Boundless as the Sky

by Dawn Raffel

Dawn Raffel's Boundless as the Sky is a book of the invisible histories that repose beneath the cities we inhabit, and the worlds we try to build out of words. The first of its two parts, stories of real and invented cities, some ancient, some dystopian, is a response to Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities. The second part comes together into one narrative, taking place in a single city-Chicago-on a single day in 1933. It is based closely on a true event, the arrival of a "roaring armada of goodwill" in the form of twenty-four seaplanes flown in a display of fascist power by Mussolini's wingman Italo Balbo to Chicago's "Century of Progress" World's Fair. The 7000-mile flight from Rome to Chicago was lauded by both Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Hitler, at a time when aviation made banner headlines across the US, and news of the Nazis was often in a side column. The novella follows a few of the many thousands of Chicagoans there to witness the planes' arrival. These two panels of Raffel's poetic diptych call out to each other with a mysterious and disquieting harmony, and from history and fantasy to the dangers and dark realities of the current moment with startling insight and urgency.

156 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 15, 2023

About the author

Dawn Raffel's illustrated memoir, The Secret Life of Objects, was a Wall Street Journal bestseller. Previous books include a critically acclaimed novel, Carrying the Body, and two story collections— Further Adventures in the Restless Universe and In the Year of Long Division.

Her writing has been published in O, The Oprah Magazine, BOMB, New Philosopher, The San Francisco Chronicle, Conjunctions, Black Book, Open City, The Anchor Book of New American Short Stories, Arts & Letters, The Quarterly, NOON, and numerous other periodicals and anthologies—most recently The Best Short Fictions 2016 (selected by Stuart Dybek) and The Best Short Fictions 2015 (selected by Robert Olen Butler).

She was a fiction editor for many years, helped launch O, The Oprah Magazine, where she served as Executive Articles Editor for seven years, and subsequently held senior-level "at- large" positions at More magazine and Reader's Digest. In addition, she served as the Center for Fiction's web editor. She has taught in the MFA program at Columbia University, the Center for Fiction, and at Summer Literary Seminars in St. Petersburg, Russia; Montreal; and Vilnius, Lithuania.

She currently works as an independent editor for individuals and creative organizations, specializing in memoir, short stories, and narrative nonfiction. She is also a certified yoga instructor and teaches embodied creative writing.

The Strange Case of Dr. Couney will be published by Blue Rider Press (a division of Penguin), July 31, 2018.

Reviews

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Knowing this book’s first section was inspired by Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, I read the latter a couple months ago in preparation. I was told it wasn’t necessary and that’s likely true; but if anything, now I know I enjoyed this much more than his. Perhaps that’s because Raffel’s cities, each described in lengths ranging from a paragraph to a few pages, have people as their focus. Perhaps Raffel feels a little bit the way I do about the Calvino, as her first piece called “The Beautiful City of Serena” ends with the sentences: The old women may be sixty or ninety, or two-hundred and ten. Despite their wild hues, no one sees them at all.

The second section takes place in the so-called Second City (Chicago) during one day in 1933, every character’s thoughts directed toward the spectacle of the true-life Italian fascist pilot flying from Rome at the head of an “armada” toward the Century of Progress, a world’s fair. The characters, who each get their own short section, include siblings who have other things on their minds; “freaks” who normally have to stay away from the midway; a suave pickpocket; the nurse tending to the preemies being exhibited, babies that wouldn’t have had a chance at life otherwise. It’s a fascinating story of connections that arrive at a satisfying conclusion.

The author’s section at the beginning and her concluding piece using the device of a metaphorical character make for a nice circuity. The only thing I might have wished for is more white space between the last photo and this conclusion, as well as more space before the “historical notes.” Without spacing, some of the meaning and magic gets lost, at least temporarily. But I understand the limitations of a small independent press and, ultimately, this doesn’t take away from the execution. If I reread the book (and I can see myself doing so), I'll just take a breather at these junctures.

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Raffel's Carrying the Body is one of my favorite novels. And I found much of what I loved in that brilliant novel in this collection, especially in the exceptional flash novella, which comprises much of the book. She interweaves, in exquisite tiny portraits, the lives of multiple characters involved in some way with Chicago's 1933 "Century of Progress" World's Fair. Freaks, lovers, law enforcement, pick pocketers, even Italo Balbo himself (an actual historical figure), whose cross-Atlantic plane trip is the thread that holds the story together. I was amazed at how REAL the characters felt, how carefully drawn each one is, and how interconnected many of them are, as we all are. Raffel has her own mesmerizing, highly perceptive and original take on people and events and this novella will not be easily forgotten. Magical and transcendent.

