Status Updates From The Hurly Burly and Other S...

“fifty pounds” was the perfect story to wrap up the whole book. every single theme across the book was summarised in this story.

my fav quotes from this story:

“It was better to part so, better from such a figure than from an abject scarecrow, even though both were the same inside.”

“Lally sighed: he was stupid.”

i enjoyed “the watercress girl”… who else can write a toxic relationship this beautifully lmao…

“the field of mustard” - FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!

“the hurly burly”… i don’t even know what to say. it’s excellent. (also very relatable)

finished “a little boy lost” and omfg it is tragic. i have to say the stories are getting more complex and better but not in a way that i can explain.

“ninepenny flute” was very different from the rest - first person POV and not about love. i think it’s great. it spoke obliquely about the cruelty of people… i need some days to gather my thoughts about this one. the story is in what’s not said. again, it’s about working class life, which is always about giving up.

“olivia and camillia” was so good 😭 coppard nailed the description of a homoerotic toxic female friendship, and my favourite quote is “I suspect him, just as I suspect the man who quotes Plato to me”. nice to know softbois existed in the 1920s.

just finished “ring the bells of heaven” and omg while it was meandering i did really enjoy it. the whole wanting you can’t have, and when you’ve gotten it, it never stays and you can’t truly relish it. this dude writes stories of working class people incredibly well.

finished “dusky ruth”. i never thought i’d be so floored by a description of jesus christ. too long for me to post here so go read it. very short but good, haha another loser man who never gets closer to a woman because he has to reckon with her eMotIoNs 🙄

finished “the higgler” and was surprised by how much of a miss it was for me given that the other stories were amazing. in 6 parts i got nothing but blatant (and predictable) misfortune. he has shown that he writes tragedy and irony really well so all of this just felt too on the nose for me. also kinda lost my appetite at the rigor mortis scene. for once, too, the female characters are totally flat. not good.

finished “luxury”, i love it so much. resonated so well with this struggling grad student. “That was the worst of poverty, not what it made you endure, but what it made you want to endure.” ugh the banana scene was just so good. so so good. that’s five for five.

finished “the poor man”. it’s a brilliant depiction of poverty. it shows the tragedy of being poor without turning dan into a caricature. the way the text depicted the self-blame dan faces towards the end is so haunting. 4 stories in and so far there have been 0 misses.

finished "the wife of ted wickham", it's a much shorter story but god damn it is good. i'm so glad i randomly chanced upon this book on libby. the gist of this one is just "this woman doesn't want me so i bet there's something wrong with her she is bad news!" when she probably set her house on fire (this is strictly my own interpretation) to avoid you dude. i love her. i support this pyromaniac.

finished the next short story “the handsome lady” and wah i really liked it initially but the ending macam kdrama i couldn’t stand it the coincidence was so JCJDNCHDJD UGH SHUT UP! HOW COULD YOU! but otherwise i enjoyed it tremendously 😄

done with the first short story "the black dog". i'm floored; it's a solid 5/5 from me so far. i love accurate representations of losers. i love that coppard subtly (but firmly) pinned the blame on the loser who did the terrible thing of projecting his desires on a vulnerable woman in the first place.