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The Bigness of the World
In Lori Ostlund’s debut collection people seeking escape from situations at home venture out into a world that they find is just as complicated and troubled as the one they left behind.In prose highlighted by both satire and poignant observation, Ostlund offers characters that represent a different sort of everyman—men and women who poke fun at ideological rigidity while holding fast to good grammar and manners, people seeking connections in a world that seems increasingly foreign. In “Upon Completion of Baldness” a young woman shaves her head for a part in a movie in Hong Kong that will help her escape life with her lover in Albuquerque. The precocious narrator of “All Boy” finds comfort when he is locked in a closet by a babysitter. In “Dr. Deneau’s Punishment” a math teacher leaving New York for Minnesota as a means of punishing himself engages in an unsettling method of discipline. A lesbian couple whose relationship is disintegrating flees to the Moroccan desert in “The Children beneath the Seat.” And in “Idyllic Little Bali” a group of Americans gathers around a pool in Java to discuss their brushes with fame and ends up witnessing a man’s fatal flight from his wife.
In the eleven stories in The Bigness of the World we see that wherever you are in the world, where you came from is never far away.
In the eleven stories in The Bigness of the World we see that wherever you are in the world, where you came from is never far away.
232 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
33 people are currently reading
1215 people want to read
About the author
Lori Ostlund
11 books149 followersLori Ostlund's novel, After the Parade, was published by Scribner in September 2015. Her first book, a story collection entitled The Bigness of the World (University of Georgia Press, 2009), which Scribner will reissue in February 2016, received the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction, the California Book Award for First Fiction, and the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award. Stories from it appeared in the Best American Short Stories and The PEN/O.Henry Prize Stories. She was the recipient of a 2009 Rona Jaffe Foundation Award. She lives in San Francisco.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
October 14, 2018
it's worth keeping in mind that this book by the author of After the Parade is actually a reissue of her debut short story collection originally published in 2009, whose stories appeared individually in publications as early as 2006. not that this collection is weak compared to a.t.p. - in fact it's damn good. but you can see all the bits and pieces that make After the Parade SO GOOD being germinated here: like a.t.p., its locations include new mexico, minnesota, and san francisco, and the recurring themes are teaching (esp els), same-sex relationships (although in this collection they are usually between women), characters who are at specific crossroads in their lives, and childhood experiences re-evaluated through adult eyes. these are all splendid and complete standalone stories, but you can see how the ideas and observations driving these stories "grew up" into the longer and beautifully polished full novel.
the stories are beautiful, lonely, sad - stories about couples growing apart, about characters who are emotionally reserved but harbor deep unexpressed feelings, academics more comfortable with intelligence than emotions, people removed from their familiar surroundings on vacations or working abroad whose relationships are tested in exotic locales.
it's a really strong collection full of (mostly) likably pompous characters with linguistic tics and scrupulous manners who suffer transgressions of personal space deeply and are more likely to be left than to be the leaver. i liked nearly every story, and as much as i hate reviewing short story collections, i'm going to try, because i really enjoyed this collection, and maybe that enthusiasm will come through and encourage someone else to check it out.
The Bigness of the World
We were not used to adults who cried freely or openly, for this was Minnesota, where people guarded their emotions, a tradition in which Martin and I had been well-schooled.
this is all beautiful clean prose with perfect character development revealed through small side stories like that of the bread mold and the mother's weight watchers story <------ oh my god. and ilsa, a character i would ordinarily dislike for her stilted grammatical precision is totally redeemed through her bizarre perception of math. it's a very unexpected story that veers way off-course from anything i could have predicted. in a good way.
Bed Death
"with love…there is the snake who devours, and there is the one who cooperates by placing his head inside the snake's mouth."
this is the only story i wasn't crazy about. it's a theme that appears in other stories in the collection more successfully than it does here, methinks, but her writing is so good, it's never a bad story; just one i liked less than others.
Talking Fowl with My Father
Of course, he has numerous reasons for not liking turkey, first among them being that he likes beef. And while this might not seem like a reason, it is what my father tells me whenever I ask him why he doesn't like turkey.
"Because I like beef," he says.
"It's not an either/or question," I say. "It's like salt and pepper. You can like both of them. Now, if turkey and beef are sitting in a room alone and someone says that you can pick only one thing from the room, okay. Then, it's true - you can have turkey or you can have beef. But this isn't like that. " Geraldine and I just spent our tenth anniversary in Greece, two blissful weeks walking where Plato and Socrates once walked, both of us nearly in tears at the thought of it, and here I am, one month later, having this conversation.
ugh, family. this is such a quietly sad, true, tender story with so much bubbling underneath it. love it. fantastic descriptions and you really feel the combination of love and frustration that runs through every family everywhere.it's a hug and a shinkick.
The Day You Were Born
another sharp, painful story of childhood innocence and experience with a perfect closing line that'll make your heart itch. all love and manners and silent suffering because of love and manners - it's one of those stories that makes you remember, "oh yeah, that's what it was like to be a little kid. it was horrible"
Nobody Walks to the Mennonites
i don't think this is the most successful story in the collection, in terms of a clear idea developed through the short story format, but it contains so many fine details about shame and embarrassment and the kind of social awkwardness that makes you freeze up like a bunny to avoid further embarrassment for yourself or others and an overeliance on presentation and manners that are culturally-specific and don't translate over into a vacation-setting and only cause further discomfort. i didn't really "get" this story as a whole, but i'm probably just missing something and i definitely enjoyed each discrete episode on the journey.
Upon Completion of Baldness
I will admit that her use of whom left me undone, even with that preposition dangling unattractively at the end, but then I'm afraid that I've always been attracted to such things, the ability to differentiate between subject and object forms, a refusal to use if when the situation requires whether
gotta love a relationship that blossoms because of grammatical usage and a passionate argument in which stanley fish is invoked. not a narrator to fall in love with, but she's utterly human - quick to defuse a bigoted student prank, but slow to fix or even address the problems in her personal life.
And Down We Went
He bent down and picked up a cognac, which he handed to me. "To the asshole birds that shit on us," he said cheerfully, waving his glass in the air as the others joined in.
a story told in three bird poops. 'nuff said.
Idyllic Little Bali
this is like a perfect little short story. it's funny and sad and ominous with an ensemble cast of slice-of-life characters whose misperceptions and secret lives are buried under lively holiday cheer as they are thrown together in proximity-friendships and experience their separate motivations, judgments, and fears as well as a collective shock.
Dr. Daneau's Punishment
a sinister-ish and unpleasantly pedantic narrator lends this story a tense "eek, what's going to happen next??" feeling of tension, but it's still very very funny. horrible/funny, but funny nonetheless.
The Children Beneath the Seat
this story reinforced my commitment to never travel anywhere ever. i have read plenty of disgusting imagery in my day, but this story was a triumph of repulsion. and i LOVED it. i spoilered it for those of you who are sensitive to descriptions of what happens to motion-sick people on a bus.
All Boy
this story brings the collection full-circle. in the first story, a babysitter is fired for using the father's toothbrush. in this story one is fired for wearing the father's socks. there's plenty of germ-squeamishness in other stories - a waitress drinking from a customer's glass before serving, the disgust over bits of leftover food being repurposed in the next day's meal, etc., but this story has the same general shape as the first one - a child (or children) being exposed to the secret lives of their parents, the idiosyncrasies of their minders and the sudden irreversible changes in the bigness of the world.
it's a fantastic collection. read it, read After the Parade, and wait impatiently for whatever she writes next.
come to my blog!
the stories are beautiful, lonely, sad - stories about couples growing apart, about characters who are emotionally reserved but harbor deep unexpressed feelings, academics more comfortable with intelligence than emotions, people removed from their familiar surroundings on vacations or working abroad whose relationships are tested in exotic locales.
it's a really strong collection full of (mostly) likably pompous characters with linguistic tics and scrupulous manners who suffer transgressions of personal space deeply and are more likely to be left than to be the leaver. i liked nearly every story, and as much as i hate reviewing short story collections, i'm going to try, because i really enjoyed this collection, and maybe that enthusiasm will come through and encourage someone else to check it out.
The Bigness of the World
We were not used to adults who cried freely or openly, for this was Minnesota, where people guarded their emotions, a tradition in which Martin and I had been well-schooled.
this is all beautiful clean prose with perfect character development revealed through small side stories like that of the bread mold and the mother's weight watchers story <------ oh my god. and ilsa, a character i would ordinarily dislike for her stilted grammatical precision is totally redeemed through her bizarre perception of math. it's a very unexpected story that veers way off-course from anything i could have predicted. in a good way.
Bed Death
"with love…there is the snake who devours, and there is the one who cooperates by placing his head inside the snake's mouth."
this is the only story i wasn't crazy about. it's a theme that appears in other stories in the collection more successfully than it does here, methinks, but her writing is so good, it's never a bad story; just one i liked less than others.
Talking Fowl with My Father
Of course, he has numerous reasons for not liking turkey, first among them being that he likes beef. And while this might not seem like a reason, it is what my father tells me whenever I ask him why he doesn't like turkey.
"Because I like beef," he says.
