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Yaban Gülü ve Hizmetçiye Şaplak
Robert Coover’ın karanlık ve alaycı iki uzun öyküsü bir arada.
“Yaban Gülü”nde genç bir kadın yüz yıl boyunca bir büyünün tesiri altında, kendisini uyandıracak prensi bekler; onu gözleyen kocakarıysa genç kadının zihnine karanlık ve rahatsız edici rüyalar boca eder, öyle ki prenses bazen rüyasında Disney çizgi filmlerinden fırlamış yakışıklı bir prens tarafından uyandırıldığını, bazen de onun kaba saba, evli bir adam olduğunu görür. Prensin durumu da pek iyi değildir: Uyuyan güzelin hapsolduğu, dikenli sarmaşıklarla çevirili kuleye ulaşmayı başardığında başına neler geleceğini düşünüp durur; böylece gerçeklik ve düş arasındaki sınırlar fevkalade bulanıklaşır.
“Hizmetçiye Şaplak”taki iki karakter, hizmetçi ve efendisi de büyük bir malikânenin bir odasında, zaman ve mekândan bağımsız, her günün tekrarlandığı bir yarı kâbusa hapsolmuşlardır. Yaşananların sırası değişse de eylemler değişmez. Kirli çarşaflar, ıslak havlular, tozlu şifoniyerler ve gün ışığını odaya dolduran büyük bir pencere… Tahakküm ve saplantı üzerine kurulan bir ilişki….
“Robert Coover artık ustalarımızdan biri.”
The New York Times
“Yaban Gülü”nde genç bir kadın yüz yıl boyunca bir büyünün tesiri altında, kendisini uyandıracak prensi bekler; onu gözleyen kocakarıysa genç kadının zihnine karanlık ve rahatsız edici rüyalar boca eder, öyle ki prenses bazen rüyasında Disney çizgi filmlerinden fırlamış yakışıklı bir prens tarafından uyandırıldığını, bazen de onun kaba saba, evli bir adam olduğunu görür. Prensin durumu da pek iyi değildir: Uyuyan güzelin hapsolduğu, dikenli sarmaşıklarla çevirili kuleye ulaşmayı başardığında başına neler geleceğini düşünüp durur; böylece gerçeklik ve düş arasındaki sınırlar fevkalade bulanıklaşır.
“Hizmetçiye Şaplak”taki iki karakter, hizmetçi ve efendisi de büyük bir malikânenin bir odasında, zaman ve mekândan bağımsız, her günün tekrarlandığı bir yarı kâbusa hapsolmuşlardır. Yaşananların sırası değişse de eylemler değişmez. Kirli çarşaflar, ıslak havlular, tozlu şifoniyerler ve gün ışığını odaya dolduran büyük bir pencere… Tahakküm ve saplantı üzerine kurulan bir ilişki….
“Robert Coover artık ustalarımızdan biri.”
The New York Times
120 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1981
About the author
Robert Coover
131 books390 followersRobert Lowell Coover was an American novelist, short story writer, and T. B. Stowell Professor Emeritus in Literary Arts at Brown University. He is generally considered a writer of fabulation and metafiction. He became a proponent of electronic literature and was a founder of the Electronic Literature Organization.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
September 23, 2024
I was certain I would enjoy Robert Coover before I even read him, because I was aware that he is often placed in the same 'fabulist' category as John Barth, Thomas Pynchon, Gilbert Sorrentino, Donald Barthelme, etc, and that's a type of fiction I especially admire.
As it happens, 'Briar Rose' has turned out to be one of the best novellas I've ever read. Why? Because it is stringently whimsical, and stringent whimsy is a fairly rare thing in the literary world these days. Calvino did it a lot, and in fact to my mind 'Briar Rose' mainly resembles a priapic Calvino. It is sexual as well as seriously mythic and playful. But what I particularly love about it is the way it takes a trope or a situation well-known in western culture (the story of Sleeping Beauty) and then proceeds to examine it systematically as if it is a chess problem rather than a fairy tale. The various possibilities of what might happen when the prince who is forcing his way through the forest of thorns manages to reach her are each examined and then expanded upon in a dreamlike exegesis.
