Reverting to a Wild State

by Justin Torres

Free online fiction from the New Yorker.

Short story, told in reverse chronological order, about the breakup of a relationship…

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, LGBT, M M Romance, Gay, Queer, Romance

7 pages, ebook

First published August 1, 2011

About the author

JUSTIN TORRES grew up in upstate New York. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, Tin House, Glimmer Train, and other publications. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, he is a recipient of the Rolón United States Artist Fellowship in Literature, and is now a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford. He has worked as a farmhand, a dog-walker, a creative writing teacher, and a bookseller.

Reviews

[Julio Genao · Rating 4 out of 5]

Savagely beautiful.

Worth more to me right now than anything I could say about it to strangers.

Read it.

ETA: I liked it so much the second time I read it a third.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A relationship comes to an end.

Beautiful words redolent with the scent of pain and sadness, hope and promise, yet lacking in bitterness.

I'm going to knit a scarf now.

[George Ilsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one short story, originally published in the New Yorker, from the talented Justin Torres.

I read it once, on screen, and it did not really grab me. However, I printed it out and later read it again; it almost read like a completely new story. Is that because I tend to skim reading on screen?

Reading it the second time I noticed much more. There were moments I had completely missed from the first scan. Maybe I should read everything twice, just in case I miss something important!

I'm probably still missing a lot, but if ignorance is bliss, my bliss is vast.

{2025 re-read...}

So I read this again, while having lunch on the way home from a memoir workshop in a town I had never been to before. There is more going on in this short story than I remember. The sections are numbered 3, 2, 1, 0 — look at that title again.

The characters are complicated, or at least the protagonist is. The combination of the two guys —one quieter, more organizer, the other wilder, a bit of a "crazy maker"— is one we have all seen many times, perhaps even right up close.

A rewarding story.

[Don Bradshaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written from the end to the beginning in a very prosaic style. This unusual short is worth reading just for the style alone although the story is quaint.

[Jenni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading Reverting to a Wild State was like walking into a room in the middle of a backwards-playing movie during a really important scene.

Like leaving the table in the middle of dinner, knowing you won't be eating again for the rest of the day.

Haunting. Confusing. Incomplete.

It's the story of a relationship in reverse, and I want to know more...

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw that this was one of Ben Monopoli's favorite authors, so I was sold there. Then I saw that some seriously well read GR friends had read and loved this and just had to dive in. A fast and heartbreaking tale of a relationship told in reverse. Just snippets of moments and that made it all the better. Very well written and worth reading as it is so well done.

[Elizabetta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow. Free, quick and lovely.

[Vivian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Evocative sketchbook of a relationship's trajectory and the connective elements between each--clever.

[Rick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Because it's sequentially reversed, this short story is infused with an inescapable sadness. Yet, like We the Animals, there is a powerful and compelling choice of prose that deliberately remolds melancholy into something beautiful and touching, almost sweet. The delicate fragility of his words are deceptive, as there is actually an enormous undertow of power and emotional investiture. I am certainly going to be looking for more from Mr. Torres.

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having just reread Torres' only novel (We the Animals), I was searching to see if he had anything else out there - this short story was written/published (in The New Yorker) the same year as the novel, and could actually serve as a coda to such. Detailing a gay relationship in reverse chronological order - from aftermath to inception - it has the same urgency and autobiographical detail as the longer work.

[Sofia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel

Sad
Angry
Sad
Raw
Sad
Why

[SheReadsALot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Where the HEA doesn't work out. Sad but beautiful story. Told in reverse.

[Hey Hey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. That was Brilliant.
Even better when you read it a second time.

7 pages. At first I was a little confused. I'm so use to stories written traditionally that reading one in reverse was elightening.

[Pixie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sometimes things don't work out...

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is probably less than 3000 words and it ripped my heart out.

I read this because I needed a break from another book. I don't know if that was a good idea.

That is all.

[Fangtasia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Painful, raw, original genius. Refreshing in the extreme.