"It's not an either/or question," I say. "It's like salt and pepper. You can like both of them. Now, if turkey and beef are sitting in a room alone and someone says that you can pick only one thing from the room, okay. Then, it's true - you can have turkey or you can have beef. But this isn't like that. " Geraldine and I just spent our tenth anniversary in Greece, two blissful weeks walking where Plato and Socrates once walked, both of us nearly in tears at the thought of it, and here I am, one month later, having this conversation.
ugh, family. this is such a quietly sad, true, tender story with so much bubbling underneath it. love it. fantastic descriptions and you really feel the combination of love and frustration that runs through every family everywhere.it's a hug and a shinkick.
The Day You Were Born
another sharp, painful story of childhood innocence and experience with a perfect closing line that'll make your heart itch. all love and manners and silent suffering because of love and manners - it's one of those stories that makes you remember, "oh yeah, that's what it was like to be a little kid. it was horrible"
Nobody Walks to the Mennonites
i don't think this is the most successful story in the collection, in terms of a clear idea developed through the short story format, but it contains so many fine details about shame and embarrassment and the kind of social awkwardness that makes you freeze up like a bunny to avoid further embarrassment for yourself or others and an overeliance on presentation and manners that are culturally-specific and don't translate over into a vacation-setting and only cause further discomfort. i didn't really "get" this story as a whole, but i'm probably just missing something and i definitely enjoyed each discrete episode on the journey.
Upon Completion of Baldness
I will admit that her use of whom left me undone, even with that preposition dangling unattractively at the end, but then I'm afraid that I've always been attracted to such things, the ability to differentiate between subject and object forms, a refusal to use if when the situation requires whether
gotta love a relationship that blossoms because of grammatical usage and a passionate argument in which stanley fish is invoked. not a narrator to fall in love with, but she's utterly human - quick to defuse a bigoted student prank, but slow to fix or even address the problems in her personal life.
And Down We Went
He bent down and picked up a cognac, which he handed to me. "To the asshole birds that shit on us," he said cheerfully, waving his glass in the air as the others joined in.
a story told in three bird poops. 'nuff said.
Idyllic Little Bali
this is like a perfect little short story. it's funny and sad and ominous with an ensemble cast of slice-of-life characters whose misperceptions and secret lives are buried under lively holiday cheer as they are thrown together in proximity-friendships and experience their separate motivations, judgments, and fears as well as a collective shock.
Dr. Daneau's Punishment
a sinister-ish and unpleasantly pedantic narrator lends this story a tense "eek, what's going to happen next??" feeling of tension, but it's still very very funny. horrible/funny, but funny nonetheless.
The Children Beneath the Seat
this story reinforced my commitment to never travel anywhere ever. i have read plenty of disgusting imagery in my day, but this story was a triumph of repulsion. and i LOVED it. i spoilered it for those of you who are sensitive to descriptions of what happens to motion-sick people on a bus.
All Boy
this story brings the collection full-circle. in the first story, a babysitter is fired for using the father's toothbrush. in this story one is fired for wearing the father's socks. there's plenty of germ-squeamishness in other stories - a waitress drinking from a customer's glass before serving, the disgust over bits of leftover food being repurposed in the next day's meal, etc., but this story has the same general shape as the first one - a child (or children) being exposed to the secret lives of their parents, the idiosyncrasies of their minders and the sudden irreversible changes in the bigness of the world.
it's a fantastic collection. read it, read After the Parade, and wait impatiently for whatever she writes next.
come to my blog!
September 1, 2015
SHORT STORIES have become the new.....
"70 is the new 50"
"Clean Eating is in--process foods are out".
"Same Sex marriages and Common-law marriages are on the rise"
and
"Kale is the super-superfood"
SHORT STORIES *RULE*.....[getting a little tire of the new trend in novels? 450+ pages has become common this past year]
Lori Ostlund's, "The Bigness of the World" *ROCKS*!!!! I'm 'over' my 'short story' phobia.
Too many great ones these days!!!!
11 short stories in this collection:
Lori gets to the heart of internal emotion and interpersonal dynamics ... her characters come alive. The stories are told with warmth, humor and insight. Lori is the type of writer who
seems to have a deep understanding for the human psyche.
In 'some' ways she reminds me of another author whom I'm deeply passionate about : Robin Black. ... Both write powerful and touching short stories - and novels.
....The title story, "The Bigness of the world" is about a babysitter, Ilsa, and the two children she is watching: Martin & Veronica. The parents are busy...but that seems to be fine as they adore
Ilsa. She's different and vivacious.
Ilsa wore colorful, flowing dresses and large hats she never took off.
She "eschewed all acronyms and initialisms, even those so entrenched in our vocabularies that
we could not recall what initials stood for".
Ilsa has some fears that most of us would find somewhat odd. She's afraid to drive in cars with power windows. If driving near a lake, and the car went in, how would she escape? There are no lakes near the area.
At some point, Ilsa is asked to leave. The young children.. Age 10 and 11 ( going on twelve), are suddenly all enough to take care of themselves without a babysitter.
This is a wonderful first story as it sets the tone for the others that follow.
The world begins to open..to observe, to feel feelings, and expand our humanity.
"Bed Death" looks at the relationship between partners, ( women). They are staying in a hotel in Malaysia... ( but from Minnesota). At first they seem to be distracted with other people's
problems....as it always seems to be easier to focus on other people, than ones own issues.
"There is a term that lesbians use- "bed death"- to describe what had already begun happening long before Julia took the bigger step of physically removing herself from our bed. In fact, at the risk of sounding confessional, a tendency that I despise, I'll admit that we had not actually touched in any meaningful way since the afternoon that we bathed together at the seedy hotel.
That this kind of thing occurred within the frequency among lesbians to have acquired it's own terminology in no way made me feel better. If anything, it made me feel worse, for I dislike contributing in any way to the affirmation of stereotypes".
"Talking Fowl with My Father" ... Turkey is the enemy.... and absolutely laugh out loud hilarious.
I could talk about each of these stories....
"The day you were born, ( father and daughter), Nobody walks to the Mennonites, ( two women in Belize)... Idyllic Little Bali, etc etc. - as they are ALL GOOD!!!
"All Boy", the last story ..... a precocious 11 year old boy and his Midwestern parents is
priceless! Harold is very observant...and because of the complications within his own home - parents complicated marriage.....he finds his own way to comfort himself.
The dialogue in these stories are intimate, regardless of the 'rainbow-ranges-of-emotions', we experience. They're simply enjoyable to read. I'm left thinking about these characters with a warmth in my heart.
Thank You Scriber Publishing, Edelweiss, and the very talented Lori Ostlund.
"70 is the new 50"
"Clean Eating is in--process foods are out".
"Same Sex marriages and Common-law marriages are on the rise"
and
"Kale is the super-superfood"
SHORT STORIES *RULE*.....[getting a little tire of the new trend in novels? 450+ pages has become common this past year]
Lori Ostlund's, "The Bigness of the World" *ROCKS*!!!! I'm 'over' my 'short story' phobia.
Too many great ones these days!!!!
11 short stories in this collection:
Lori gets to the heart of internal emotion and interpersonal dynamics ... her characters come alive. The stories are told with warmth, humor and insight. Lori is the type of writer who
seems to have a deep understanding for the human psyche.
In 'some' ways she reminds me of another author whom I'm deeply passionate about : Robin Black. ... Both write powerful and touching short stories - and novels.
....The title story, "The Bigness of the world" is about a babysitter, Ilsa, and the two children she is watching: Martin & Veronica. The parents are busy...but that seems to be fine as they adore
Ilsa. She's different and vivacious.
Ilsa wore colorful, flowing dresses and large hats she never took off.
She "eschewed all acronyms and initialisms, even those so entrenched in our vocabularies that
we could not recall what initials stood for".
Ilsa has some fears that most of us would find somewhat odd. She's afraid to drive in cars with power windows. If driving near a lake, and the car went in, how would she escape? There are no lakes near the area.
At some point, Ilsa is asked to leave. The young children.. Age 10 and 11 ( going on twelve), are suddenly all enough to take care of themselves without a babysitter.
This is a wonderful first story as it sets the tone for the others that follow.
The world begins to open..to observe, to feel feelings, and expand our humanity.
"Bed Death" looks at the relationship between partners, ( women). They are staying in a hotel in Malaysia... ( but from Minnesota). At first they seem to be distracted with other people's
problems....as it always seems to be easier to focus on other people, than ones own issues.
"There is a term that lesbians use- "bed death"- to describe what had already begun happening long before Julia took the bigger step of physically removing herself from our bed. In fact, at the risk of sounding confessional, a tendency that I despise, I'll admit that we had not actually touched in any meaningful way since the afternoon that we bathed together at the seedy hotel.
That this kind of thing occurred within the frequency among lesbians to have acquired it's own terminology in no way made me feel better. If anything, it made me feel worse, for I dislike contributing in any way to the affirmation of stereotypes".
"Talking Fowl with My Father" ... Turkey is the enemy.... and absolutely laugh out loud hilarious.
I could talk about each of these stories....
"The day you were born, ( father and daughter), Nobody walks to the Mennonites, ( two women in Belize)... Idyllic Little Bali, etc etc. - as they are ALL GOOD!!!
"All Boy", the last story ..... a precocious 11 year old boy and his Midwestern parents is
priceless! Harold is very observant...and because of the complications within his own home - parents complicated marriage.....he finds his own way to comfort himself.
