Learning to Swim (Cambridge Literature)

published	May 25th 1995 by Cambridge University Press
binding	Paperback
isbn	052148555X (isbn13: 9780521485555)
pages	223
description	Cambridge Literature is a series of literary texts edited for study by students aged 14–18 in English-speaking classrooms. It will include novel...more [close] Cambridge Literature is a series of literary texts edited for study by students aged 14–18 in English-speaking classrooms. It will include novels, poetry, short stories, essays, travel-writing and other non-fiction. The series will be extensive and open-ended and will provide school students with a range of edited texts taken from a wide geographical spread. It will feature writing in English from various genres and differing times. Learning to Swim by Graham Swift is edited by Richard Hoyes, Head of Sixth Form at Farnham College. [close]
date added	05-06-07 edit book

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Robert rated it:

(review of isbn 0679739785)

01/24/08

bookshelves: finished, owned-and-gave-away

Read in November, 2001

Graham Swift, Learning to Swim and Other Stories (Washington Square Press, 1982)

Graham Swift is something of a one-trick pony, actually, but the one trick he does he does exceptinoally well. This is less obvious when you're reading the man's wonderful novels-- Waterland, for instance, which someone will hopefully soon canonize as one of the classics of twentieth-century literature-- but when you get digging into a story collection, you realize that Swift, or a close family member, was in the t...more Graham Swift, Learning to Swim and Other Stories (Washington Square Press, 1982)

Graham Swift is something of a one-trick pony, actually, but the one trick he does he does exceptinoally well. This is less obvious when you're reading the man's wonderful novels-- Waterland, for instance, which someone will hopefully soon canonize as one of the classics of twentieth-century literature-- but when you get digging into a story collection, you realize that Swift, or a close family member, was in the throes of the nasty ending of a relationship while he was writing these stories. His main characters, at least those of an age to be so,
are almost alwast divorced men, and the tale of the leaving wife is either the main thread of the story or part of the circumstance leading up to the main part of the story. Swift just takes that tale and paints it with different hues.

Any fan of Mondrian or his brethren will hasten to comment here that different hues are usually enough to make the same thing interesting anew. Indeed, and such is the case with Swift's stories. Recognizing the similarity between the characters doesn't make them any less interesting, and it certainly doesn't lessen the top-notch quality of Swift's writing, which has
yet to flag in any book of his I've read even for an instant. The man is truly gifted.

It's likely the publication date will give some readers pause. Yes, it's a collection of short stories published during the nineteen eighties. And yes, that should set off justifiable alarm bells in the reader who's been turned off to eighties lit. But what characterizes the good eighties lit (Vanderhaeghe, Swift, McInerney on his good days) and separates it from the bad eighties lit (Ellis, McInerney on his bad days) is emotion. Rest assured that Swift has emotion in spades. While his stories cover much of the same territory as those of his contemporaries, Swift is not the detached observer who narrated most eighties fiction; he is down in the muck of emotion, and has no qualms about dragging the reader in with him.

Another excellent book from Graham Swift. **** ...less

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Learning to Swim (Cambridge Literature)

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