J R (American Literature)

by William Gaddis

hey? Books and papers threatening to right and left, he trotted up beside Bast.—

Good verb usage

again.—Hey Mister Bast? he called, and Bast half raised an arm without lifting his eyes from his lengthening steps toward the main road opening ahead, where the voice barely reached him as he crossed its unkempt shoulder.—I just mean like maybe we can use each other some time, okay . . .?

Pursuing nothing, unpursued,

sight beyond the firehouse and the crumbling plaza of the Marine Memorial behind him as he turned up the highway and crossed, stepping over ruts, tripping against cragged remnants of sidewalk in block lengths allotted by rusted poles still bearing aboveground indecipherable relics of street signs that had signaled a Venetian bent real estate extravaganza in the twenties, until even those limbs of rust lay twisted to earth and naked of any sign of place, of any suggestion of the tumbled column and decollated plaster Lion of St Mark’s moldered smooth there in the high browned grass where he turned in, any memory at all but these weeds recalled by the aged as Queen Anne’s laces lining ruts which led back into the banks of oak, no cars ...

—Is this Uncle James? here, in this hat? Stella asked absently, mirrored in the picture’s glass, her back to them in a simple curve of gray tailored to the grave decline of her shoulders.

—That book you had about, about India, things they do in India. —Things they do in India! My God! You sound like, I don’t know what. You think they aren’t doing them right this minute someplace a block away?

—Vogel! What’s he going to do, build a model? Did you hear he had the whole fourth grade out sniffing glue? What do you think the police picked him up for, with those scars on his face, my God. Daisies won’t tell. He ought to be locked up. So what did Whiteback tell you.

—Feel me out, I’ll tell you what he wants with his dirty mouth Nora come back to the table, where are you going. —Just in the bathroom to vomit. —Well clean up when you’re finished and come back to the table, I’ll tell you what he wants.

modakheli,

and somewhere the clock took up its occasional tries at striking the hour till morning made a tentative approach as though uncertain what it might discover.

Pretty.

came on through bread, the gone bite in the buttered roll smeared with lipstick like the coffee cup at her knee on the bed and the cigarette raised quivering now her contact lenses were out she looked at Mister Duncan with no interest at all,—

she braced a foot coming down

example of narrating character movement in environment inbetween dialog

she reached the sagging denims down from the dishcloth rack, sank to 24-12 Oz Btls Fragile! to tug at a clasp

another example of previous note

No man I mean look, I mean you don’t give news to newspapers you get news out of newspapers like I mean that’s what newspapers are man,

example of good writing, good humor, profound statement through day-to-day chatter

her leg gaped fighting a foot back into the plaid from 24–12 Oz Btls Fragile!

ant. exm. of good verb narration that develops char and set

The gum wad bounded off the sill, rose, dropped again. He tipped the bottle over the empty cup—all I need right now little encouragement from Marian . . . he came down on H-O with the blue folder, set the cup aside emptied again—just need to loosen up a little, run through the rest of this before I type it where the, one eyed, good eye yes the good eye could now peer into Aris tripods here, tripods of Hephaestus which, says the poet, of their own accord entered the assembly of the gods, if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves. For though the tale how for art’s sake Wilde had faced Leadville’s bullies to a standoff continued to amuse long after he’d withdrawn to join the compost smoldering in Europe with Pater’s recipe for, fueled by Pater’s no. The tale no. For though, and though the, for now the tale . . .

exp. of writing, allusions

His hands went white against his face, drawn down for fingertips to press his eyes, dig at them, fall away to leave them staring

String came lowering a gum wad into the cast of light at the sill abruptly gone with his lurch against the punctured shade coming down on Hoppin’ With Flavor!

you need to make your narration as good as this, if not better.

left him, eyes follow you around the room wave his God damned stick figure out what the hell he wants, plump the God damned pillow change bandage read aloud move a clause around wipe his chin new paragraph God damned eyes follow you out stay a week, stay a month whole God damned year think about something else, God damned friends asking how’s he coming along all expect him out any day don’t want bad news no news rather hear lies, big smile out any day now, walk down the street God damned sunshine begin to think maybe you’ll meet him maybe cleared things up got out by himself come back open the God damned door right there where you left him . . .

good dialog, realist.