The dialogue in these stories are intimate, regardless of the 'rainbow-ranges-of-emotions', we experience. They're simply enjoyable to read. I'm left thinking about these characters with a warmth in my heart.
Thank You Scriber Publishing, Edelweiss, and the very talented Lori Ostlund.
February 8, 2016
"I had started them on Salinger, despite the fact that another English teacher, whose name I shall not disclose, had suggested that Salinger, with all his “New Yorkiness,” had little to “say” to a group of students who had grown up here in New Mexico.
“I believe that Salinger has something to say to all tenth graders,” I had replied, perhaps overearnestly. “I myself was once a tenth grader growing up in Minnesota, and I found that he had plenty to say.” I do not buy into this idea that one learns more from literature that is familiar; in fact, it seems only logical that one would learn most from subject matter that one has not already mastered through the daily grind of one’s existence, which is what I shall tell my colleague the next time she bothers me about Salinger.
Months ago, when I first requested an early review copy of this collection of short stories, I did so based on its description and beautiful cover. My request came before I had any familiarity with the author, Lori Ostlund, and prior to my reading of After the Parade, which ended up being one of my favorite reads of 2015. I also didn't realize that this collection was a republication of prior works, written before "Parade."
Ostlund is a gifted writer, and I will continue to look forward to her publications. In each of the stories contained in this book, she exquisitely captures the beauty (and pain --- and humor) of the human condition. She draws characters that are both quirky and familiar. Characters trapped by their circumstances, and characters who can transcend it.
Taken on their own, any one of the stories in this book would range from a 4 to a 5 star rating (my personal favorites were "Upon Completion of Baldness," "And Down We Went," and "Dr. Daneau's Punishment"); however, as a collection I'm rating the book a 3.5. The issue with this collection is that about 75% of the stories are the same -- a lesbian couple from Minnesota (on the brink of ending their relationship) teach ESL grammar to students in Malaysia (or Indonesia). They were just too similar. Again -- as stand alone pieces they were brilliant, but they just got too repetitive when reading the same set-up back to back to back.
3.5 Stars
Thank you to NetGalley and Scriber for a galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.
“I believe that Salinger has something to say to all tenth graders,” I had replied, perhaps overearnestly. “I myself was once a tenth grader growing up in Minnesota, and I found that he had plenty to say.” I do not buy into this idea that one learns more from literature that is familiar; in fact, it seems only logical that one would learn most from subject matter that one has not already mastered through the daily grind of one’s existence, which is what I shall tell my colleague the next time she bothers me about Salinger.
Months ago, when I first requested an early review copy of this collection of short stories, I did so based on its description and beautiful cover. My request came before I had any familiarity with the author, Lori Ostlund, and prior to my reading of After the Parade, which ended up being one of my favorite reads of 2015. I also didn't realize that this collection was a republication of prior works, written before "Parade."
Ostlund is a gifted writer, and I will continue to look forward to her publications. In each of the stories contained in this book, she exquisitely captures the beauty (and pain --- and humor) of the human condition. She draws characters that are both quirky and familiar. Characters trapped by their circumstances, and characters who can transcend it.
Taken on their own, any one of the stories in this book would range from a 4 to a 5 star rating (my personal favorites were "Upon Completion of Baldness," "And Down We Went," and "Dr. Daneau's Punishment"); however, as a collection I'm rating the book a 3.5. The issue with this collection is that about 75% of the stories are the same -- a lesbian couple from Minnesota (on the brink of ending their relationship) teach ESL grammar to students in Malaysia (or Indonesia). They were just too similar. Again -- as stand alone pieces they were brilliant, but they just got too repetitive when reading the same set-up back to back to back.
3.5 Stars
Thank you to NetGalley and Scriber for a galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.
September 17, 2020
My friend Maya said it very very well here. As she said the eleven shorts stories deals with seperation with quiet intensity. The people here try in all ways to keep the seperation away, denial, travel, books, wit, new jobs, new people, anything, but seperation still creeps up and settles in their lives which are our lives, because yes we cannot run away from life.
I would recommend a slow read for these stories.
List of the stories (in order of my favorites not as per book order):
Dr Daneau's Punishment
The Day You Were Born
All Boy
The Bigness of the World
Talking Fowl with My Father
Idyllic Little Bali
Upon Completion of Baldness
Bed Death
And Down We Went Thrice
Nobody Walks the Mennonites
The Children Beneath the Seat
I would recommend a slow read for these stories.
List of the stories (in order of my favorites not as per book order):
Dr Daneau's Punishment
The Day You Were Born
All Boy
The Bigness of the World
Talking Fowl with My Father
Idyllic Little Bali
Upon Completion of Baldness
Bed Death
And Down We Went Thrice
Nobody Walks the Mennonites
The Children Beneath the Seat
reading with my dear Maya and Lena
February 6, 2016
For, at each turn, the people we hold close elude us, living their other lives, the lives that we can never know.
The Bigness of the World is a wonderful collection of short-stories who all in some way deal with separation. A sense of being separated from the world or from the ones who are closest, often lying side by side in a bed, not being able to bridge the emotional gap that has silently made its way into a relationship. It is interesting to look at the different locations Ostlund's stories are set in. A lot of them are set in exotic places overseas, without any romanticism of the 'I found myself far from home' - kind. Many of her characters are repulsed by the culture surrounding them, or merely exhausted from trying to make themselves understood. However the stories set in the character's familiar environment (often Minnesota) don't seem any more at home than the ones who have fled abroad in the hope of leaving behind their problems or to stop their relationships from slowly disintegrating.
A lot of Lorie Ostlunds characters are teachers, and most of them are obsessed with grammar and the importance of the correct use of language, as if finding the right expression to describe their life, their emotions or their experience of the world to others will gain them back a sense of control, will place things back in order, unbreak the broken.
One of my favourite stories in the book is titled 'Upon Completion of Baldness'. As an English teacher picks up her girlfriend from the airport one day, she finds her girlfriend entirely bald. It's almost as if the emotional estrangement has suddenly taken a physical form, a shiny bald head as a constant reminder of the strangers they've become to each other. In the same story the teacher walks into her classroom to find the words “MISS LUNDSTROM & MISS SHAPIRO ARE LEZZIE LOVERS!!” scribbled onto the chalkboard and then spends the rest of the class getting them to correct the sentence into a linguistically respectable form, until it reads “Ms. Lundstrom and Ms. Shapiro are lovers.”
Other favourite stories of this collection are Dr. Daneau's Punishment and All Boy, but all of them are sublime in their own way. Carefully observed, witty, melancholic, sometimes bleak.
An amusing side-note: Lori Ostlund worked or still works as an English teacher for non-native English speakers. When reading through my notes for the book, I discovered a lot of single words highlighted in yellow. Words which were unfamiliar to me but which I liked so much that I wanted to remember and include them into my - rather stagnant - pool of active English vocabulary.
So here I am. A new ESL student. Imperfect but eager.
This is my second book by Lori Ostlund, and I am hoping for a shipload more to come. (I'll have a yellow pen ready)
With many thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for the ARC.
The Bigness of the World is a wonderful collection of short-stories who all in some way deal with separation. A sense of being separated from the world or from the ones who are closest, often lying side by side in a bed, not being able to bridge the emotional gap that has silently made its way into a relationship. It is interesting to look at the different locations Ostlund's stories are set in. A lot of them are set in exotic places overseas, without any romanticism of the 'I found myself far from home' - kind. Many of her characters are repulsed by the culture surrounding them, or merely exhausted from trying to make themselves understood. However the stories set in the character's familiar environment (often Minnesota) don't seem any more at home than the ones who have fled abroad in the hope of leaving behind their problems or to stop their relationships from slowly disintegrating.
A lot of Lorie Ostlunds characters are teachers, and most of them are obsessed with grammar and the importance of the correct use of language, as if finding the right expression to describe their life, their emotions or their experience of the world to others will gain them back a sense of control, will place things back in order, unbreak the broken.
One of my favourite stories in the book is titled 'Upon Completion of Baldness'. As an English teacher picks up her girlfriend from the airport one day, she finds her girlfriend entirely bald. It's almost as if the emotional estrangement has suddenly taken a physical form, a shiny bald head as a constant reminder of the strangers they've become to each other. In the same story the teacher walks into her classroom to find the words “MISS LUNDSTROM & MISS SHAPIRO ARE LEZZIE LOVERS!!” scribbled onto the chalkboard and then spends the rest of the class getting them to correct the sentence into a linguistically respectable form, until it reads “Ms. Lundstrom and Ms. Shapiro are lovers.”
Other favourite stories of this collection are Dr. Daneau's Punishment and All Boy, but all of them are sublime in their own way. Carefully observed, witty, melancholic, sometimes bleak.
An amusing side-note: Lori Ostlund worked or still works as an English teacher for non-native English speakers. When reading through my notes for the book, I discovered a lot of single words highlighted in yellow. Words which were unfamiliar to me but which I liked so much that I wanted to remember and include them into my - rather stagnant - pool of active English vocabulary.
So here I am. A new ESL student. Imperfect but eager.
This is my second book by Lori Ostlund, and I am hoping for a shipload more to come. (I'll have a yellow pen ready)
With many thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for the ARC.
September 29, 2015
Full disclosure: I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. Many thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for making it available!
