The Ballard of the Sad Cafe: The Novels and Stories of Carson McCullers

by Carson McCullers

A world intense and strange, wild, extravagant and beautiful-extraordinary tales from our most original write.

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1951

About the author

Carson McCullers was an American novelist, short-story writer, playwright, essayist, and poet. Her first novel, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (1940), explores the spiritual isolation of misfits and outcasts in a small town of the Southern United States. Her other novels have similar themes. Most are set in the Deep South.
McCullers's work is often described as Southern Gothic and indicative of her Southern roots. Critics also describe her writing and eccentric characters as universal in scope. Her stories have been adapted to stage and film. A stage adaptation of her novel The Member of the Wedding (1946), which captures a young girl's feelings at her brother's wedding, made a successful Broadway run in 1950–51.

Reviews

[Bee Operanto · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting book full of short stories with sad tales which leave you pondering

[Matthew Hanson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this. Was a good change of pace to read some short stories. The book I read also had in:

-Wunderkind.
-The Jockey.
-Madame Zilensky and the king of Finland.
-The Sojourner.
-The Domestic Dilemma.
-A Tree, a Rock, a cloud.

They are all really memorable stories on their own right exploring themes such as loneliness, passages in life, individual experience and meaning.

I guess Carson McCullers is a bit of a master of the short story really managing to paint vivid scenes and characters in such short spaces.

The Ballard of the Sad Cafe is very melancholy (!! resisted the urge to say sad) with lots of deeply flawed characters carrying the story.

I guess the message is that life will fuck you if you allow it to, so be prepared; to get fucked.