[Vespasian · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Sarrah · Rating 3 out of 5]

A column, not a short, but still well worth the read, even for non-New Yorker readers such as myself.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

The stages of a breakup, told in reverse-chapter order, in this short story. I found a copy easily online. A bit sad that this relationship ate up 10 years. You can hear the MC gets too bored, too easily, while his partner had an easier-going personality that could have worked things out.

Maybe you'll recognize this story as one you've seen happen near you.

3.75*

[Pete Mathershaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

Means so much to know that someone understands you...

[Gina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful writing. I could not stop reading.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exactly what it feels like

[Kate]

:(((

[Ivy Rockmore · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jesus fucking christ

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Just...wow.

Torres is an amazing author, a crafter of beautiful prose that evokes not only emotions but states of mind and being. The title of the story can be interpreted in several ways, and the backwards arc of the narrative, in opposition to the forward arc of characters' lives, somehow makes their changes through time all the more intense and touching.

Here's one of my favorite bits:

"I handed Nigel his scarf, which he had knitted himself, poorly. How proud he was of its garish colors and its holes and dropped stitches, the inelegance of it all. I had watched him from bed, many nights, knitting in the lamplight and playing records with our little fat, deaf cat on his lap, and I had thought him beautiful, soft, cozy..."

There is nothing more domestic than someone knitting with a cat on their lap; the contrast between this image and the idea of a "wild state" forms the central tension of the story. And "reverting" -- does that refer to the main character's end state, or the "end" of the narrative which is years ago? The tiny detail of beginning the story with the main character finding a golden feather, which brings to mind the phrase "free as a bird," punctuates the narrative beautifully.

Torres touched my heart with this short story. I will definitely seek out more of his work.

[Penumbra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Looks like I'm one of the few readers who didn't care for this short story all that much. I only read it because the reviews were favorable. Wish I hadn't read it, it's depressing and I dislike depressing stories.



Telling this story of a disintegrating relationship backward is different, but I don't think it makes it special. In fact, I didn't like the flash back chapters that read like diary entries. I prefer reading stories forwards, not memories into the past, so this didn't work for me, it was actually annoying. Besides, the MC wasn't a nice or happy person, so there wasn't anything for me to like there either. But there are many readers who did like this. It's really short, so you won't waste too much time reading it if you decide to. 2 Stars only because I read the whole thing, even though I pushed myself. That says a lot if I have to do that for a short story. Wish I hadn't read it. At least it didn't take up a lot of my time.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

The fact that this story came recommended to me by my creative writing professor based on a story that I'm working on was both flattering and discouraging, as it's a better piece than I could ever hope to write. In three short segments which span a decade, the first-person narrator chronicles his relationship in reverse, beginning with his precarious mental and emotional state without his long-term partner and ending with the details of how they came to be in love.

Torres' spare and controlled language belies the complex themes and powerful, vivid lines in "Reverting to a Wild State." For example tiny, passing detail near the story's concluding paragraph provoked me to utter "No!" aloud and set it aside for a moment, so that I could collect myself.

Reading this story was painful and satisfying, like pulling a baby tooth. I would recommend it to anyone who likes his or her literature to be of the emotion-pummeling variety.

[Ada]

I have some really mixed feelings about the short story.

First I had to read it multiple times because I didn't get it.
Then I wanted to hate the main characters. Except why? They were people being people.
Third... I'm not a literature fan. I know when I read beautiful words that they mean something, but I don't get it half the time. Even in my own language and apparently the Dutch have some beautiful literature... Ja, reading Dutch literature was one of the most painful things I had to do in high school...

Still. This story. It doesn't let go.

[Marlobo ♥ epilogues · Rating 3 out of 5]

An uncomfortable read but very unique and interesting.

[Milan/zzz · Rating 2 out of 5]

Quite interesting way to tell a story but that's pretty much all that is unique. The story itself is meh. I'm not too impressed.