About 20 years ago, I adamantly refused to read short stories, saying that I didn't want to invest a great deal of emotion or effort in getting hooked on a story that would end not long after it began. And even though I read some classic short stories in my youth, I didn't necessarily think I was missing much by boycotting this literary form.
But then I picked up one of the Best American Short Stories collections in the late 1990s, and found myself marveling at the artistry, emotion, characterization, plot, and imagery these writers packed into a small number of pages. I haven't looked back, and count myself tremendously privileged to have read short stories that have taken my breath away. Authors like Thom Jones, David Schickler, Robin Black, Nathan Englander, Alice Munro, Alethea Black, Amy Bloom, and Jacob Appel have taken residence in my head and my heart.
I can now add Lori Ostlund to that list of authors who have dazzled me with their literary gifts. Her debut collection, The Bigness of the World , which won the Flannery O'Connor Prize, will be re-released early next year, and I hope that she finds a multitude of fans like me, because her talent is definitely evident in these stories, which deal with seemingly ordinary men, women, and children confronting the unexpected.
Here is an example of how she captures thoughts and emotions:
Some of my favorite stories in this collection included: "Talking Fowl with My Father," which chronicled the strained relationship of a woman and her elderly father, both of whom have very different ideas about what constitutes a life well lived; "Idyllic Little Bali," about a group of American tourists who come together while on vacation, not realizing the emotional turmoil one of them is dealing with; "The Day You Were Born," which tells of a young girl caught between her mother and her father, who suffers from mental illness; "All Boy," about a young boy who is dealing with how he differs from his peers in the midst of his parents' marital woes; "Upon Completion of Baldness," which tells of a couple of teachers whose relationship hits a rough patch when one of them shaves their head; and the magnificent title story, about two siblings and their unique relationship with their one-of-a-kind babysitter.
Ostlund's stories are set everywhere from Minnesota to Malaysia, but their themes are universal. And while many deal with gay and lesbian characters, their sexuality doesn't define them or the stories; it's just another plot point to consider in many cases. These are beautifully written, emotionally evocative stories which will move you, make you think, make you chuckle, and perhaps help you realize your life may not be so chaotic or problematic after all.
See all of my reviews at http://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blo....
About 20 years ago, I adamantly refused to read short stories, saying that I didn't want to invest a great deal of emotion or effort in getting hooked on a story that would end not long after it began. And even though I read some classic short stories in my youth, I didn't necessarily think I was missing much by boycotting this literary form.
But then I picked up one of the Best American Short Stories collections in the late 1990s, and found myself marveling at the artistry, emotion, characterization, plot, and imagery these writers packed into a small number of pages. I haven't looked back, and count myself tremendously privileged to have read short stories that have taken my breath away. Authors like Thom Jones, David Schickler, Robin Black, Nathan Englander, Alice Munro, Alethea Black, Amy Bloom, and Jacob Appel have taken residence in my head and my heart.
I can now add Lori Ostlund to that list of authors who have dazzled me with their literary gifts. Her debut collection, The Bigness of the World , which won the Flannery O'Connor Prize, will be re-released early next year, and I hope that she finds a multitude of fans like me, because her talent is definitely evident in these stories, which deal with seemingly ordinary men, women, and children confronting the unexpected.
Here is an example of how she captures thoughts and emotions:
"Is it possible, Noreen wonders, to locate the exact moment that fear (or hate or love) takes shape? And is there ever a way to convey that feeling to another person, to describe the memory of it so perfectly that it is like performing a transplant, your heart beating frantically in the body of that other person?"
Some of my favorite stories in this collection included: "Talking Fowl with My Father," which chronicled the strained relationship of a woman and her elderly father, both of whom have very different ideas about what constitutes a life well lived; "Idyllic Little Bali," about a group of American tourists who come together while on vacation, not realizing the emotional turmoil one of them is dealing with; "The Day You Were Born," which tells of a young girl caught between her mother and her father, who suffers from mental illness; "All Boy," about a young boy who is dealing with how he differs from his peers in the midst of his parents' marital woes; "Upon Completion of Baldness," which tells of a couple of teachers whose relationship hits a rough patch when one of them shaves their head; and the magnificent title story, about two siblings and their unique relationship with their one-of-a-kind babysitter.
Ostlund's stories are set everywhere from Minnesota to Malaysia, but their themes are universal. And while many deal with gay and lesbian characters, their sexuality doesn't define them or the stories; it's just another plot point to consider in many cases. These are beautifully written, emotionally evocative stories which will move you, make you think, make you chuckle, and perhaps help you realize your life may not be so chaotic or problematic after all.
See all of my reviews at http://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blo....
December 25, 2015
A wonderful collection of short stories.
This book is a perfect choice for a BR.
Because it delivers a SUBSTANCE, it gives you so many topics to discuss and thinking about.
Every single story is a beautiful and sophisticated piece of prose that gives you food for thought and keeps you craving for more.
My favorite stories :
Dr Daneau's Punishment
All Boy
Highly recommended.
**Copy provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review**
December 25, 2015
For, at each turn, the people we hold close elude us, living their other lives, the lives that we can never know.
A very good collection of 11 short stories joined together by the common theme of separation, the end of a relationship between partners or between parents and their children.
The stories are quiet on the surface (as are their narrators), the emotional punch comes from all that remains unsaid. While the events were unfolding I could feel how the carefully constructed inner balance of the characters was crumbling down bit by bit to be finally undone by something seemingly unrelated to their struggle. Great stuff!
My highlights in the collection were:
Dr Daneau's Punishment
All Boy
The Day You Were Born
Idyllic Little Bali
Book chat with the lovely Sofia and Lena; Dec 21, 2015
February 2, 2016
I feel the eyes of many fictional English teachers upon me. Critiquing my sloppy, half-baked sentence structure, and marking all over my prose with their endless supply of red pens.
I feel with resentment the misplaced time of every corrective slash, and a yearning for the innocence of youth, a yearning for the past.
I feel the irony deep inside my bones. It's uncomfortable, really, but the truth tastes bitter. Or so I have been told.
I feel with resentment the misplaced time of every corrective slash, and a yearning for the innocence of youth, a yearning for the past.
I feel the irony deep inside my bones. It's uncomfortable, really, but the truth tastes bitter. Or so I have been told.
August 12, 2015
review coming...
The opening, title story is just great, funny, literary, intelligent and engaging, about an eccentric and flamboyant babysitter and her impact on a conservative family. She (the babysitter) is afraid of abbreviations, wears a hat indoors, has to brush her teeth after eating colourful foods and refuses a lift because she won’t ride in cars with power windows in case they drive into a lake (even though my father explained to her there were no lakes, no bodies of water of any sort, along the twelve blocks that lay between our house and her apartment). The next one ‘Bed Death’ about the dying of a lesbian relationship set in a hotel in Malaysia is also good, if more bitter. People commit suicide from an apartment block because it is the only building tall enough. In fact all the stories are of a very high level of accomplishment worthy of four or five stars. So why three? Because the stories became all the same, they melded into one (apart from the title story), always about lesbian teachers, usually abroad (Mexico, Belize, Spain etc) and usually in the last throes of a relationship, and really I became a little tired of reading the same scenarios over and over. That’s not to say they’re not good, they are.
The characters are mainly from Minnesota, apparently known for restraint and good manners, and here at least, pedantry. (Is that true Ceridwen?) These factors often drive the story. For example Miss Lundstrom comes into class one day to find this chalked on the board:
MISS LUNDSTROM & MISS SHAPIRO ARE LEZZIE LOVERS!!
Instead of reacting like an enraged teacher and bawling out the class she takes them through the statement pointing out its flaws, or asking the class to do so – the ampersand is lazy, the exclamation points unnecessary (a boy comes up and replaces them both with a full stop), the capitals excessive, the word lezzie prejudicial, and as one student point out: redundant. I mean you know they’re lesbians because they’re both women and they’re lovers. So she turns the whole thing into a lesson.
On the board was our final revision. Ms Lundstrom and Ms Shapiro are lovers. Of course, we had changed ‘Miss’ to ‘Ms.’ In both cases, for, as I pointed out to them, Ms Shapiro and I were not schoolgirls, nor was this the 1950s.
The opening, title story is just great, funny, literary, intelligent and engaging, about an eccentric and flamboyant babysitter and her impact on a conservative family. She (the babysitter) is afraid of abbreviations, wears a hat indoors, has to brush her teeth after eating colourful foods and refuses a lift because she won’t ride in cars with power windows in case they drive into a lake (even though my father explained to her there were no lakes, no bodies of water of any sort, along the twelve blocks that lay between our house and her apartment). The next one ‘Bed Death’ about the dying of a lesbian relationship set in a hotel in Malaysia is also good, if more bitter. People commit suicide from an apartment block because it is the only building tall enough. In fact all the stories are of a very high level of accomplishment worthy of four or five stars. So why three? Because the stories became all the same, they melded into one (apart from the title story), always about lesbian teachers, usually abroad (Mexico, Belize, Spain etc) and usually in the last throes of a relationship, and really I became a little tired of reading the same scenarios over and over. That’s not to say they’re not good, they are.
The characters are mainly from Minnesota, apparently known for restraint and good manners, and here at least, pedantry. (Is that true Ceridwen?) These factors often drive the story. For example Miss Lundstrom comes into class one day to find this chalked on the board:
MISS LUNDSTROM & MISS SHAPIRO ARE LEZZIE LOVERS!!