The second novella in this book, 'Spanking the Maid', is a very unusual piece of work. It's a sexual romp but the kinky antics it describes are metaphors for the process involved in the creation of a piece of art (in a nice twist, for the creation of this story). In other words it only seems to be about sex and is actually about writing. I have read many stories in which non-sexual interactions are used as metaphors for sexual ones, but this is the first time I've seen a reversal of the device. It's almost an anti-Freud story, with the aggressive priapic stuff brashly up front and the innocuous truth hidden behind. Peculiar, to say the least! And exceptionally metafictional.
As it happens, 'Briar Rose' has turned out to be one of the best novellas I've ever read. Why? Because it is stringently whimsical, and stringent whimsy is a fairly rare thing in the literary world these days. Calvino did it a lot, and in fact to my mind 'Briar Rose' mainly resembles a priapic Calvino. It is sexual as well as seriously mythic and playful. But what I particularly love about it is the way it takes a trope or a situation well-known in western culture (the story of Sleeping Beauty) and then proceeds to examine it systematically as if it is a chess problem rather than a fairy tale. The various possibilities of what might happen when the prince who is forcing his way through the forest of thorns manages to reach her are each examined and then expanded upon in a dreamlike exegesis.
The second novella in this book, 'Spanking the Maid', is a very unusual piece of work. It's a sexual romp but the kinky antics it describes are metaphors for the process involved in the creation of a piece of art (in a nice twist, for the creation of this story). In other words it only seems to be about sex and is actually about writing. I have read many stories in which non-sexual interactions are used as metaphors for sexual ones, but this is the first time I've seen a reversal of the device. It's almost an anti-Freud story, with the aggressive priapic stuff brashly up front and the innocuous truth hidden behind. Peculiar, to say the least! And exceptionally metafictional.
November 25, 2013
Two bites of coovery goodness for the price of one!
Wonderful writing, as one would expect, though (for me) some of the explorations felt a little "old hat" and I can't say it rocked my world to any great extent. None the less, Coover is one of those whose writings are worth reading regardless of the usual criteria one may place upon ones literary feasts. I think I shall try and read all of him before 2014 is out...
Wonderful writing, as one would expect, though (for me) some of the explorations felt a little "old hat" and I can't say it rocked my world to any great extent. None the less, Coover is one of those whose writings are worth reading regardless of the usual criteria one may place upon ones literary feasts. I think I shall try and read all of him before 2014 is out...
July 4, 2018
Harold Bloom, the ruler of all cranky white curmudgeons, the maintainer of the least surprising reading list of this millenium, throws this right onto that list. So you're like ha! What is this, smut? Did Harold Bloom sneak smut into the Canon?
The answer is sortof. Spanking the Maid is actually a lengthy, postmodern allegory, I guess for the creative process although (like this white whale I read about once) with enough general effectiveness to stand in for any number of other annoying processes. That's pretty good in itself - allegories involving spanking are a thing we could probably use more of, or at least a thing we could not use less of - but it's also one of those "YO CHECK IT OUT, ALLEGORY" situations - again, like that whale - where you're kinda like yeah, dude, I get it; I mean, it's not a subtle piece of work.
"No seriously though," you ask, if you are Jennifer, "But is there spanking?" Yes, there is spanking! There is a lot of spanking. It is chock full o' spanking. It's spanktastic! If spanking was white guys, this book would be Harold Bloom's Canon*. See, the allegory is that there's this maid who keeps trying to clean this dude's room but she does a lousy job and he has to punish her by spanking her, as one does; similarly, you keep having to try to discipline your brain to create great art, by spanking it, but your brain's panties keep falling down about its ankles while it's trying to dust. Or something like that.
* Because Harold Bloom's Canon has a lot of white guys, and this book has a lot of spanking. Get it?
