Short Stories Reading Packet Response

Blog Response

Brandon Lazovic

                This week we had to read a packet of short stories (about three of them). The first in this collection was Brian Evenson’s Internal. Throughout the story it follows an intern who has to analyze his mentor’s brother, spying on him in an apartment complex that he lives in. Throughout this story it seems to satire the way that the medical profession is run in terms of psychosis. The intern describes Rauch as having found 200 classifications of disorders for patients in his book, that list forever growing. However he never actually discusses a cause of these disorders. There is also a hint of dehumanization and distance with doctor Rauch as the intern prefers not to get close with him. The fact that Rauch’s brother seems to not exist also adds to that sense of dehumanization. Regarding the next psychologist, Kagen, he focuses on the behavior of his patients throughout the story. The intern obsesses over it, obsessively writing in his notebook posture of the man he is assigned to watch (Kagen’s brother). At times the intern obsesses over the brother’s behaviors as he spies on him, yet completely neglects his own behaviors and appearance, then describing his mannerisms as healthy, more than healthy.

                The intern seems off-kilter as well, spying on people who may never have been there. He analyzes himself in more than one way, through Rauch’s classifications of personality as well as Kagen’s behavioral studies. It could be looked at further in the sense that the brother’s that he is spying on are actually manifestations of his own personality. Throughout his travel to get to the rundown apartment building for Rauch’s brother he analyzes his own personality, trying to describe himself and find what personalities he has. But upon inspecting the building and poking holes to find an empty room this could be that he truly has no comprehension as to who he truly is and what personality traits he exhibits. Or, again, that whole trip was his attempt to discover his own personality traits. In a more abstract manner Dr. Rauch’s description of his brother may actually be the intern’s trait percentages, that 8% that is missing manifesting itself in his brother as the intern is unable to find that 8% of himself that is unknown.

                In regards to Kagen’s brother it’s apparent, or at least hinted at, that the brother isn’t truly there. The intern seemingly enters the exact same apartment considering the description of the apartment was similar to the first one: there being no kitchen, a heat plate, cans of soup in the closet; what gives the largest hint, however, are the holes poked into the wall from his previous spying attempts. The intern watches all of Kagen’s brothers mannerisms, behaviors, and obsessively scribbles them down in his notebook trying to make sense of them but ultimately cannot. In the awareness that he is spying on Kagen’s brother, this manifestation makes itself known in the intern as Kagen’s brother seemingly stares back at him and sends him blank sheets of paper through the wall. The intern becomes obsessive, trying to make sense of Kagen’s brother. But just as with Rauch’s brother he cannot understand what it all means, those blank sheets of paper coming through the hole an example of that as he cannot truly comprehend his own mannerisms.

                I feel as though the story is a satire on psychology methods practiced today, treating the symptoms that come about without actually understanding the underlying causes for them. The biggest piece of evidence for this assumption is the intern not understanding his mannerisms and personality traits at all despite knowing what they are on a shallow scale, as well as each doctor’s approach to trying and correct their disorders through their different methods without understanding the root cause of these disorders.

                The second story is called Point and Line by Thalia Field. It’s a very interesting story as it seemingly jumps from place to place. In my mind it jumps from perspective to perspective, the main one being that a woman in this man’s house. I would try and connect what is going on in the story with each other, but the phrase, “always assume nothing relates” in the story really sticks out to me. So instead of having everything written to follow each other in the story they really aren’t meant to, being their own stand out entities. Going back through it on a brief glance a second time I notice that each paragraph really doesn’t correlate with one another too much. Maybe the author was trying to write about things that she saw in daily life or was thinking about as she picked out particular events or experiences throughout the day.

                The two main parts of the story that do correlate with each other, however, are the fragments regarding the woman and man and the little girl on the street. It seems as though the woman had cheated on the man and they were discussing it, or discussing their issues with one another. The room was awkwardly silent, the cat the only one comfortable in its surroundings. She makes several allusions to Schrodinger’s cat, so in that regard it could pertain to the relationship. Something in it could’ve easily saved it and it was a 50-50 chance that they would still be together had an event or mannerism in time not transpired. But when the box was opened the cat was dead and as they discuss their relationship (ending one at that) the only option that the man explored was the one which wasn’t an option (being together still). The sentence, “We would have lived life differently had we known the dumb thing was empty!” probably refers to the fact that they maybe had nothing in the relationship, yet tried to keep it alive. The constant referring back to the cat in the room seems like it may support this notion. But in the end it didn’t matter if their relationship thrived or died off, pointing back to the sentence regarding the box being empty. The little girl on the street is somewhat surprising considering she stole a scarf, pretending to be an innocent little child but is really a thief, not caring if she were to get caught. That may be where “Always assume nothing relates,” in which case that could be translated to never judge a book by its cover. There is most likely more to the story that I am missing as it seems there is a large amount that I missed behind the way it’s worded and the particular word choice, allusions, and thoughts behind the story, Freudian references included.

                The final story is Close Range by Annie Proulx. The story follows two ranching families. One has an extremely hard life, while the other has extremely poor luck brought by their design. These families draw parallels and contrasts between one another. While both have it off bad, one family thrives while the other barely gets by, one working extremely hard while the other doesn’t. The Dunmire family are raised tough, hard, and bear the brunt of their hard life. The Tinsleys, on the other hand, seem more pampered in a sense, although misfortune falls upon them for better reasons considering they plant crops on the bad soil, plant the wrong crops and change their produce from season to season, and was a failure as a stockman. His wife threw their child into the river and killed it and as a result she was extremely overprotective of her children. Her son had aspirations of the sea and at the age of sixteen went out and explored the world. Unfortunately he wasn’t raised to face the cruelty of the world and returned years later scarred for the rest of his life, his face a mess, a hole in his throat, and a lame shamble on his leg that was broken numerous times.

                During this time the Great Depression and dustbowl hits, hurting both families with financial issues, livestock and produce burden and an overall horrible time to live. The Tinsley’s son ends up going about, exposing himself to neighboring women. He’s warned that he can’t do that (after doing it for a while) but he just laughs at his father for the first time. Well, he gets a fever and ends up dying because his penis was cut off with a dirty knife and it turns gangrenous. I feel like Ras didn’t care and actually wanted to die, his only freedom being that of having no rules or whims in which to follow. In a sense this story is about broken dreams and aspirations, considering both families are brought into unfortunate circumstances and don’t have a way to dig themselves out. It parallels the different paths that they take, but most of all it highlights the climate during the Dust Bowl and Great Depression. The quote at the ends really adds an anti-climax to the story but gives a hint at what the story was trying to convey. “That was all sixty years ago and more. Those hard days are finished. The Dunmires are gone from the country, their big ranch broken in those dry years. The Tinsleys are buried somewhere or other, and cattle range now where the Moon and Stars grew. We are in a new millennium and such desperate things no longer happen. If you believe that you’ll believe anything.” So basically it’s saying that hard times will always be upon us, no matter when or where it is. If you believe that hard times no longer exist, you’re gullible and don’t understand how the world really works. There is a quote at the front of the story, saying “People in Hell just want a drink of water” and I feel as though it pertains to people wanting some respite from the hard ships that they face. They want the easy life and wish that they could have it while they’re in their own personal Hell. But throughout the story things didn’t seem to get any better and both families had to keep moving on against the adversity and hardship or else they’d drown in it.