Instead of reacting like an enraged teacher and bawling out the class she takes them through the statement pointing out its flaws, or asking the class to do so – the ampersand is lazy, the exclamation points unnecessary (a boy comes up and replaces them both with a full stop), the capitals excessive, the word lezzie prejudicial, and as one student point out: redundant. I mean you know they’re lesbians because they’re both women and they’re lovers. So she turns the whole thing into a lesson.
On the board was our final revision. Ms Lundstrom and Ms Shapiro are lovers. Of course, we had changed ‘Miss’ to ‘Ms.’ In both cases, for, as I pointed out to them, Ms Shapiro and I were not schoolgirls, nor was this the 1950s.
February 1, 2016
When I requested this from Edelweiss, I didn't realize it was a republishing and nothing new. Regardless I appreciate the opportunity to read Ostlund's stories; she was a new author to me.
I feel like most of the stories in this collection are versions of the same story - practically every character is a woman in her 40s, teaching (often abroad in Malaysia or Korea), near the end of a longterm relationship with another woman, not adapting well to whatever quirks of the local culture - so she ends up isolated. This constant repetition makes it hard to distinguish one story from the other and also makes me assume these experiences come from the author's life. It might have been better to write it as a novel.
One thing I appreciate about these stories is that they are able to span a period of time and show growth or change in the situation or characters, without feeling like a summary of events. This is not an easy thing to do in a short story!
I received a copy from the publisher through Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.
I feel like most of the stories in this collection are versions of the same story - practically every character is a woman in her 40s, teaching (often abroad in Malaysia or Korea), near the end of a longterm relationship with another woman, not adapting well to whatever quirks of the local culture - so she ends up isolated. This constant repetition makes it hard to distinguish one story from the other and also makes me assume these experiences come from the author's life. It might have been better to write it as a novel.
One thing I appreciate about these stories is that they are able to span a period of time and show growth or change in the situation or characters, without feeling like a summary of events. This is not an easy thing to do in a short story!
I received a copy from the publisher through Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.
August 20, 2015
Having loved After the Parade I was more than happy to review this. I saw After the Parade listed as 'Gay Fiction' and yes, it is about a homosexual man but so what- the book was beautiful and whatever you identitfy as, it's about people. I am straight, and much of her writing is relatable because... we are human beings. It's funny how we seperate ourselves. Good writing is good writing, regardless of your sex, or preferences, or skin color, or the country you call home.
In this collection there were stories that made my heart sink like a stone and then laugh in another. I adored the first story straight off. The quirky Isla Marie Lumpkin, as delightfully fun as her name tickled me. She is fragile and sensitive one minute and does the strangest things- I still can't shake the toothbrush incident but that's me and my 'gross' factor.
Another story that struck a nerve is The Day You Were Born. I felt the crushing weight love for a damaged parent inflicts on a child. Being in the middle, understanding in some intuitive sense the wrongness of behavior and yet not because one is still so young, this story is short but grabbed me hard in the heart. Ostlund is a wonderful writer. Nothing exciting has to happen, the sugar is in the relationships and personal struggles- this is just a surface of her talent. I encourage anyone to read her, and grab After the Parade, because regardless of who you love- struggles aren't really much different when it comes to the heart.
In this collection there were stories that made my heart sink like a stone and then laugh in another. I adored the first story straight off. The quirky Isla Marie Lumpkin, as delightfully fun as her name tickled me. She is fragile and sensitive one minute and does the strangest things- I still can't shake the toothbrush incident but that's me and my 'gross' factor.
Another story that struck a nerve is The Day You Were Born. I felt the crushing weight love for a damaged parent inflicts on a child. Being in the middle, understanding in some intuitive sense the wrongness of behavior and yet not because one is still so young, this story is short but grabbed me hard in the heart. Ostlund is a wonderful writer. Nothing exciting has to happen, the sugar is in the relationships and personal struggles- this is just a surface of her talent. I encourage anyone to read her, and grab After the Parade, because regardless of who you love- struggles aren't really much different when it comes to the heart.
October 19, 2015
I received an ARC from NetGalley for an honest review.
The first story, from which the collection takes its name, had me hoping that the stage was set for some really solid writing. Sadly, it wasn't. I plodded along, hoping that these were just uneventful stories in which some larger lesson or takeaway looms, but nothing really comes to fruition.
The problem for me was that so many of these stories started out with the same outline of main characters, most often two lesbian teachers. In more than one, the two lesbian teachers go abroad to teach and, as if often felt, not do much of anything else. Lots of collections deal with similar protagonists--you may read a collection about families, couples, gay men, single twentysomething women. You probably never even stop to think about how a collection includes stories only told by mothers because all of those mothers are different. They have noticeable different personalities, appearances, ways of doing, ways of talking. It felt like Ostlund was writing the same story over and over in hopes of saying something larger and more meaningful, but she never gets there.
The first story, from which the collection takes its name, had me hoping that the stage was set for some really solid writing. Sadly, it wasn't. I plodded along, hoping that these were just uneventful stories in which some larger lesson or takeaway looms, but nothing really comes to fruition.
The problem for me was that so many of these stories started out with the same outline of main characters, most often two lesbian teachers. In more than one, the two lesbian teachers go abroad to teach and, as if often felt, not do much of anything else. Lots of collections deal with similar protagonists--you may read a collection about families, couples, gay men, single twentysomething women. You probably never even stop to think about how a collection includes stories only told by mothers because all of those mothers are different. They have noticeable different personalities, appearances, ways of doing, ways of talking. It felt like Ostlund was writing the same story over and over in hopes of saying something larger and more meaningful, but she never gets there.
May 3, 2018
The Bigness of The World, The Loss and Detachment of Childhood:
a study of the first-person point of view
Having a storyteller is a vital element for any story: a narrative voice, real or implied, that presents the story to the reader. When we talk about narrative voice we are talking about point of view. So important it is that it shapes and colors the way in which everything else is presented and perceived, including the plot, character and setting. In some sense, a narrative is a form of communication. Acc/ording to G. Genette, every text discloses traces of narration; all narrative is necessarily telling and showing by making the story real and alive.
Unlike the omniscient point of view, the use of first-point of view is, somehow restricted on the voice that tells the story. It involves the author’s decision to limit his omniscience to what can be known by a single character. In Lori Ostlund’s The Bigness of The World, the author uses a first-person point of view featuring an experiencing narrative voice that is “I” narrating what she is experiencing as a twelve years old girl. Thus, it serves as a tool for a better understanding of the growth and inner transformation of the protagonist.
The story begins through the lens of a child’s observation. In the first paragraph, “We” considered ourselves as adults meanwhile still relied on Ilsa, that one-of-a-kind babysitter’s attendance; mom’s job as vice president at the bank just seems nebulous and dull. When depicting our daily life with Ilsa, especially her hyperfocus on acronyms and mania for good grammar, the narration was definitely intriguing and humorous. So innocent and childish was the protagonist’s tongue that we can see, from this kind of description, a barrier between the narrator and true maturity. And, this first-point narrative, too, helps readers gain a glimpse into the protagonist’s inner world, bringing a focus on the character’s mentality and psychology.
Along with the story develops, this barrier, somehow detrimental, also lies between children and parents. “I believe he wanted to understand us, for example, how we viewed the world, but this required patience, something that our father lacked, for he did not have enough time at his disposal to be patient, to stand there and puzzle out what it was about his business card that we did not understand.” This line immediately hints us what we might be digging into: a problematic relationship with a parent. For dad, work was something more important than getting to know our perspective. Here, first point of view directly shows a lack of understanding and emotional connection between the loved ones, also the two disparate worlds of child and adult.
In our eyes, my mother, a stern and cold character in the story, seemed like a workaholic and lived a rigid life. “My mother was always very clear in her opinions; she said that in banking one had to be, that she needed to be able to size people up quickly and carry through on her assessment without hesitation or regret, a policy that she applied at home as well.” Again, in those narration we scarcely see any trace of intimacy. It’s the kind of tone you’d use on a stranger: business-like and curt, by using words like “assessment” and “policy”. Through first -person point of view, Ostlund enables us to step back from everyday life’s banalities and view from a child’s eye how we are estranged from loved ones, thus reinforcing the theme. These adult characters in the story seemed to preserve the veneer of social calm while letting slow detachment simmer below the surface.
Then comes the first loss of Martin and “me” that is Ilsa’s leaving. She used father’s toothbrush and got fired while “I” thought “It was my fault that things with Ilsa came to an end.” Here, adults assessed emotional intimacy through the lens of toothbrush. Toothbrush represented an overwhelming intimacy which, however, didn’t make sense to “me”. From first-person point of view, the story had a muted but bleak outlook on the child’s view of the world and their vague opinion about intimate relationship.
Another interesting detail lies in their visit to Ilsa’s house. There, “we” found Ilsa’s kitchen quite tiny, unlike our imagined “perfect size”. The two felt a sudden disappointment and soon had to face the fact that not everything was perfect and not everyone could maintain a middle-class life as their family did. And by that, they began to be aware of the world. The huge gap between different classes did exist. And they saw it, felt it, and from first point of view, uttered it by themselves. That’s the society they lived in, brutal but real.
