MODERN SHORT STORIES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 339, 21 December 1945, Page 24

MODERN SHORT STORIES

SPEAKING FOR OURSELVES. Edited by Frank Sargeson. The Caxton Press.

(Reviewed by

H. Winston

Rhodes

T is reasonable to suggest that like any other form of literary expression the short story should have a_beginning, a middle, and an end; but this does not necessarily imply that it must have a plot. E. M. Forster is not the only novelist who has complained of the way in which the reading public’s demand for a_ swiftly-moving, dramatic, and skil-fully-constructed story hampers the writer and forces him to tie up threads which he would sooner leave untied, to introduce situations and characters in which he is little interested, and to pay attention to the mechanics of tale-telling when he would prefer to explore the tangled forests of human relationships. Some novelists have attempted to achieve form with the minimum amount of action, but many writers of modern short stories have succeeded in completely emancipating themselves from the tyranny of the plot. To-day the slightest incident or experience, a fleeting emotion, a casual conversation can provide the material for what is offeréd to the public as a short story, and the stress is placed upon the significance of an authentic fragment of life rather than upon the excitement or surprise produced by a dramatic theme. The short story has become less artificial and more human. This is well exemplified in Frank Sargeson’s recent collection, Speaking For Ourselves, which shows scarcely a sign of the formal, slightly pretentious manner of writing, the manufactured situations, the stock characters, and the romantic Homesickness of the exile which used to be ‘so typical of many earlier stories written in New Zealand, Nevertheless the

modern cult of literary psychology provides a form of preténtiousness which is likely to appeal only to the few. In one.or two of the sketches, in "Notes on an Abstract Arachnid," by Maurice Duggan, and in "The Papeye and the Molacca," by Max Harris, the intricate pattern of words is wasted on psychological ruminations capable of producing neither pleasure nor, I fancy, much profit. For the most part, however, a pleasing informality characterises these sketches. The glimpses of life presented, glimpses of servicemen and their wives and sweethearts, glimpses of children at school and at play, glimpses of human beings in familiar surroundings, are in a sense fragmentary and unfinished, but either in passages or in whole stories they are convincing because there is little straining after effects. They are as ordinary and as informal as the outhouse in the cover design, but they contain within them something of the flavour of New Zealand, something, and this is far more important, of the flavour of life. It is true that in "The Everlasting Miracle," by Roderick Finlayson, whose Maoris are always credible human beings and not museum exhibits, and in G. R. Gilbert’s fantastic and satirical sketch "Mrs. Pornog’s Afternoon," there is some pretence at constructing a plot, but even in these the meaning of the writers is to be found rather in the sympathetic or satirical treatment than in the development of the story, and the artificial balance of Lyndahl Chapple Gee’s "Double Unit" hinders more than it helps her description of the return of the two soldiers from the war. The most successful stories in the collection, ones like E. M. Lyders’ "On the (continued on next page) ry

(continued from previous page) Rocks," an account of two children at play, "Purity Squad," by A. P. Gaskell, descgibing the conversation of a few men on Homeguard duty, or Frank Sargeson’s "The Hole That Jack Dug," depend for their interest upon the seemingly irrelevant detail, the flavour of the dialogue, and the description of the scene. There have been so many stories written about New Zealand which merely provoke the comment: "Hullo, someone is telling someone else overseas how different New Zealand is from the older countries," that it is refreshing to read sketches which, whatever their limitations may be, are firmly rooted in people, place, and thing. It is refreshing to read a collection of New Zealand stories by contemporary writers who are able to talk easily and naturally not because they weave intricate plots, make spectacular discoveries, or engage in trenchant social criticism, but because more modestly they are willing to observe and eager to record and interpret. Speaking for Ourselves is en indication,. and in spite of the lack of encouragement given to New Zealand authors there have been others, that the craft of short story writing in this country is very much alive.