Collected Fictions

by Gordon Lish

  Whereupon he, our unnamed tenant, not one whit to his surprise, found himself discovering in himself a certain sense of—ah, the word is triumph, isn't it?—and never a gladness more grateful and intemperate.

  AT LEAST THIRTEEN WAYS OF LOOKING AT LOOK

  LISTEN, YOU ARE LOOKING AT SOMEBODY who just can't wait to look derived. It scares the spunk out of me for me to think they'll come along and look at my writing and say, "Hey, who sent this clown? Where'd he come from? Uh-oh, this goofball, he's not some kind of vagrant Johnny-come-lately, is he?"

  Please, I know all about Bloom and that stuff—and, believe me, I'm not saying it's not terrific stuff, Bloom's stuff. But I'm telling you, the one thing you are sitting there looking at when you sit and look at me is somebody who does not want to look like somebody who is exclusively responsible for himself.

  Talk about anxiety—as far as I myself am concerned, Bloom did not know what he was talking about when the man was talking about anxiety.

  He ever hear of the Anxiety of the Appearance of You Being the Sole Culpable Party in Sight?

  Which is why I always knock myself out looking for epigraphs as alibis.

  I figure if I can stand my writing right in back of the right writer by citing the right epigraph right up front in front of my writing before anybody has had himself a chance to look at my writing, I can maybe sort of look as if I am sort of maybe guilty, all right—conceded, conceded!—but not without virtue of a certain glamorous affiliation. You know—the forgivably bastard son of, a traceably impoverished relation to. As in, you know, all honor to Bloom, you bet—but, honest, I'm always looking to look as if I am as influenced as anybody can transumptively get. Which is what led me to looking very closely at Wallace Stevens a little bit ago—epigraph-hunting for all I was worth.

  Well, I had the notion it would look pretty wonderful on me for me to look as if I had spent some deep time looking deep into the depths of Wallace Stevens.

  (Which can have the effect of getting you to believe Wallace Stevens spent some deep time looking deeply into you, you know?)

  So when the poems had me stumped (except for a couple or three that probably had me no less stumped but that, anyhow, knocked me flat), I started looking all around inside of Stevens' daughter's selection of Stevens' letters—and, boy, didn't I find there all the wild provocation for wild postures of derivation a fellow as underived as myself could require!

  Get this.

  The man's wife was named Elsie.

  Okay, the fifth-most of the most romantic sensations of my childhood (the first-most I felt in the vicinity of myself, the second-most in the ditto of my mother, the third-most in that of one of my grammar-school teachers, the fourth-most while sitting on the curb gazing at—I admit it, I admit it!—an American coin) was aroused by the name Elsie when I found out it was the name Elsie which was the name of the woman up the block, which woman—O Elsie, Elsie, Elsie!—was my playmate Harvey Weidenfeld's—oh, wow!—mother.

  Okay, so now I find out Stevens' wife, his daughter Holly's mother, that she also was an Elsie.

  Okay, what next do I find but that that where Stevens and his Elsie first lived here in the city here was where their landlord had Stevens' Elsie model for him so that the landlord—otherwise, in the official manifestation of himself, a sculptor—could enter the result in a U.S. Mint competition for the face that would newly decorate the U.S. Mint's newly-to-be-minted ten-cent piece, which is, you know, remember the coin? Oh, you must, you must!

  The dime.

  Get this.

  It wins.

  He wins.

  The Stevenses' landlord wins.

  It's therefore Elsie Stevens' face that is there on one side of the ten-cent piece that is driving me—when I am eight and nine and ten—crazy with feelings.

  Plus which, it's such a swell face, or that version of it is, that the U.S. Mint decides to let it also go be the face that goes on the fifty-cent piece, too.

  The half dollar.

  So that that face—you get it, you get it?—the face a million years ago my insides were getting themselves all swimmy over—turns out to have been the face of—well, of my derived-from's missus.

  But here's the capper, topper, pay-off.