In the story, the narrator was literally looking back on the event happened when she was eleven going on twelve from first-point of view. Thus, when we have a close-up view of her word choice, her syntax, there’s a sort of wistfulness in it. But the author also tried to retain a certain naivete that she was just figuring out the world and too was quite award of the world, especially when mom got arrested. Those sudden changes and losses seemed wired to her.
“In those days, Martin’s hands were unusually plump, at odds with the rest of his body, and from where I sat, directly across from my father, Martin’s hand looked like a fat, white bullfrog perched on my father’s shoulder.” The author was somehow tricky. She didn’t have her saying: “Here I am as an adult with all these years in between and I’ve analyzed it and thought about it.” Instead, she revealed a feeling of detachment, an unsettling state of mind.
“We had no inkling of what lay ahead, no way of knowing that the familiar terrain of our childhoods would soon become a vast, unmarked landscape in which we would be left to wander, motherless and, it seemed to us at times, fatherless as well.”
Is life always easy and happy? Time and again the narrator answered it in the negative. Childhood died out in a blink of eye. No matter how hard we tried, separation still creep up and settled in our lives. Through all these losses, we finally woke up from illusion of the carefree childhood and walked out and found out only the bigness of the world might be our only consolation, as the monologue revealed.
----
an essay for my English class...
a study of the first-person point of view
Having a storyteller is a vital element for any story: a narrative voice, real or implied, that presents the story to the reader. When we talk about narrative voice we are talking about point of view. So important it is that it shapes and colors the way in which everything else is presented and perceived, including the plot, character and setting. In some sense, a narrative is a form of communication. Acc/ording to G. Genette, every text discloses traces of narration; all narrative is necessarily telling and showing by making the story real and alive.
Unlike the omniscient point of view, the use of first-point of view is, somehow restricted on the voice that tells the story. It involves the author’s decision to limit his omniscience to what can be known by a single character. In Lori Ostlund’s The Bigness of The World, the author uses a first-person point of view featuring an experiencing narrative voice that is “I” narrating what she is experiencing as a twelve years old girl. Thus, it serves as a tool for a better understanding of the growth and inner transformation of the protagonist.
The story begins through the lens of a child’s observation. In the first paragraph, “We” considered ourselves as adults meanwhile still relied on Ilsa, that one-of-a-kind babysitter’s attendance; mom’s job as vice president at the bank just seems nebulous and dull. When depicting our daily life with Ilsa, especially her hyperfocus on acronyms and mania for good grammar, the narration was definitely intriguing and humorous. So innocent and childish was the protagonist’s tongue that we can see, from this kind of description, a barrier between the narrator and true maturity. And, this first-point narrative, too, helps readers gain a glimpse into the protagonist’s inner world, bringing a focus on the character’s mentality and psychology.
Along with the story develops, this barrier, somehow detrimental, also lies between children and parents. “I believe he wanted to understand us, for example, how we viewed the world, but this required patience, something that our father lacked, for he did not have enough time at his disposal to be patient, to stand there and puzzle out what it was about his business card that we did not understand.” This line immediately hints us what we might be digging into: a problematic relationship with a parent. For dad, work was something more important than getting to know our perspective. Here, first point of view directly shows a lack of understanding and emotional connection between the loved ones, also the two disparate worlds of child and adult.
In our eyes, my mother, a stern and cold character in the story, seemed like a workaholic and lived a rigid life. “My mother was always very clear in her opinions; she said that in banking one had to be, that she needed to be able to size people up quickly and carry through on her assessment without hesitation or regret, a policy that she applied at home as well.” Again, in those narration we scarcely see any trace of intimacy. It’s the kind of tone you’d use on a stranger: business-like and curt, by using words like “assessment” and “policy”. Through first -person point of view, Ostlund enables us to step back from everyday life’s banalities and view from a child’s eye how we are estranged from loved ones, thus reinforcing the theme. These adult characters in the story seemed to preserve the veneer of social calm while letting slow detachment simmer below the surface.
Then comes the first loss of Martin and “me” that is Ilsa’s leaving. She used father’s toothbrush and got fired while “I” thought “It was my fault that things with Ilsa came to an end.” Here, adults assessed emotional intimacy through the lens of toothbrush. Toothbrush represented an overwhelming intimacy which, however, didn’t make sense to “me”. From first-person point of view, the story had a muted but bleak outlook on the child’s view of the world and their vague opinion about intimate relationship.
Another interesting detail lies in their visit to Ilsa’s house. There, “we” found Ilsa’s kitchen quite tiny, unlike our imagined “perfect size”. The two felt a sudden disappointment and soon had to face the fact that not everything was perfect and not everyone could maintain a middle-class life as their family did. And by that, they began to be aware of the world. The huge gap between different classes did exist. And they saw it, felt it, and from first point of view, uttered it by themselves. That’s the society they lived in, brutal but real.
In the story, the narrator was literally looking back on the event happened when she was eleven going on twelve from first-point of view. Thus, when we have a close-up view of her word choice, her syntax, there’s a sort of wistfulness in it. But the author also tried to retain a certain naivete that she was just figuring out the world and too was quite award of the world, especially when mom got arrested. Those sudden changes and losses seemed wired to her.
“In those days, Martin’s hands were unusually plump, at odds with the rest of his body, and from where I sat, directly across from my father, Martin’s hand looked like a fat, white bullfrog perched on my father’s shoulder.” The author was somehow tricky. She didn’t have her saying: “Here I am as an adult with all these years in between and I’ve analyzed it and thought about it.” Instead, she revealed a feeling of detachment, an unsettling state of mind.
“We had no inkling of what lay ahead, no way of knowing that the familiar terrain of our childhoods would soon become a vast, unmarked landscape in which we would be left to wander, motherless and, it seemed to us at times, fatherless as well.”
Is life always easy and happy? Time and again the narrator answered it in the negative. Childhood died out in a blink of eye. No matter how hard we tried, separation still creep up and settled in our lives. Through all these losses, we finally woke up from illusion of the carefree childhood and walked out and found out only the bigness of the world might be our only consolation, as the monologue revealed.
----
an essay for my English class...
July 4, 2020
Short stories, with characters determined to escape their ordinary lives and enter new ones. Disruptions, a big interest in choosing characters who place a great deal into vocabulary and grammar, into shaping others (there are plenty of teachers, librarians etc.) and the relational dynamics between partners of LGBTQ couples and also between them and the world.
April 5, 2020
This is the first book of Lori Ostlund I read. I find this collection of short stories thoughtful and engaging, and the perspectives unique. The only reason I gave it a four star is because I find some protagonists' stream of consciousness repetitive.
THE BIGNESS OF THE WORLD: A child’s recount of her middle-upper class family’s tumultuous time soothed by their warm, empathetic, old-fashioned simpleton kind of a babysitter. A few gems I found in this story: the well-to-do parents’ pride in their careers, the babysitter’s distain of math, mother’s rigid attitude toward the children’s mimic of Chinese opera, Martin’s gentleness and bravery (in his own way) toward bullies – “such is the life of a fairy.” I especially liked how it ended with Ilsa’s (babysitter) parting words, “I know it may sound frightening, yet I assure you that there have been times in my life when the bigness of the world was my only consolation.”
BED DEATH: A lesbian couple’s experience as English teachers in a Malaysian city, Malacca. The title was strange – it refers to the couple breaking up by gradually not talking to each other then not sleeping in the same bed and finally one of them leaving the apartment. Perhaps the breakup was the heart of the story, even though the story appears to be a mosaic of different aspects of their daily living. It’s not the most uplifting story – suicide, alcoholism, and boredom. What I remember the most is the Malaysian tale of a British man and the snake. The tale, from Mr. Mani’s interpretation, is about love, “With love, there are always two: There is the snake who devours, and there’s the one who cooperates by placing his head inside the snake’s mouth.” What I failed to understand, is how this story relates to Mr. Mani’s own marriage and alcoholism. Is it about his love for alcohol or is this referring to his loveless marriage to his wife that is slowly killing him?
TALKING FAWL WITH MY FATHER: One of my favorite stories. It’s about the main character’s interactions with her ill-mannered, illogical, obstinate, and sometimes manipulative father: 1. circular argument about turkey (father’s preference of beef over turkey, father’s interpretation of his “penpecked son’s” preference to turkey); 2. Broasted chicken (chicken marinated and breaded and then fried in a pressured fryer – I just learned), father’s backhanded complaint of the author’s infrequent calls – asking if she knew something that happened a long time ago (“Your sister got married”), and his peculiar way of storing books in the basement with standing water; III. Father’s mailing pheasant to the author as an overt symbol, similar to Mike’s mother-in-law’s question to a Jew, “Do you know about the Holocaust” as a way of establishing her own awareness. The second half of the book relates to the father’s uncomfortable acknowledgement of the author’s lesbian girlfriend, and the author’s parents’ life-long habit of being pack rats. I don’t quite get the narrator’s insufferable tolerance toward her father.
THE DAY YOU WERE BORN: A heartbreaking story of intelligent yet mentally ill man coming back from the hospital after his unsuccessful suicide attempt, from the eyes of his nine-year-old daughter.