I like Coover's "The Babysitter" a little better; it's similarly aggressively pomo, and similarly amused by waving its penis around, but I thought it was more complicated than this was.
Briar Rose is better, too, a winky novella about Sleeping Beauty, entertained or tortured through the years by a procession of fantasies about her own rescue, woven into her brain by the evil witch, a funhouse Scheherezade, while her faithful princes die in the hedge outside. According to John Banville's worshipful intro, this is about love.
BTW, this is impossible to get on Kindle even if you know where to look, so if you want to read this you're going to have to hold a book called "Spanking the Maid" up in front of your face, which is either good or bad depending on whether you're on the subway and a creep.
The answer is sortof. Spanking the Maid is actually a lengthy, postmodern allegory, I guess for the creative process although (like this white whale I read about once) with enough general effectiveness to stand in for any number of other annoying processes. That's pretty good in itself - allegories involving spanking are a thing we could probably use more of, or at least a thing we could not use less of - but it's also one of those "YO CHECK IT OUT, ALLEGORY" situations - again, like that whale - where you're kinda like yeah, dude, I get it; I mean, it's not a subtle piece of work.
"No seriously though," you ask, if you are Jennifer, "But is there spanking?" Yes, there is spanking! There is a lot of spanking. It is chock full o' spanking. It's spanktastic! If spanking was white guys, this book would be Harold Bloom's Canon*. See, the allegory is that there's this maid who keeps trying to clean this dude's room but she does a lousy job and he has to punish her by spanking her, as one does; similarly, you keep having to try to discipline your brain to create great art, by spanking it, but your brain's panties keep falling down about its ankles while it's trying to dust. Or something like that.
* Because Harold Bloom's Canon has a lot of white guys, and this book has a lot of spanking. Get it?
I like Coover's "The Babysitter" a little better; it's similarly aggressively pomo, and similarly amused by waving its penis around, but I thought it was more complicated than this was.
Briar Rose is better, too, a winky novella about Sleeping Beauty, entertained or tortured through the years by a procession of fantasies about her own rescue, woven into her brain by the evil witch, a funhouse Scheherezade, while her faithful princes die in the hedge outside. According to John Banville's worshipful intro, this is about love.
BTW, this is impossible to get on Kindle even if you know where to look, so if you want to read this you're going to have to hold a book called "Spanking the Maid" up in front of your face, which is either good or bad depending on whether you're on the subway and a creep.
November 19, 2016
2 stars for his mastery of language.
I get it - this was an exploration of how making subtle differences to a described scene makes a new story every time. Interesting. Clever.
However, having this played out over 84 pages in Briar Rose became boring, tedious and repetitive. The Layout made no sense. It felt like there should be plot progression but frustratingly there was none at all. If each telling had been presented as individual stories - vignettes, this would have made it more palatable.
Spanking the Maid used this technique slightly better, adding more narrative to each retelling exposed the story in a slow, seductive fashion. However, no paragraph breaks over multiple pages makes for a disjointed, exhausting read.
I won't be bothering with Coover again.
I get it - this was an exploration of how making subtle differences to a described scene makes a new story every time. Interesting. Clever.
However, having this played out over 84 pages in Briar Rose became boring, tedious and repetitive. The Layout made no sense. It felt like there should be plot progression but frustratingly there was none at all. If each telling had been presented as individual stories - vignettes, this would have made it more palatable.
Spanking the Maid used this technique slightly better, adding more narrative to each retelling exposed the story in a slow, seductive fashion. However, no paragraph breaks over multiple pages makes for a disjointed, exhausting read.
I won't be bothering with Coover again.
February 6, 2017
So and so, a writer writes, with something in mind, show AND even (sometimes) tell, but readers can AND do, pick/choose sometimes go, meh, ok. There is, though, something Beckettian going on. More like blisters in the thorn patch and go spank the monkey. The movie "The Secretary" is quite similar in scenario with the domineering boss nitpicking the inefficiency and error prone secretary/typist who then submits to corrections a la spanking which is both comical and sexually building as the movie progresses. James Spader plays a perfectly sadistic overlord to Maggie Gyllenhaal's submissive underling. Maybe reading this book in conjunction with watching the movie would enhance and bring synergy to the overall experience. Hmm, now that's better. Possibly same w/BR too?
