Description
William H. Gass has written of Donald Barthelme that "he has permanently enlarged our perception of the possibilities open to short fiction." In Forty Stories, the companion volume to Sixty Stories, we encounter a dazzling array of subjects: Paul Klee, Goethe, Captain Blood, modern courtship, marriage and divorce, armadillos, and other unique Barthelmean flights of fancy. These pithy, brilliantly acerbic pieces tangle with the ludicrous, pose questions that remain unresolved, and challenge familiar bits of language heretofore unexamined. Forty Stories demonstrates Barthelme's unrivaled ability to surprise, to stimulate, and to explore.
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About the Author
Unspeakable Practices, Unnatural Acts(1968) apparently collects sometimes surrealistic stories of modern life of American writerDonald Barthelme.A student at the University of Pennsylvania bore Donald Barthelme. Two years later, in 1933, the family moved to Texas, where father of Barthelme served as a professor of architecture at the University of Houston, where Barthelme later majored in journalism.In 1951, this still student composed his first articles for theHouston Post. The Army drafted Barthelme, who arrived in Korea on 27 July 1953, the very day, when parties signed the ceasefire, ending the war. He served briefly as the editor of a newspaper of Army before returning to the United States and his job at theHouston Post. Once back, he continued his studies of philosophy at the University of Houston. He continued to take classes until 1957 but never received a degree. He spent much of his free time in “black” jazz clubs of Houston and listened to musical innovators, such asLionel HamptonandPeck Kelly; this experience influenced him later.Barthelme, a rebellious son, struggled in his relationship with his demanding father. In later years, they tremendously argued about the kinds of literature that interested Barthelme. His avant-garde father in art and aesthetics in many ways approved not the postmodern and deconstruction schools.The Dead FatherandThe King, the novels, delineate attitude of Barthelme toward his father as King Arthur and Lancelot, the characters, picture him. From the Roman Catholicism of his especially devout mother, Barthelme independently moved away, but this separation as the distance with his father troubled Barthelme. He ably agreed to strictures of his seemingly much closer mother.Barthelme went to teach for brief periods at Boston University and at University at Buffalo, and he at the college of the City of New York served as distinguished visiting professor from 1974-1975. He married four times.Helen Barthelme, his second wife, later entitled a biographyDonald Barthelme: The Genesis of a Cool Sound, published in 2001. WithBirgit Barthelme, his third wife and a Dane, he fatheredAnne Barthelme, his first child, a daughter. He marriedMarion Barthelmenear the end and fatheredKate Barthelme, his second daughter. Marion and Donald wed until his death from throat cancer. People respect fiction ofFrederick BarthelmeandSteven Barthelme, brothers of Donald Barthelme and also teachers at The University of Southern Mississippi.
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