God damned friends getting indignant

this would make a good title short story

where invention was eliminating the very possibility of failure

would be a good line to rewrite

—For those whom classic pieces interest, Scarlatti, Bach, Haydn and old Handel have written oratorios and fugues how’s that. —Like I tell all my friends and I really break my ass when I get out of school like I take this charm course and how to do makeup and all and I mean then they’re all getting pissed off buying Vogue when I’m like never in it and I’m like nothing you know? —Unhappy Schubert speaks to them in the sweet tones of Rosamunde. Beethoven, master of masters, thrills alike the listeners and the performer of his Appassionata or beautiful Fifth Symphony . . . —And then I mean I finally figure out like all this time I’m trying to be it I really hate this fucking model I always said I’ll be, you know? —Chopin bemoans the fate of Poland in his nocturnes or breathes the fiery valor of his countrymen in Polonaise . . .

as though enlivened by some demented electric eye scanning the gloom beyond the glass where the gum wad leaped and splashed on the sill.

I shall write nothing the world will have to understand all by itself

hope without expectation

loyal to a nightmare

though to clutch the desperate consequence of the papers he’d found there,

came out with the lunge of a man abruptly threatened by the weight of the overcast sky.

—He was out there waving a hair dryer at them shouting come and get me they did too when that awful kid of his started . . .

came up clutched tight

The train jolted, glided ahead, stopped, his free hand caught the heap against lock steps past his elbow, came up with a tattered streamer—

a gleam of quite pardonable pride

He’d come forward freeing his hand to drop between them and scratch, to rise and wipe the frayed edge of the sweater’s sleeve across his nose and leave the lip trembling there turned toward the inert profile jolting between him and the dirty pane where the trembling lip tightened at the abrupt encounter, where the eyes hesitated as though caught by a passing gleam in the near darkness beyond—

A car passed joining their shadows in a leap, flinging them aside to raise the shell of the Marine Memorial ahead in crumbling detail—

The wind held his hair on end hunched down on one knee there, lights loomed a shadow back over him, dropped it as they passed—

I mean why should somebody go steal and break the law to get all they can when there’s always some law where you can be legal and get it all anyway!

the wind came down, lost any voice but its own till it seized the clash of branches tossed bare over ruts leading into more ruts and the remnants of pavement, the rusted length of a car’s muffler and the sodden heap of a mattress, torn pennants of paper swirled in the leaves and then the sudden iron nakedness of a piano frame still strung pounced shaping in the mud as though to fossilize a bedspring fused at this lonely height of passionate deformity caught now in a glance of lights where the ruts broke off on darkness spread glistening beyond, lights sweeping in with maritime disdain to stop and add a burst of flashlight reduced to the jarring cadence of a man on foot.

—Wait wait yes, yes I’m stopping no push that down, yes down that’s, yes can you lean a little further out over the, that’s it yes just get this coat sleeve out of your, there, there yes that ought to, let’s hurry yes we’re right in front of a church they might misinterpret the, you’re sure that’s all now? Yes just just before you wait wait here’s a don’t have a handkerchief wait just, wait here it’s just a polishing cloth if you can wipe off your, you’re sure that’s all? If you can get your here let me slam this door a little harder there, feeling better now? Get that coat around you yes if you can just settle back, it’s quite difficult to see the road . . .

good way to write vomit w/o sounds

—Silly there aren’t any trees . . . only the flurry of hands and sheets, the rattle of carts and trays and finally of a shade coming down on the glow at a wall socket indifferently exchanging day for night, night for day.

blend between dialog and narration

—No he’s on iv maybe I better go check him now, don’t go away wait till I tell you what they found stopping up the junior high plumbing . . . and she came hedged by that despair of color down the corridor to weigh in green’s arrest OXYGEN NO SMOKING with a shoulder and search a pulse among whites left sallow with her steps away in the wall socket glow’s indifference day to night, night to day.

repetition of green, day to night...

Through bull’s eye doors from the lull of an elevator, down those greens lost to the morning sun already failed elsewhere for the decline of afternoon’s—

that’s what I’m telling you Bast, if you want to make a million you don’t have to understand money, what you have to understand is people’s fears about money

the spot of light leaped, dropped shrunk close searching white from whites, darted, paused—

for all these here letters and offers I been getting because I mean like remember this here book that time where they wanted me to write about success and like free enterprise and all hey? And like remember where I read you on the train that time where there was this big groundswill about leading this here parade and entering public life and all? So I mean listen I got this neat idea hey, you listening? Hey? You listening . . .?