NOBODY WALKS TO THE MENNONITES: This is probably my least favorite story in this book. A slice of an American lesbian couple’s tedious, tension-wrought venture in Belize City – their lodging in a decrepit hotel. The part that interests me was the main character’s theory: Each family has a member whose absence rounds out the family far more than his or her presence ever could. I didn’t get why this theory – the main character being that one member of the family – made her feel better.
UPON COMPLETION OF BALDNESS: Another not-so-favorite story. The slow death of a lesbian couple’s relationship. The catalyst to this dissolution was that, after the partner came back from Hong Kong with a shaved head (a paid role in a movie shoot), the narrator, though thinking it strange, never asked about it. The coolness of the relationship was chilling and unbreachable. The interesting, no, ingenious part of the story is how the narrator maneuvered the students to normalize a lesbian relationship by grammatically dissecting a derogatory statement about the couple being “lezzi lovers.”
AND DOWN WE WENT: The brief history of the author being boomed by a bird three times in her life. During these three times – first was in the US, when on a field trip with a boy next to her. The boy got startled and cried but subsequently pretended that it was the author that cried; second when the author was in Spain when she and Georgia were about to become a couple, a bird drop landed on her hand as she was getting a delivery from a mailman, and the third when the couple’s relationship came to a slow death as they were to open a furniture shop in Malaysia. In short, the three bird bombs coincided with the author’s childhood, as well as the developing and ending of a relationship. The author, or someone else, cried upon the occasions, and thus the phrase “don’t cry” surfaced. According to the author, there are two ways the statement is issued: as a demonstration of solidarity and sympathy, one suggesting that the situation, and often life in general, does not merit tears, a tone that is generally both reassuring and persuasive; and there is the other Don’t Cry that is a pure threat, that warns, Do not start because I am not in a situation to think about you or your needs, and if you do start, you will see this and most surely be disappointed.
IDYLLIC LITTLE BALI: An evening of American guests’ spontaneous gathering in a hotel in Bali. They were brought together upon the exhaustion from the effort of speaking in a foreign tongue or trying to be understood by non-Americans. The main character, Martin, is a confused and hurt man whose wife, after many years together and saving for a dream trip in Southeast Asian countries, finally let out her disappointment in marriage during the trip, decided to leave his wife and ended up boarding an airplane that crashed. The part that struck me was Martin’s wife’s reply when Martin asked what he could do, “Can you learn to cry when you hear sad songs? Can you learn to articulate why you prefer radishes to cucumbers? Can you learn to appreciate irony? Wait. Can you learn to even understand irony? No? Well, then there’s absolutely nothing you can do, Martin.” So much sadness and helplessness in her outburst. A marriage that should not have started in the first place? How many people tried to stay in this kind of marriages and found peace with them? Can we assume there is no joy in this type of marriage? Can it be fixed?
DR. DENEAU’S PUNISHMENT: I became dumbfounded by the ending. A seemingly bookish, old-school, childishly rigid but principled school teacher who hired “houseboys” to keep him company, was placed under administrative investigation for punishing two male students who engaged in fistfights by making them hold hands. The story ended with the protagonist returning home in shock and sadness, and the houseboy held his hand after he laid down on the houseboy’s bed. He felt, “Such torment, but I do no ask him to stop for this punishment is what I need and what I deserve.” Such ambiguity! Is he gay? Is he in his right mind? What’s the true relationship he has with his houseboy?
THE CHILDREN BENEATH THE SEAT: I honestly don’t know what to make of this story. A lesbian couple’s encounter with a poor Morocco family while on a bus in the desert, and their subsequent encounter with a gentle yet mysterious hotelier who took care of his either mentally-ill or a bully of a nephew. I enjoyed the part about the couple’s brief appearances at a church.
ALL BOY: The meaning of the title eludes me. The story is tale about a gay man leaving the family. The part of the story about the man’s discussion with the gay librarian on speed-reading baffled me at first. Now I am wondering if that was the impetus that finally helped the man make up his mind to leave – “understanding has its own rhythm” and “Waving your hands about? Well. That is merely a distraction.”
THE BIGNESS OF THE WORLD: A child’s recount of her middle-upper class family’s tumultuous time soothed by their warm, empathetic, old-fashioned simpleton kind of a babysitter. A few gems I found in this story: the well-to-do parents’ pride in their careers, the babysitter’s distain of math, mother’s rigid attitude toward the children’s mimic of Chinese opera, Martin’s gentleness and bravery (in his own way) toward bullies – “such is the life of a fairy.” I especially liked how it ended with Ilsa’s (babysitter) parting words, “I know it may sound frightening, yet I assure you that there have been times in my life when the bigness of the world was my only consolation.”
BED DEATH: A lesbian couple’s experience as English teachers in a Malaysian city, Malacca. The title was strange – it refers to the couple breaking up by gradually not talking to each other then not sleeping in the same bed and finally one of them leaving the apartment. Perhaps the breakup was the heart of the story, even though the story appears to be a mosaic of different aspects of their daily living. It’s not the most uplifting story – suicide, alcoholism, and boredom. What I remember the most is the Malaysian tale of a British man and the snake. The tale, from Mr. Mani’s interpretation, is about love, “With love, there are always two: There is the snake who devours, and there’s the one who cooperates by placing his head inside the snake’s mouth.” What I failed to understand, is how this story relates to Mr. Mani’s own marriage and alcoholism. Is it about his love for alcohol or is this referring to his loveless marriage to his wife that is slowly killing him?
TALKING FAWL WITH MY FATHER: One of my favorite stories. It’s about the main character’s interactions with her ill-mannered, illogical, obstinate, and sometimes manipulative father: 1. circular argument about turkey (father’s preference of beef over turkey, father’s interpretation of his “penpecked son’s” preference to turkey); 2. Broasted chicken (chicken marinated and breaded and then fried in a pressured fryer – I just learned), father’s backhanded complaint of the author’s infrequent calls – asking if she knew something that happened a long time ago (“Your sister got married”), and his peculiar way of storing books in the basement with standing water; III. Father’s mailing pheasant to the author as an overt symbol, similar to Mike’s mother-in-law’s question to a Jew, “Do you know about the Holocaust” as a way of establishing her own awareness. The second half of the book relates to the father’s uncomfortable acknowledgement of the author’s lesbian girlfriend, and the author’s parents’ life-long habit of being pack rats. I don’t quite get the narrator’s insufferable tolerance toward her father.
THE DAY YOU WERE BORN: A heartbreaking story of intelligent yet mentally ill man coming back from the hospital after his unsuccessful suicide attempt, from the eyes of his nine-year-old daughter.
NOBODY WALKS TO THE MENNONITES: This is probably my least favorite story in this book. A slice of an American lesbian couple’s tedious, tension-wrought venture in Belize City – their lodging in a decrepit hotel. The part that interests me was the main character’s theory: Each family has a member whose absence rounds out the family far more than his or her presence ever could. I didn’t get why this theory – the main character being that one member of the family – made her feel better.
UPON COMPLETION OF BALDNESS: Another not-so-favorite story. The slow death of a lesbian couple’s relationship. The catalyst to this dissolution was that, after the partner came back from Hong Kong with a shaved head (a paid role in a movie shoot), the narrator, though thinking it strange, never asked about it. The coolness of the relationship was chilling and unbreachable. The interesting, no, ingenious part of the story is how the narrator maneuvered the students to normalize a lesbian relationship by grammatically dissecting a derogatory statement about the couple being “lezzi lovers.”
AND DOWN WE WENT: The brief history of the author being boomed by a bird three times in her life. During these three times – first was in the US, when on a field trip with a boy next to her. The boy got startled and cried but subsequently pretended that it was the author that cried; second when the author was in Spain when she and Georgia were about to become a couple, a bird drop landed on her hand as she was getting a delivery from a mailman, and the third when the couple’s relationship came to a slow death as they were to open a furniture shop in Malaysia. In short, the three bird bombs coincided with the author’s childhood, as well as the developing and ending of a relationship. The author, or someone else, cried upon the occasions, and thus the phrase “don’t cry” surfaced. According to the author, there are two ways the statement is issued: as a demonstration of solidarity and sympathy, one suggesting that the situation, and often life in general, does not merit tears, a tone that is generally both reassuring and persuasive; and there is the other Don’t Cry that is a pure threat, that warns, Do not start because I am not in a situation to think about you or your needs, and if you do start, you will see this and most surely be disappointed.
IDYLLIC LITTLE BALI: An evening of American guests’ spontaneous gathering in a hotel in Bali. They were brought together upon the exhaustion from the effort of speaking in a foreign tongue or trying to be understood by non-Americans. The main character, Martin, is a confused and hurt man whose wife, after many years together and saving for a dream trip in Southeast Asian countries, finally let out her disappointment in marriage during the trip, decided to leave his wife and ended up boarding an airplane that crashed. The part that struck me was Martin’s wife’s reply when Martin asked what he could do, “Can you learn to cry when you hear sad songs? Can you learn to articulate why you prefer radishes to cucumbers? Can you learn to appreciate irony? Wait. Can you learn to even understand irony? No? Well, then there’s absolutely nothing you can do, Martin.” So much sadness and helplessness in her outburst. A marriage that should not have started in the first place? How many people tried to stay in this kind of marriages and found peace with them? Can we assume there is no joy in this type of marriage? Can it be fixed?