December 23, 2017
Coover`s metafiction at his best - multi-lying/layering stories as a narrative within narrative within narrative, etc. mirrorlike plot about storytelling (Briar Rose) and art (Spanking). Coover is a master of powerful and perfect repetitions and a genius of wordish texts
July 22, 2018
The spirit of Hegel runs through these short novellas, more obviously in the master/slave dialectic of 'Spanking the Maid', but just as surely in the trio of characters that synthesize in 'Briar Rose'. Both use repetition and variation to explore the absurdity of relationships, the cruel ritual and illusion that takes our desire and sucks all the blood out until we imperceptibly reach a point where we cling to a shell rather than let the illusion go. 'Briar Rose' in particular shows the necessity of story in our self-narratives, the awful power of fairy tales both classical and modern, and how ultimately there's no real escape from our illusion. However, on the gender front Coover is an interesting, and probably aggravating, antithesis to someone like Angela Carter, who also subverts fairy tales. Compare the passivity of Coover's Sleeping Beauty to Carter's protagonists, such as Little Red Riding Hood. The patriarchal view of womanhood is very much that peddled by Coover, for all his subversion. Nevertheless what both authors have in common, and where Hegel's spirit truly shows itself, is their celebration of form over substance, stasis over flux, the idea of process overriding even process itself. Arguably, and Coover himself makes this argument, all fiction is the triumph of idea over life. It may be what he rails against, but ultimately he himself cannot accept that there may be a possibility of change, or better, improvement.
These books are wry, witty, but despairing. He may be right and maybe all we can do is laugh, but like the illusions he spears, he is himself guilty of sucking the blood out, of embracing the husk above the body. As one of his many princes says:
"And I live in the real world of the senses, not some chilly remote tower of the mind."
Sometimes the mind can be a little too cold, no matter how hot the higher end may become.
These books are wry, witty, but despairing. He may be right and maybe all we can do is laugh, but like the illusions he spears, he is himself guilty of sucking the blood out, of embracing the husk above the body. As one of his many princes says:
"And I live in the real world of the senses, not some chilly remote tower of the mind."
Sometimes the mind can be a little too cold, no matter how hot the higher end may become.
March 21, 2013
"I really want to try to like this"
... but cannot.
To frame a point, for those who say that Briar Rose and Spanking the Maid try to be avant-garde in their approach to sexuality in literature, but fail for modern times, Briar Rose was first published in 1996 and Spanking the Maid first made an appearance in 1982; in their time, perhaps they made more of an impact.
I hadn't read any Coover before, but having looked him up I was interested in the way he supposedly uses literature (metafiction and fabulation) to deliver his works.
He is probably a fantastic author for those that appreciate these writing methodologies, but whilst I found the writing engaging, I found the stories themselves difficult to follow. Not dated or wordy, just hard to follow.
If you are looking for a straightforward piece of alternative literature this is not it. If you're looking for a diverse and challenging read then give this a try. It just wasn't for me.
*note the reviewer received this book for free for review purposes for the Amazon Vine Programme*
... but cannot.
To frame a point, for those who say that Briar Rose and Spanking the Maid try to be avant-garde in their approach to sexuality in literature, but fail for modern times, Briar Rose was first published in 1996 and Spanking the Maid first made an appearance in 1982; in their time, perhaps they made more of an impact.
I hadn't read any Coover before, but having looked him up I was interested in the way he supposedly uses literature (metafiction and fabulation) to deliver his works.
He is probably a fantastic author for those that appreciate these writing methodologies, but whilst I found the writing engaging, I found the stories themselves difficult to follow. Not dated or wordy, just hard to follow.
If you are looking for a straightforward piece of alternative literature this is not it. If you're looking for a diverse and challenging read then give this a try. It just wasn't for me.
