Chroma

by Frederick Barthelme

This story collection examines relationships between friends, brothers and sisters, parents and children, husbands and wives, and lovers

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Barthelme's works are known for their focus on the landscape of the New South. Along with his reputation as a minimalist, together with writers Raymond Carver, Ann Beattie, Amy Hempel, and Mary Robison, Barthelme's work has also been described by terms such as "dirty realism" and "K-mart realism."He published his first short story in The New Yorker,and has claimed that a rotisserie chicken helped him understand that he needed to write about ordinary people.He has moved away from the postmodern stylings of his older brother, Donald Barthelme, though his brother's influence can be seen in his earliest works, Rangoon and War and War.
Barthelme was thirty-three year editor and visionary of Mississippi Review, known for recognizing and publishing once new talents such as Larry Brown, Curtis Sittenfeld, and Amy Hempel early in their careers.

Reviews

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

So very eighties, and so very short fiction-y. Thank god that people are no longer expected to think and behave like the characters in these stories.

[Tom Bensley · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Chroma, there are some beautiful stories and some bad ones and some wanky ones, but all in all it's a good collection, totally. Here is a list of recurring/central themes/ideas etc., in this and other story collections of Barthelme's (for some reason):

chicken (live, cooked, raw, the preparing of)
conversation
marriage (bad marriages, cheating, boredom, weird postmodern domestic living)
diners
parking lots (so many parking lots)
male, first person narrators (who are weirdly unintrospective)
driving around for no reason
neighbourhoods
women (tough, beautiful, sad, bored)
chicken-fried steak (whatever the FUCK that is...)
younger girls and older men
bored men
sad men
passive men
disruptive family members
general sadness of living (while being comfortably able to support oneself)
shopping centres (and watching shoppers shop)
2nd person narration
plot (the lack of, the complete non-existence of)
having money
objects inside of houses

If these sound like things you want to read about, then you should like read this book.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just a few pointless little snippets from Fredericksburg, USA

[Francisco Manuel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frederick Barthelme’s Chroma sits squarely in the Dirty Realist tradition of the 1980s, alongside Raymond Carver and Richard Ford, and for readers who love that mode, it mostly delivers. These are spare, restrained stories about relationships (primarily men with women) told from the men’s point of view. The emotional register is low, but the stakes are quietly existential.

Barthelme’s men are aging, slightly bewildered, and rarely articulate about what they want. They move through marriages and partnerships without fully understanding their partners, or themselves, hoping for some sense of peace in lives that often feel drained of meaning. When relationships fail to provide that meaning (which Chroma treats as the central, almost tragic loss) these men don’t collapse so much as drift. They go on autopilot: working, shopping, driving, watching television. Life continues, thin, and strangely weightless.

What makes these stories compelling is Barthelme’s attention to the mundane moment. A small, seemingly insignificant event can suddenly reframe a life, offering a flicker of hope or a new way of seeing. The prose is flat by design, the settings interchangeable, the emotional palette muted, but that sameness becomes part of the point. Chroma captures the quiet desperation of ordinary lives, where meaning isn’t found in grand revelations but in minor shifts of perception. It’s minimalist fiction that understands how emptiness itself can be a powerful subject.

[kemmm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Menemukan chroma ini adalah murni kebetulan. Ketika saya dengan kawan saya mengunjungi suatu cafe di tengah pusat kota marrakech, kebetulan disana menjual buku-buku bekas, dan salah satu yang membuatku tertarik adalah cover dari buku ini. Kumpulan cerpen yang saya agak kurang bisa menikmatinya. Tapi secara keseluruhan, kumpulannya tidak terlalu buruk, beberapa kisah ada yang dibawa secara puitis, ada dengan naratif yang terkesan eksploratif, yang pasti masih asik untuk dibaca. Berisi tentang fragmen problematika kehidupan amerika tahun 80an pada umumnya.

[Kevin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't care for the stories at all. They weren't really stories. More like odd snippets of couples' lives. Because they were snippets, they didn't really go anywhere. No beginning or end. It was as though you were dropped into random people's homes for an hour and then lifted back up again without any warning. Surprised I actually finished it. Disappointed because I heard Frederick Barthelme was such a great writer.

[nils · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF. unglaublich langweilige kurzgeschichtensammlung

[J B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading this makes me want to be in the 80s, specifically in a K-Mart?

[Penny · Rating 1 out of 5]

I couldn't even finish this book...