DR. DENEAU’S PUNISHMENT: I became dumbfounded by the ending. A seemingly bookish, old-school, childishly rigid but principled school teacher who hired “houseboys” to keep him company, was placed under administrative investigation for punishing two male students who engaged in fistfights by making them hold hands. The story ended with the protagonist returning home in shock and sadness, and the houseboy held his hand after he laid down on the houseboy’s bed. He felt, “Such torment, but I do no ask him to stop for this punishment is what I need and what I deserve.” Such ambiguity! Is he gay? Is he in his right mind? What’s the true relationship he has with his houseboy?
THE CHILDREN BENEATH THE SEAT: I honestly don’t know what to make of this story. A lesbian couple’s encounter with a poor Morocco family while on a bus in the desert, and their subsequent encounter with a gentle yet mysterious hotelier who took care of his either mentally-ill or a bully of a nephew. I enjoyed the part about the couple’s brief appearances at a church.
ALL BOY: The meaning of the title eludes me. The story is tale about a gay man leaving the family. The part of the story about the man’s discussion with the gay librarian on speed-reading baffled me at first. Now I am wondering if that was the impetus that finally helped the man make up his mind to leave – “understanding has its own rhythm” and “Waving your hands about? Well. That is merely a distraction.”
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 2, 2016
I was approved an ARC of this book by the publishers via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This review in its entirety was originally posted at eclectictales.com: http://www.eclectictales.com/blog/201...
The Bigness of the World was an interesting collection of stories capturing those fleeting moments of life. It’s hard to explain, many of these stories may not seem out of the ordinary or may happen to anyone at one point or another within a person’s week, and some of these stories may not seem to have a particular end goal in mind, but the reader is swept along following the characters’ experiences: moments of revelation, of things falling apart, of uncertainty or confusion. It’s interesting, and the author did a wonderful job in really capturing these characters’ experiences, whether the protagonist is young or old, man or woman.
Like any short story collection, there’s going to stories that you either like or you don’t. This collection kept my interest enough, but I would have to say my favourites were “The Bigness of the World” (I felt for the young characters and that gap between what’s going on amongst the adults and how they understand everything that’s happening to them), “Bed Death” (interesting in the way the relationship drifted apart without the narrator really realising it), “Talking Fowl With My Father” (a very odd tale–the father was quite an eccentric character–but I couldn’t help but follow along), “Upon Completion of Baldness” (similar to “Bed Death” only the narrator was focusing much on the baldness of her girlfriend as a sort of anchor to her thoughts and the things in their lives that were spiraling out of control without her realising it), and “All Boy” (aww, Harold).
The Bigness of the World overall was an interesting read and impressive collection. The author had a wonderful way of capturing the ebbs of everyday life and really relling a story out of them, whether they be about relationships falling apart or misconceptions about what’s going on around these characters. I would recommend this book to readers of contemporary fiction and readers looking to diversify their readings/books with LGBQT elements.
Rating: 3.5/5
The Bigness of the World was an interesting collection of stories capturing those fleeting moments of life. It’s hard to explain, many of these stories may not seem out of the ordinary or may happen to anyone at one point or another within a person’s week, and some of these stories may not seem to have a particular end goal in mind, but the reader is swept along following the characters’ experiences: moments of revelation, of things falling apart, of uncertainty or confusion. It’s interesting, and the author did a wonderful job in really capturing these characters’ experiences, whether the protagonist is young or old, man or woman.
Like any short story collection, there’s going to stories that you either like or you don’t. This collection kept my interest enough, but I would have to say my favourites were “The Bigness of the World” (I felt for the young characters and that gap between what’s going on amongst the adults and how they understand everything that’s happening to them), “Bed Death” (interesting in the way the relationship drifted apart without the narrator really realising it), “Talking Fowl With My Father” (a very odd tale–the father was quite an eccentric character–but I couldn’t help but follow along), “Upon Completion of Baldness” (similar to “Bed Death” only the narrator was focusing much on the baldness of her girlfriend as a sort of anchor to her thoughts and the things in their lives that were spiraling out of control without her realising it), and “All Boy” (aww, Harold).
The Bigness of the World overall was an interesting read and impressive collection. The author had a wonderful way of capturing the ebbs of everyday life and really relling a story out of them, whether they be about relationships falling apart or misconceptions about what’s going on around these characters. I would recommend this book to readers of contemporary fiction and readers looking to diversify their readings/books with LGBQT elements.
Rating: 3.5/5
February 24, 2016
3.5/5 stars
This book is definitely different with the other short stories I've read recently.
I just think that some of the stories could be the beginning chapter of a novel, such as the story that used as the title of this collection. And I sure have some favorites here, besides the Bigness of The World itself, like Taking Fowl with My Father, Idyllic Little Bali, Dr. Daneau's Punishment and All Boy. The written of Lori Oslund is absolutely stunning.
This book is definitely different with the other short stories I've read recently.
I just think that some of the stories could be the beginning chapter of a novel, such as the story that used as the title of this collection. And I sure have some favorites here, besides the Bigness of The World itself, like Taking Fowl with My Father, Idyllic Little Bali, Dr. Daneau's Punishment and All Boy. The written of Lori Oslund is absolutely stunning.
May 7, 2010
You gain a star for having short stories about lesbians which no one ever does but I felt like they lacked a depth that I kept looking for. I hated that she kept referring to the characters as old and then you would find out they were like 44!!!! Have pity, please....
April 13, 2016
This is a well-written book with no heart. The characters, who were remarkably similar, reminded me why I avoid books without diverse characters. Read it if you want-- maybe it'll be for you, but it certainly wasn't for me.
May 12, 2016
Though the stories were arguably well-done individually, the collection as a whole began to feel like reading the same story over and over. The writing, as well as the collection, became tedious before I was even halfway through.
June 1, 2016
4,5 stars. I wrote about this book here: https://theblankgarden.wordpress.com/...
October 2, 2017
What a great quirky short story collection! Mr Deneau's Punishment is laugh out loud funny. Some of the stories have a sad unexpected twist. I can't wait to read more by this author.
January 3, 2018
Wonderful.
July 6, 2017
This is a brilliant collection. The pace is perfect, the plots are engaging, the characters are funny and sad, and the writing is distinctive. Bonus points for the fact that no one's straight. And not in a political I'm-making-a-point way. The queerness just is, which is how it should be. The only problem, which intensifies the further you read, is a sense of pervasive...sameness. The settings are almost entirely white people or couples from small towns in the U.S. who're traveling to the third world. The relationships are all in virtually identical states of quiet disrepair and no one seems to talk to each other a whole lot. Attempts at relationship revival follow the same trajectory: international travel, false hope, dissolution. A lot of the characters share a pinched-nose obsession with correct English. Their thoughts sound the same. It soon begins feeling like you're reading different versions of one story, and that gets a bit tedious. But the writing is precise, the insights astute, and each story contains a perfect blend of melancholy and humor which makes you keep reading.
October 30, 2018
Every story in this work has such incredible forward momentum, without the overly plotted-ness that contemporary fiction can sometimes have. The characters' voices drew me in so deeply I couldn't put it down from one to the next. This collection puts tone, sound, syntax, character forward, a refreshing change, and yet every one has an unexpected twist or angle. Realistic fiction without being dull, without relying on predictable conventions, without reaching for dystopian settings. I could have used one less story about a couple inhabiting a foreign country, but thank god for so many stories with finely wrought, complex same-sex relationships. In particular, "Idyllic Little Bali", "Dr. Deneau's Punishment" (hilarious and sad), and "Bed Death".
May 9, 2018
A collection of mostly indistinguishable short stories written in the hopes of saying something profound but never coming to fruition. Far from memorable, with the exception of this passage from 'The Day You Were Born'
"It was because I loved you so much, even before you were born, and I could feel how much you loved me. [...] At night, when your mother was asleep with you between us, I would put my hand on her stomach, on you, and I could feel you telling me that, Annabel. I could feel you saying that you loved me. That already you loved me more than anyone had ever loved me or ever would."
"It was because I loved you so much, even before you were born, and I could feel how much you loved me. [...] At night, when your mother was asleep with you between us, I would put my hand on her stomach, on you, and I could feel you telling me that, Annabel. I could feel you saying that you loved me. That already you loved me more than anyone had ever loved me or ever would."
January 13, 2019
This is one of those rare collections of short stories in which every single story is really, really good. The stories take the reader to the four corners of the world to Minnesota, Spain, Morocco, Belize, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Albuquerque. The protagonists are often people who are afraid of the bigness of the world, the messiness and sadness of it, but the book is for people who embrace it. The writing is beautiful and precise and incredibly funny, irreverent at times and always moving.
April 12, 2018
A collection of stories set in Malaysia, Spain, New Mexico, San Francisco, Minnesota, among others. Many of the stories detail the decay as well as the comfort of intimate relationships. Each story analyzes human connection by way of strangers, close friends, family, and romantic partners. The narrators of each story feel like the smart kid in class no one is quite sure how to interact with.
January 27, 2023
3.5 rounded down. The prose was gorgeous and lovely to read. I liked the book a good bit early on, but ended up finding the 11 stories/themes/characters/relationships a little too same-y to read back to back in the same collection. They kinda blurred together in some ways to me. Plus, a bit of weird writing about larger bodies and food that didn't sit quite right to me.
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