these are miscellaneous writings collected from throughout grace paley’s life, as a result, it doesn’t always retain a steady level of continuity. predictably the parts that were most interesting to me, in light of recent events, were about wars (mostly vietnam, but also an essay about the gulf war), as paley was very involved in those anti-war movements. the various prefaces to books are definitely worthwhile to be included in this random collection, but at times lacked a necessary context for me to get into them, most notably when they are about specific people i’ve never heard of before. it probably doesn’t help that i tend to read such “prefaces” after i’ve read the whole book, kind of to test to see if the impression that i developed reading their work aligns at all with the preface-writer’s.
this impression from the gulf war feels all to familiar:
Almost overnight, once the war started, the silence began. Having lived for sixty-eight years, a surprising number of them in some political consciousness, I must report that I’ve never experienced the kind of repression that set in once the air war started. It was not like the McCarthy period—that is, there were no personal direct attacks on well-known people of that kind. It was as though a great damp blanket had been laid over our country with little pinholes for American flags to stick up into the public air.
vacation to the south continues, or really had been going on throughout the poetry days. these short stories share a theme of misunderstanding, especially between family members with misaligned philosophies. many parallels of characters trying to do in essentially flawed manners (trying to prove something, trying to be better than others, etc). well-crafted stories: no wasted words, all the pertinent details & nothing unnecessarily thrown in. though also pretty much non-upbeat throughout.
i’ve probably had this for about two years and only browsed through it a little. this was recommended to me by my old roommate addie, and she strongly suggested reading it at the height of summer. it might be good to save this for a hot month, heavy with wet air, as close to the picture of the deep south as one could get up here; but reading this now is a good escape from the post-blizzard (warmer but still cold & wet only in hug puddles on street corners). i may have to read this one repeatedly for years to start to feel out the repetitions of various phrases and concepts—juxtaposed and re-juxtaposed. a single long poem, a perspective of the south, and various souvenirs.
read from cover to cover to prove myself wrong. i realize in reading this that i have little vocabulary to talk about poetry, maybe from having a limited background. it’s not that i disliked anything in this specifically, but it didn’t blow me away and i can’t articulate why. near the end suddenly i started noticing how rich the summer imagery was, but then it was perhaps a consummate vision of the season becoming focused throughout the whole book. “Unpainted Door” is maybe my favorite.
the first book of poetry i’ve tried to consume entirely in a short period of time, and it’s not straight-up poetry, so i may be cheating. this is full of brilliant spaces. the “Hopper: Confessions” series is perhaps my favorite. i have this doubt that i could set my mind to take in a volume of poetry cover to cover, in sequence, and i’m wondering if it’s possible.
also from the thrift store in woodside. there’s a pleasing cadence to this narrative, a careful rhythm sidestepping between pasts and presents.
A carbreeze blew. Greentrees and telephone poles flew past the windows. Still birds slid by on moving wires, like unclaimed baggage at the airport. A pale daymoon hung hugely in the sky and went where they went. As big as the belly of a beer-drinking man.
