack- Up, and such significant stories as "Absolution," I must admit that I have never considered Fitzgerald to be as significant as Stein, Faulkner, Nabokov, or Gass. But he continues to trouble me: his sense of loss; his awareness of the spectral life; and his Catholic sensibility have never been fully explained.

His stories, both the familiar and the neglected, have not, indeed, received the attention they deserve. And the fact that they may contain hidden treasures--that they are more than the "trash" Fitzgerald claimed they were--is the cause for Bryer's return. He is, with John Kuehl and Matthew Bruccoli, one of the most dedicated specialists in Fitzgerald studies. This new collection definitely marks a turning point in Fitzgerald criticism, because it demonstrates that the senior and junior critics have again returned to the stories, recognizing that they are more than clues to the major novels, that they are not mere pauses between the novels. All of these essays assume that the stories are art (even those Fitzgerald omitted from his collections); that they demand more than biographical approaches.

I must choose several essays as my favorites, although the fact that I do so should not indicate that this hefty collection is uneven. My first choice is Gerald Pike's close reading of "The Spire and the Gargoyle"; the story has been reprinted only once (in John Kuehl's The Apprentice Fiction of R Scott Fitzgerald 1909-1917), since its 1917 appearance in the Nassau Literary Magazine. Pike, like all of the critics in this collection, offers a few paragraphs devoted to plot and publication history--all of the contributors have been urged by Bryer to do so, since he assumes that the reader has probably not really read the story--and then explicates Fitzgerald's rhetoric of loss. The phrase is underlined; it suggests that Pike recognizes the linguistic devices Fitzgerald uses. He takes the opening fines and reads them carefully, looking at them almost word by word; now this is close reading, the kind that takes into account metaphors, pronouns, sentence lengths, and punctuation. I admire his performance. He writes: "The anomalous look and character of the lead sentence draws attention and invites speculation. Short sentences have a particular authority, like those of the intelligent speaker who chooses to speak little and whose few words therefore acquire weight." The sentence is: "The night mist fell." Pike draws attention to rhythmic stresses, and to the implications of "mist" and "fell."

Alan Cheuse, a fine novelist, is a wonderful reader of "The Camel's Back," viewing it as a kind of "carnival" and "Christmas Carol." He sees a "double vision" of the old rites and myths and the ordinary details of Midwestern life. His explication of this double vision offers him (and us) a "fable about the trials of romantic love whose airy superstructure is supported by naturalistic stonework" (my emphasis). Cheuse's criticism, as we can tell by this one sentence, is wonderfully phrased. It is not a formal, jargon-filled academic essay (the kind we too often get in today's criticism). All the essays, indeed, are meant to be read! And they contain no mention of Derrida and company!

William H. Loos and Victor A. Doyno's reading of "Rough Crossing" dwells upon a "folkloric" and mythic approach. They mention "talismanic pearls," and the voyage as quest. And they bring to light various "crossings" throughout the story. Many of the essays offer intertextual readings: the presence of Little Women in one story; the Jamesian references in "The Hotel Child"--those uncanny or spectral qualities that should be pursued by future critics.

I salute Bryer's achievement. He forces us to consider all of Fitzgerald's work; any collection that intrigues us so much that we want to reread the "neglected stories" is praiseworthy.

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