  Which is that where they made their residence, the Stevenses, when they first got together as marrieds and first set up housekeeping here in the city here, and which was where Mr. Weinman, the landlord/sculptor I was telling you about, got Elsie Stevens—O Elsie, Elsie, Elsie!—to sit for him for the coin thing I was just telling you about, that where that was, that where (according to a Holly Stevens footnote in the compilation of letters I was, wasn't I, just telling you about) all those goings-on were going on was three doors from the selfsame address where I, Gordon—O Gordon, Gordon, Gordon, shame!—pulled off the most lucrative of my—burgle, burgle—larcenies.

  So will you look?

  Will you just look at how far somebody will go for him to look as if he is not just any old nameless belatedness but—look, look!—an identifiably indictable one?

  FUCK JAMES JOYCE

  NUMBER ONE, I NEVER REALLY READ IT. So just so you know I never really did. I had a copy of it, yes—a cousin I hated gave me a copy of it, yes—but, no, this doesn't mean I really read it, does it? Because, no, I didn't. Granted, I went looking through it looking for the dirty parts in it because this cousin I hated who gave it to me said to me there's dirty parts in it. But I didn't have the patience. I wanted to find them, but I didn't have the patience. I just turned the pages looking for cunt and for tits and for so on. There were plenty of books where you could find cunt and find tits and had so on. There was one I had that was called Twelve Nights in a Moorish Harem that had cunt and that had tits in it and had so on. There were in it even things in it I can remember even all of these ages and ages after it, such as this person nailing this other person while the whole time the second one is up on her heels and is up her toes up on a cushion and so on. I beat off on that one lots of times. Whereas I beat off on his book maybe at the most, if that, only twice. It was the yes stuff in the back. It was all of this yes I said stuff way back in the back. It was all right, this yes I said yes I said stuff way back in the back. I hand it to the man for that. You've got to hand it to the man for that. For that and for the other thing after that—where the man says Trieste, Zurich, Paris, 1914–1921. That's all right. That I loved. I really absolutely really loved that. I had never heard of any places like that. Boys didn't hear so much about places like those kinds of places back when I was a boy. I'm serious. Not even about Paris. People were different. People weren't so, call it like, so international like. Well, I guess it depended on who your people were, didn't it? Mine weren't the kind. So I wasn't the kind. My cousin who gave it to me, the cousin I probably didn't hate so much as just didn't like so much, he must have been more the kind I'm talking about—hearing of Paris, having heard of Paris, a pretty international specimen, him. But the other two outfits, forget it, you would have had to have been way more international than was anybody in any way related to me could have been for you to have heard of either of those. Jesus—Trieste, Zurich. Even just pronounce them, just the business of pronouncing. So it sort of really made this really sort of hideous, you'd call it, cruel impression on me, this thing the man wrote at the end of the book even after all of the yes I said I said yes that is at the end of it before that. I mean this other thing—at the really end of it—this Trieste, Zurich, Paris, 1914–1921 I've been sitting here carrying on so much about. So that I twice sat there after just beating off just looking at that—my heart thumping all around with itself with what it must be for a fellow to come along and say to people a thing like that—say where he was matters because that's where he was, say so now here's the book I brought back from it, so like it or lump it. That's something—how you just sit down and say to them look, you people, look. So this is how come Scranton, Schenectady, Bayonne, 5:51 p.m-5:59 p.m. shows up at the back of one of the books that ar
e my books. Plus then, just to beat the pants off him, just to show the Micks this is one Yid that can go them one better than one of the Micks could—so this is how come I go ahead and stick on another one after that one—namely, Akron, Akron, no time flat. Hey, two of them for his one of them! Better still, just to go them all even one better better still, this here right here is your official goddamn final notice those ones are hereby amended to read Nowhere, Nothing, not even writ. So, okay, so how's that? Which, for your information, I just decided just writing here with my foot up. Which, for your further information, I just this instant decided sitting writing with my foot up on a stool with a pillow up under it. Man oh man, how I would just love to see some Mick come try writing anything sitting with a foot up on a stool with anything up under it. Did he ever? No, he never! There is not one Mick anywhere who could do it. You could go look high and low for the Mick who could do it and not find even a gymnast who could. And don't try to hand me any crap about his eyes. I don't want to hear from you any crap about his eyes. He is not the first one with eyes. There have been plenty of them with eyes. Whereas a foot is a foot. Plus which, it is from guess what. It is from this tremendous walk I took. I walked all around the block. Which is how come this foot. Plus talk about you going them all of them one better—did I see one thing to come home and sit down and write one thing about? I did not even have a stinking lousy what you could call like a true-to-life experience. The whole walk, no, all the whole walk all I was ever thinking about was, you know, was cushion versus pillow. Please, you can't be any fucking James Joyce and answer any word versus any word like that one. It's you're either a Gordon Lish or skip it. On top of which, don't you dare try to sit there and tell me the day ever dawned when no could not take yes by a country mile—as witness who's got the hard-on now?

