Poll

I hadn't read Alice Eliot Dark's story before and I've read Nabokov's several times. "Signs and Symbols" will get my vote, because I do think it's great, but I also wonder how much of my preference is that it has had time to infect me where "In the Gloaming" hasn't.

Well, as the only one of all the 60 stories, In the Gloaming made me cry, so that's one reason it gets my vote. I also found it a very touching and tender portrait of a difficult situation (and it made me disturb my Overwatch competitive gameplaying son to go hug him:)

This is a tough one. I've voted for Signs and Symbols (is the title actually Symbols and Signs though? - The New Yorker shows it this way, but Wikipedia shows the other).

I don't understand the ending of S&S. What is the supposed wrong number from an anxious girl signifying?

I could be convinced to change my vote.

Ang wrote: "This is a tough one. I've voted for Signs and Symbols (is the title actually Symbols and Signs though? - The New Yorker shows it this way, but Wikipedia shows the other).

I don't understand the en..."

Signs and Symbols was probably literally the second short story I've ever read, specially assigned to me by my professor from the one creative writing class I took. From what I remember, the New Yorker editor at the time took some liberties and rearranged a bunch of Nabokov's original manuscript without his consent, including swapping the nouns in the title. All of which Nabokov was duly unhappy with, because he had painstakingly attended to every little detail in the story. So when it came time to release a collection, he republished it in his original vision.

It's been a while since I read this story, but my interpretation is that it's just a comment on the way people tend to project certain meanings onto events (exactly like the son's "delusions of reference" due to his supposed schizotypal personality disorder-- which I believe Nabokov refers to as "referential mania," a phrase I quite like) the dying bird, the wrong number, the jars of jam, when in fact it's quite evident that whether we succeed at doing so or not, all we're really doing is searching for reasons that things are as they are. i.e., we search for justifications so that we can comfort and protect ourselves.

Are the mothers voting for Gloaming? Mothers with grown boys?

Two paragraphs from SaS describing the son's last suicide attempt
and the nature of his delusions were used on an SAT in the late 80s or early 90s, so I've read those a hundred times. I felt a thrill when I read the first line included in the excerpt because I hadn't remembered they were part of this story.

"Signs and Symbols" seems to me to be one of the best of this bracket.

I’m a mother of two grown up boys. Yes, I am voting for Gloaming.

I kept wondering if the third call was actually the hospital saying that the son was successful in his attempt this time.

I should have asked, Is any mother of a grown son not voting for Gloaming? Because that mother-son relationship, from the mother's perspective, is poignantly, pin-prickingly, precise - gay, dying son, or not.

Estelle wrote: "I’m a mother of two grown up boys. Yes, I am voting for Gloaming."

Well mine's only 10 - but Gloaming really hit a nerve with me! I totally agree with you Ctb

Two grown sons and voted for Nabokov. It's close, and thinking back, In the Gloaming was the first one I read from the New Yorker archive which is just an old style photocopy so that would have effected me negatively as I read it. I think I will change my vote.

yay :-)

And, yay.

But where is your vote, Estelle? And could you make it count fivefold?

Ctb wrote: "And, yay.

But where is your vote, Estelle? And could you make it count fivefold?"

Yikes! I can’t believe I forgot to vote! Just voted now. Too bad it’s only 1 and not 5.