[John Madera · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abrim with paradoxes, reversals, negations, affirmations, Dawn Raffel's Boundless as the Sky is a profound feminist attack against patriarchy embedded in the literary imaginary and beyond, Raffel's many ways of reimagining archetypes (e.g., maiden, nymph, mother, and crone) deftly contesting the so-called canon, her many ways of problematizing history—itself full of fable and fantasy—foregrounding the "telling" of storytelling, her prose the very definition of jeweled: bright, sharp, multi-faceted, alluring.

[AP Dwivedi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Absolutely loved Raffel’s artistic vision. I’ve never encountered a book where the first half was assorted vignettes and poetry that thematically sets up the second half which is narrative. The narrative is also such that it tracks many different characters as they anticipate the historic singular moment when Italo Balbo’s armada of Italian planes descends into Chicago in a glorious show of force, greeted as paragons of aviation.

Only at the end did I realize that this book, in its own modernist way, was a slice of life story. We are getting that singular day from the perspective of all the people whose lives the fascist regimes were soon to change, almost like a moment in time both experiencing itself and being remembered decades later.

Despite its short length there were still a small number of parts that seemed to drag on, which caused me to skim. And leading with poetry rather than interspersing it requires a reread in order to appreciate in a more meaningful way. So until that happens I’m limited by own inabilities in giving this a 3.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I started this book I decided to read Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino first as I had never read it and thought the first half of Raffel’s book may not have any meaning to me. I’m glad I did as it gave Calvino’s book more shape, from Raffel’s response I understood more of what was going on in the first book and I was able to get what Raffel was saying here (well maybe, I could have gone in a completely different direction than Raffel intended). It does feel like a response to Calvino, Raffel is saying how different things are now and at the same time hardly different at all, the cities we inhabit or imagine ain’t that much different to Calvino’s time, we may have climate change and social media but the people in Calvino’s cities faced their own demons too.

The second half of Raffel’s book is rather spectacular…in fact taking inspiration from Raffel herself:

spec·tacu·lar
[spɛkˈtakjʊlə]
ADJECTIVE
beautiful in a dramatic and eye-catching way:
“spectacular mountain scenery”
SIMILAR:
striking
picturesque
eye-catching
breathtaking
arresting
amazing
glorious

Raffel takes an event, Chicago’s “Century of Progress” World’s Fair, which I hadn’t heard of before and a host of real life characters and created this story based around their lives for this single day. Different writing techniques and voices creates something that feels very real, and there is a darkness just under the surface that feels dangerous, the list of how a woman should behave and the police who turn a blind eye to crimes gives you a feeling of imminent chaos. The best thing about this book for me was that real people were used and I spent quite a while on google looking them up. I also loved how this felt like a riddle and each chapter gives the reader another piece of the puzzle.

Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2023...

[Marianne Mersereau · Rating 4 out of 5]

I especially enjoyed part two of "Boundless as the Sky" which is based on a true story of the flight of twenty-four seaplanes that flew from Rome to Chicago in 1933 as part of the World's Fair being held there. The author demonstrates remarkable creativity in the formatting of the stories in this interesting and entertaining book.

[Sabeeha Rehman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book reads like poetry. Beautifully written, and it's creative style feels like a breath of fresh air. It's brilliant.

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stunning! Unforgettable journeys, beautiful language: surprising and original. Love how these pieces build, how these worlds come alive. I've always been a fan of Dawn Raffel's work and this book is a favorite.

[Meg Tuite · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely mesmerized by "Boundless As The Sky"! It moves and radiates like a spectator at the World Fair! Raffel's voice throughout is forceful, clear, and steady! DEEP LOVE for all the research, the action, the characters, and the structure that binds it all together! Here are some quotes:
"Her face, reconsidered, looked bloated to her. She would pull back the flesh. She would claw at the fabric, damage the arms, the interchangeable legs. She would interrogate the crystal."
"you are forever condemned to see yourself in everything, distorted, occluded, everywhere you look."
"Your mouth is a shroud. If you could you would swallow yourself."
"A universe floating on a note, a world conjured with your fingers, even on the shabby old piano his mother had inherited, that poor wretched instrument of wood and warped fibers, the tusks of hunted elephants, the keys with which to enter the divine."
GET A COPY! IT'S MAGNIFICENT! DEEP LOVE!

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

More like 3.5 stars. This stunning small book consisted of vignettes of all sizes from a few lines to several pages: some of fantastic fictional cities and their people and the second half consisted of the Chicago "Century of Progress", the amazing fly-over of General Italo Balbo of fascist Italy, and various characters in the exhibits and among the patrons of the exposition. This read like poetry and was exquisitely written. The book was both fiction and fact. The author explains factual information.

[in8 · Rating 5 out of 5]

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