  WIND

  TELL YOU THIS THING ABOUT SCUMBAGS.

  Not a thing about scumbags in general but about the scumbags in particular of my father, which I come across sneaking around inside of his sock drawer looking for money or something or looking for some kind of terrific unexpectable discovery or something and which are in this orange-colored box which is as orange-colored-looking of an orange as you will ever, I do not personally care who you are, as you will ever in all of your life see, and which are not, please notice, not called Trojans and are not called Rameses and are not called anything like that—like Sheiks, for instance, like Sheiks—but which are called merely just bluntly called Kaps, which are just called this like peppy little name of Kaps, which it turns out it is because when I take one for Arnie and for me to use the two of us on Fat Shirley, which it turns out when I take a deep breath for myself and then go ahead and take one of these scumbags called Kaps for me and for Arnie for us to use the two of us the next time we can get Fat Shirley talked into maybe doing it with us, which it turns out that what I find out is that what they do is they just go over only the, you know, like only over the knuckle of it, which means in my case that for me to keep it from coming off of me when I am actually with Fat Shirley going to town with it and so on, which means in my case yanking it all of the way down on my business as far as it will keep going, which in truth, in truth, which is right down to the root of it in truth.

  So this is the story—Arnie and me each getting to do it once to Fat Shirley twice apiece both with the same scumbag, us meanwhile getting it washed out in the ocean in between these two different uses both apiece for each of us—because, hey, this is—didn't I tell you?—this is, you know, doing it on the beach. Which is terrible, terrible—the wind never quitting for a single lousy stinking rotten instant—and the sand.

  Because we are what?

  Arnie and me, my buddy Arnie and me, or maybe my cousin Arnie and me, we are probably at this stage in our histories at the age of fourteen to fourteen and a half stage of years in our histories, which is how come you did not have any selection but for you to take the chance of swiping one of these Kaps of your father's for you the both of you to go try and use it on somebody inasmuch as do I have to tell you you could not in those times back all of those ages ago just go dancing into every drugstore you wanted to and just go waltz right up to them and just say to them in those times to them may I please, if you please, have a jimmy for me to do it with somebody please?

  You couldn't.

  Because this was taking place—Fat Shirley and me and Arnie—at the time period in our history when are you kidding?—you couldn't. Whereas I know I am not required to tell you nowadays the situation, it could not be more, you know, with respect to people being enlightened and having, in this regard, undergone enlightenment, could it possibly be more different for people—in the sense of youngsters shvantzing and so on?

  Or for me as a private issue privately?

  No kidding, no kidding—because there has suddenly come about for me like this private enlightenment for me—the fact of what it was—Kaps, the Kaps—which they were there for. In other words, the fact that that is what it was which the Kaps were there in the drawer for—that what it was, that what it was, that it was not for Fat Shirley nor for Cousin Arnie nor for me to come stand there and stand there and do it or not do it but for him to come when he wanted to come stick them on when he wanted—orange on the knob of it!—you hear me, orange, orange!—then turn around for him to stick one after another of them—but once not any of them—up inside my mother.

  Homage to Katherine Mansfield

  NARRATOLOGY TO THE PEOPLE!