*note the reviewer received this book for free for review purposes for the Amazon Vine Programme*
July 10, 2012
Two novellas. The writer essentially wrote a bunch of paragraphs (albeit they were very well written) and just repeated them over and over with slight tweaks. The first story, 'Briar Rose' was engaging until about the half-way point when I realized the plot was NEVER going to move forward. When the second story started to repeat itself after a few pages, I realized what was happening and swiftly lost interest.
June 19, 2017
I'd like to give this one star but I guess because he's clever I have to give it two, begrudgingly, mind you.
I will never read this author again if anyone senses me mulling over giving him 'one more shot', spank me, in light of the bejewled-dew like nonsense.
Blerfhmjfkfkd.
3.1
I will never read this author again if anyone senses me mulling over giving him 'one more shot', spank me, in light of the bejewled-dew like nonsense.
Blerfhmjfkfkd.
3.1
January 3, 2021
Afschuwelijk. Laatste keer dat ik tussen Daan zijn boeken iets kies.
January 24, 2019
As duas novelas nesse livro definitivamente não são leituras fáceis. A descrição aqui no Goodreads é particularmente enganosa. Os textos abordam temas como o desejo (especialmente em Briar Rose), mas sempre dentro de um contexto maior da vida, das expectativas e suas decepções. E sem relação com a sexualidade, embora ela, em muitos momentos, seja usada como símbolo. As imagens, inclusive, podem ser um tanto fortes para algumas pessoas (trigger warnings de todos os tipos são cabíveis), embora a linguagem seja sempre bastante contida e calculada. Coover não quer causar nenhum efeito físico ou emocional em quem o lê, apenas intelectual. O que tem suas vantagens, mas também desvantagens. Outro aspecto que dificulta a leitura são as repetições. As duas novelas são sobre isso, sobre processos que se repetem infinitamente, sobre como os atos não tem sentido e fazemos coisas automaticamente, só pela impossibilidade de não fazer. O fato de estarem emparelhadas, embora crie uma consistência temática, enfraquece o conjunto enquanto livro. Preferia ter lido esses textos no contexto de outras estórias, talvez. Talvez não seja a melhor das introduções a Coover, mas pretendo continuar a lê-lo, até mesmo por motivos acadêmicos.
March 6, 2024
TW: Sexual assault
There's much to be said for Coover's writing style. He kept two stories that were close repetitions of events from feeling tiresome. The language was well-balanced as the stories progressed.
I would have liked to see both stories developed a little further. I preferred Briar Rose in this regard as it managed to belie a progression of actions but folded it back into the uniform cycle. Spanking the Maid, a bit like the master within, seems to just run out of steam and peter out.
In both stories, while there were scarce moments of charged eroticism, I would have to describe the overall tone as lurid. This would be fine if I didn't think the book believed itself to be more sensual than it actually comes across.
There's much to be said for Coover's writing style. He kept two stories that were close repetitions of events from feeling tiresome. The language was well-balanced as the stories progressed.
I would have liked to see both stories developed a little further. I preferred Briar Rose in this regard as it managed to belie a progression of actions but folded it back into the uniform cycle. Spanking the Maid, a bit like the master within, seems to just run out of steam and peter out.
In both stories, while there were scarce moments of charged eroticism, I would have to describe the overall tone as lurid. This would be fine if I didn't think the book believed itself to be more sensual than it actually comes across.
November 8, 2020
Read Briar Rose months ago and reviewed it at the time. Spanking the Maid is a highly intriguing story, one of those that makes me wonder “just what’s going on here?” Could be about a lot of things — dreams, marriage, growing old, creating, the curious nature of routines. A lot of fun word play here too. Both the stories have a recurring theme of being caught in something, a routine, a dream, and being unsure of how to get free. Very curious. Looking forward to reading what others think.
November 27, 2019
If Samuel Beckett wrote erotica
December 24, 2025
I could NOT get into it. I am a philistine
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews