Sherwood Anderson (1876–1941)

The stories in Winesburg, Ohio, tell of a restless longing for something that the characters can’t quite define, but which may be community or connection. It has an aura of disappointment verging on despair. The town is filled with lonely souls who seem detached from everyone around them, except for young reporter George Willard, who seems to be the last remaining thread connecting the people of Winesburg. What will happen to the town when George Willard leaves?

Anderson seems to capture show more the beginning of the Midwest’s shift from agricultural economy to manufacturing economy and the waning of its small towns. Everyone with Midwestern roots ought to read this book. show less

If Winesburg, Ohio had gone on for just another 10 pages, I would have started looking for a razor blade. Oh, this work deserves its place among classics, sure, because you could read and re-read and still have plenty of "grotesque" meat left to chew on. But, good lord, who would want to? A therapist?

I had to force myself to finish the long parade of people nursing old hurts, sabotaging themselves with actions sure to shame them, and often blaming others. Granted, Anderson wrote some show more amazing, delicate moments of the human condition but I was still much relieved at the last page. I made it through. Alive!

There was one character who made me smile, Joe Welling. He's the tiny volcano of a man in "A Man of Ideas," who quietly works around town until suddenly charged by an idea, big or small, an idea he finds so fascinating he erupts with enthusiasm, accosting any hapless soul. Gee, one guy in the whole town who is undamaged by childhood, made no bad life choices, and is not steeped in brooding. Just a half-nutty, likeable guy being true to himself.

Call me well-adjusted, but I wish the town had had half a dozen more Wellings. show less

Hands: a single word title, conjuring work, writing, prayer, support, caresses, sharing, boxing, begging, greeting, signing, and more. It occurs 33 times in less than a handful of pages.

I had no prior knowledge of the author or story, but the cinematic opening captivated me for suggesting several stories in a single sentence:
“Upon the half decayed veranda of a small frame house that stood near the edge of a ravine near the town of Winesburg, Ohio, a fat little old man walked nervously up show more and down.”

But his silly name created immediate dissonance with his obviously tragic character:
“Wing Biddlebaum, forever frightened and beset by a ghostly band of doubts.”
His hands are always moving, or else in his pockets to hide them - from himself as much as others.
Stick with it; Anderson knows his craft.
“Their restless activity, like unto the beating of the wings of an imprisoned bird, had given him his name.”

Image: A selection of hands by Qinni (Source)

Biddlebaum’s only friend is George Willard, a reporter on the town newspaper. When they go for walks, Biddlebaum talks quickly and earnestly, though never about himself, his hands frantically moving all the time. He wants to inspire the young man to think beyond the provincial locale:
“You are afraid of dreams. You want to be like others in town here… You must begin to dream.”

Dreams and memories collide and the omniscient narrator switches to Biddlebaum’s backstory for the second half. It’s taut and almost brittle, laden with ambiguity. Reading this in 2022, my response is probably very different from what Anderson expected or intended when it was published just over a century ago.

Avoid spoilers

In his memoir, Anderson railed against plot-based stories:
“What was wanted I thought was form, not plot, an altogether more elusive and difficult thing to come at.”
Nevertheless, read the story (link below) before reading the spoilered section.


Biddlebaum’s real name is Adolph Myers. He was a much-loved teacher at a boys’ school in Pennsylvania.
“He was one of those rare, little-understood men who rule by a power so gentle that it passes as a lovable weakness. In their feeling for the boys under their charge such men are not unlike the finer sort of women in their love of men.”
But he was handsy:
“Here and there went his hands, caressing the shoulders of the boys, playing about the tousled heads. As he talked his voice became soft and musical. There was a caress in that also.”
Is that just affection and reassurance, or a euphemism for something more sinister - the sort of abuse we know happened, and still does, in many institutions such as schools and churches?

“In a way the voice and the hands, the stroking of the shoulders and the touching of the hair was a part of the schoolmaster’s effort to carry a dream into the young minds.”
The power of dreams, as he had told George Willard before his own memories flooded back.

Anderson wants us to excuse Biddlebaum: “a half-witted boy”, had a crush on the master:
“In his bed at night he imagined unspeakable things and in the morning went forth to tell his dreams as facts.”

We should always listen to victims. False accusations are very rare. But rare isn’t zero. True or not, such allegations stick and grow very quickly, but it seems there was already suspicion:
“Hidden, shadowy doubts that had been in men’s minds concerning Adolph Myers were galvanized into beliefs.”
He’s hounded out of town by a mob with lanterns, sticks, and a noose.

Praying hands or preying hands?

Even after that, Anderson excuses Biddlebaum:
“Although he did not understand what had happened he felt that the hands must be to blame. Again and again the fathers of the boys had talked of the hands. ‘Keep your hands to yourself’.”
Could a teacher really be so naive as not to understand, even after being told to keep his hands to himself, or is he self-deluded?
The final sentences, in the quotes below, liken him to a devotee at prayer. The image is beautifully described, but much as I admire the story, I wouldn’t entrust my child to Biddlebaum.

Image: “Praying Hands” by Albrecht Dürer (Source)


Quotes

• “The feet of the boy in the road kicked up a cloud of dust that floated across the face of the departing sun.”

• “A few stray white bread crumbs lay on the cleanly washed floor by the table; putting the lamp upon a low stool he began to pick up the crumbs, carrying them to his mouth one by one with unbelievable rapidity. In the dense blotch of light beneath the table, the kneeling figure looked like a priest engaged in some service of his church. The nervous expressive fingers, flashing in and out of the light, might well have been mistaken for the fingers of the devotee going swiftly through decade after decade of his rosary.”

See also

• This is a very short portrayal of a character in a fictional Ohio town. It’s one of collection of 23 such pieces in Anderson’s 1919 book, Winesburg, Ohio. George Willard is a linking character.

• Gioia’s The Art of the Short Story includes excerpts of Anderson’s memoir, A Storyteller's Story, specifically about plot and form:
“The words used by the tale-teller were as the colors used by the painter. Form was another matter. It grew out of the materials of the tale and the teller’s reaction to them. It was the tale trying to take form that kicked about inside the tale-teller at night when he wanted to sleep.”

Short story club

I read this as one of the stories in The Art of the Short Story, by Dana Gioia, from which I'm aiming to read one story a week with The Short Story Club, starting 2 May 2022.

You can read this story here.

You can join the group here. show less

Esta es la historia de un observador, George Willard, y de sus crónicas sobre algunas de las situaciones que acontecen o acontecieron a su alrededor. Sherwood Anderson era un mago. No hay otra explicación. Es capaz de conmovernos con cualquier mísera historia, apenas importante a simple vista, pero contada con tal apasionamiento que logra hacer grande lo insignificante. Anderson es capaz de ver lo extraordinario en lo cotidiano, de hablarnos de sus semejantes con una precisión y una show more poesía exquisitas.

Estos cuentos transcurren en el Medio Oeste americano, concretamente en Winesburg, Ohio, durante los primeros años del pasado siglo.

* EL LIBRO DE LO GROTESCO. Nada más empezar la novela, un relato extraño pero maravilloso sobre un anciano escritor que desea elevar la altura de su cama para poder observar por su ventana. Como digo, una pequeña maravilla, cuyo significado se va comprendiendo según se van leyendo el resto de cuentos.

* MANOS. Las protagonistas de este cuento son las manos de Wing Biddlebaum. ¡Pobre Wing! Este cuento es una pequeña (o gran) obra maestra.

* PÍLDORAS DE PAPEL. Nunca más veré las manzanas rugosas y arrugadas de la misma manera. Un cuento, apenas una miniatura, conmovedor y bellísimo.

* MADRE. Elizabeth Willard desea lo mejor para su único hijo, ya que no ha podido conseguirlo para ella misma. Un cuento triste y hermoso al mismo tiempo.

* EL FILÓSOFO. El doctor Parcival es un personaje curioso que intenta inculcar a George Willard su particular filosofía de vida a través de sus vivencias. Una buena historia de aventuras.

* NADIE LO SABE. Historia sobre el deseo, contada muy sutilmente.

* DEVOCIÓN. Este cuento está dividido en cuatro partes en las que se nos cuentan las vicisitudes de la familia Bentley, sobre todo del cabeza de familia, Jesse Bentley, obsesionado con ser el elegido de Dios y conseguir cuantas más riquezas mejor. Los otros dos personajes principales de este cuento son Louise, hija de Jesse y mujer sumamente compleja para su época, y David, su hijo y nieto del viejo Jesse, muchacho absorbido por las neurosis de ambos. Es un relato perfecto, en el que ni sobra ni falta nada.

* UN HOMBRE DE IDEAS FIJAS. Otro cuento exquisito en el que prima el humor, y es que Joe Welling es un personaje memorable.

* AVENTURA. Me he sentido muy identificado con este cuento, porque al igual que Alice Hindman, también he sufrido más de una vez el temor a la soledad, a qué será de mí en los años venideros.

* RESPETABILIDAD. Una clásica historia de amor e infidelidad, perfectamente contada.

* EL PENSADOR. De nuevo un personaje, Seth Richmond, en busca de qué y quién ser en la vida. Seth se siente un extraño en su propio pueblo, no logra integrarse. Le gusta la soledad y hablar poco, y esto me gusta.

* TANDY. ¡Ójala encuentre algún día mi propia Tandy!

* LA FUERZA DE DIOS. A simple vista, parece que el reverendo Curtis Hartman es un hombre satisfecho con la vida que lleva. Pero surge un obstáculo, en forma de mujer, que pone en entredicho su fe.

* LA MAESTRA. Este cuento es el complemento del anterior, 'La fuerza de Dios', y un ejemplo de cómo escribir un cuento con los mínimos medios, para obtener un resultado en donde todo encaja como en el mecanismo de un reloj.

* SOLEDAD. Este es un triste cuento de hasta dónde nos puede conducir un exceso de imaginación.

* UN DESPERTAR. De cómo la pasión y el amor, por y de una mujer puede ofuscar la razón.

* "RARO". Elmer Cowley odia ser un bicho raro. Pero no se da cuenta de que es imposible huir de uno mismo, que luchar contra la propia naturaleza es imposible. Cuanto menos raro quieres parecer, más lo eres. ¡Qué bien comprendo a Elmer!

* LA MENTIRA NO DICHA. Un relato precioso sobre las insatisfacciones de la vida, y de las obligaciones a las que se han de ver abocadas las personas en un momento dado de su existencia.

* BEBIDA. Otro maravilloso cuento. Cómo me gustaría vivir en un pueblo como Winesburg, estar cerca de la naturaleza, que cuando quieras alejarte y pensar un rato, estés a un paso del campo. Tom Foster y su abuela son unos personajes muy tiernos de los que habría que aprender.

* MUERTE, es un emotivo relato impregnado de una bella tristeza.

* SOFISTICACIÓN. El despertar a la edad adulta siempre supone un fuerte golpe y un enigma.

* PARTIDA. Y por fin, George Willard se decide.

Tras la lectura de estos cuentos, no me extraña que escritores de la talla de Faulkner, Hemingway o Steibeck, por citar unos pocos, hablasen de Anderson como de una de sus más significativas influencias.

Recomiendo este libro a todos aquellos que amen las palabras y las buenas historias. Así de simple. show less