  I'M NOT APOLOGIZING. You can sit there and snort in disgust all you want, I am not apologizing. You think I don't realize the rep I get from telling jokes and from trying to get away with the claim the jokes are stories? Look, it's not going to kill me, what people say about me—or, hah, think. I am unimpressed. I am, as a result of unimpression, unapologetic. I like telling jokes. I like getting the jokes into print under the impression the jokes are stories. I probably even like getting myself complained about for it. Besides which, I just finished reading the biggest novel I ever read and it had more jokes in it than I ever had anywhere in any of anything I ever wrote and what do you want to bet me the writer of the novel isn't doing any apologizing either? Why apologize? The joke-haters hate you anyway. Okay, enough preambling. I preamble one more instant, it's going to start sounding as if I am saying I am sorry for something, whereas the only thing I am saying I am sorry for is for not being a big enough writer for me to be more impressed with myself. Here's a joke. Joke is Schmulevitz. Doc says to Schmulevitz say your prayers, Schmulevitz, close the books, you're lucky if you live until morning. Schmulevitz says until morning? Doc says at the outside. Doc says until bedtime you can definitely count on, until morning is definitely only at the outside. Doc says unless you get some mother's milk—then maybe until morning's a sure thing for you. So on the way home to tell Mrs. Schmulevitz it's only until bedtime as far as a guarantee, Schmulevitz sees a woman with in her lap an infant which is doing guess what. So Schmulevitz starts starting over to her, but forget it, he can't do it, it's too crazy, it's too humiliating, it's too embarrassing, so he's going home again, he's turned around going home again when he hears the woman say mister? Schmulevitz turns back around and says to her me? The woman says to Schmulevitz oh, I don't know, you look like such a nice old gentleman, was there something you wanted? Schmulevitz says to her listen, as a matter of fact I'll tell you. So Schmulevitz tells her and the woman says hold the baby and get up here and it's okay with me, fine, maybe two minutes, maybe three minutes, what you need you'll get, what you get you'll take, so if you have to have you'll have. So one thing leads to another and, lo and behold, his time is all up and the woman burps Schmulevitz and puts him back down on the pavement and takes back the baby from him and says to Schmulevitz is there anything else? And Schmulevitz says to her anything else? And the woman says to Schmulevitz yes, anything else? And Schmulevitz says to the woman no, no, I just wanted to say to you you never in a million years would a woman like you ever know what you have done for a person li
ke me, this Schmulevitz I am, never, never, because such a favor, because such a terrific favor, a blessing, for your information, an unbelievable blessing, for your information, because life, because like life itself, because like life itself was what you just did for me, yet who would believe me, such a woman like you! That's nice, says the woman. Happy to help you out, says the woman—but so, says the woman, so are you positive there is nothing else? Whereupon Schmulevitz says to the woman no, no, there is nothing, there is not anything—unless you wouldn't maybe possibly happen to have like maybe a cookie with you, would you?

  Now tell me, go ahead and tell me, since when does anybody have to apologize for a thing like that? Plus which, if you say it's not a story I'm telling you, then if that's what you say, then isn't it you're saying it's a thing which in real life happened that I am telling you? So in this event, so then maybe it's you who should be the person who's saying you're sorry—shooting your mouth off making trouble for the truth.

  Or what about when Schmulevitz gets home and says to Mrs. Schmulevitz, sweetheart, sweetheart, let's you and me go make a night of it, let's you and me, the two of us, go get on our Richard Tucker and go out downtown on the town and paint the town red tonight. So Schmulevitz says to Mrs. Schmulevitz like crazy people, like lunatics, we'll eat, we'll drink, we'll dance until we drop and maybe not until dawn would we even begin to get home because listen, listen, I went and heard the doctor say to me just two minutes ago, the man says to me Mr. Schmulevitz, he says to me, I can write you a guarantee you got maybe until suppertime but more than this it's iffier and iffier and probably by sunup tomorrow it's bye-bye. Whereupon Mrs. Schmulevitz says to Schmulevitz, she says to him yeah, sure, it's fine for you, get cockeyed, go knock yourself out, go run around all night like a nut, but may I please with your permission beg to remind you just exactly who it is who is going to have to shlepp herself up out of bed in the morning?