Short Story lovers discussion
Story Discussion -- The Invasion from Outer Space
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I read the story and a couple thoughts have occurred to me: 1. There doesn't seem to be any specific character or protagonist. Rather, humanity is portrayed in the story as a sort of collective character. And a rather complacent character, at that.
2. Millhauser seems to have been very specific about omitting alarmed humans and government scientists decked out in haz mat suits. It felt to me like a way to carve out his own space for the story, and also to play against the ideas we all have of invaders that have developed from popular entertainment. I want to say that Millhauser is not doing realism here, but I think that partly because he doesn't have sirens and scientists and military troops running around mucking things up. I guess that makes me like the people in the story, they expected real aliens to fight with, I expected humvees and spotlights and sealed tents where secret procedures were carried out on the aliens like in E.T.
I think this is great:
...it’s also possible that we will fail and that our town will gradually disappear under a fatal accumulation.
The narrator is just not concerned at all with the global implications of the yellow dust. What gives?
Really well done. He's exemplified the way we (or most of us) can be lulled into inactivity and acceptance. Because the aliens weren't big scary monsters they were able to cover the town and enter the homes with no resistance. Doesn't the narrator sound almost dazed at the end?
**************SPOILER WARNING******************Nice story.
As jennifer and Andy allude, the villian here is complacency. If we look at all the passive qualities that this alien life form possesses, it is clear that within a measurable amount of time it will cover the planet and smother out all plant life and, therefore, all life. But nobody can seem to rouse themselves to do anything about it.
Sounds like a familiar problem to me.
That's what I got out of it, as well. Millhauser likes exploring things that cannot be sustained ad infinitum, and this story fits right into that. What if the cataclysm isn't all that cataclysmic? Will our disappointment, our boredom, preclude appropriately strident action? Sounds familiar, indeed.
I really liked this story, but then I like most of his stuff.
Mosca wrote: "**************SPOILER WARNING******************
Nice story.
As jennifer and Andy allude, the villian here is complacency. If we look at all the passive qualities that this alien life form ..."
I don't think we're supposed to think of this as a story at all. If that were the case, there would be suspense and drama, but there's none of that here. Instead it's a study in disappointment: What good is an alien invasion if there are no monsters, no explosions, no mayhem? If a CNN reporter can't turn it into breaking news, what's the use?I like the concept, but I didn't find it compelling to read.
It seems like there has been a trend toward stories told in non-traditional ways. Take a book of found shopping lists, for example. Or the pieces that show up on McSweeney's Internet Tendency. Don't they post fictional essays or something? This piece could almost be a fictional historical essay. Are there precedents for this kind of thing out there? If you look at The Book Bench blog (linked on the story page) there is a mention of a story with the form of an auction catalog. I'm sure non-traditional story forms are nothing new, but it might be fun to list a couple for purposes of comparison.Yes Robert, I can see how the story could be found to be less than compelling. Making complacency a compelling theme does have its challenges.
I'm thinking of a painter I know who only works in moments of extreme passion, she feels all other kinds of work end up empty. I disagree, I say my friend has no respect for subtlety and time. I think many writers attempt to give voice to the very subtle feelings that otherwise would never get a hearing. I guess the challenge is to make those subtleties into something compelling.
I still can't get over the omission of military types and the fact that the narrator only is interested in his own town. These two factors make the story feel like a fairy tale to me, so divorced from the tropes of the classic invasion story, where the government would step in. The government always steps in, don't they?
Not being familiar with Millhauser's writing, I read this story cold and had two reactions; the first was that it was written in one sitting and the second that Millhsuser had never been in the South. I live in Georgia. Every spring we delay car washing, spring cleaning and porch sweeping to concentrate on sneezing during the one week that pine trees shed their very yellow pollen over any level surface, indoors and out. Sure enough, NYC, Connecticut, Rhode Island -- Columbia & Brown & Skidmore, too, are his haunts.
I thought the story was going to be a joke, but then realized what he was doing. For me he should have used another color, but I admired and was amused by the concept. I looked him up after reading the story and discovered that he won a Pulitzer in 1997 and that the stories 'Eisenheim the Illusionist' and 'The Dome' also follow the theme of an overwhelming element or idea. I'd like to read more, but was not impressed with this finished product as I kept reading things over to get the meaning and looking unsuccessfully for the ends of sentences.
Great short story for a start -- makes us all think. I must admit, however, that I didn't even consider looking for the missing military and news factors and the geographical limitation as some of you did. I liked the concept put forward that complacency as a theme has its challenges. I'm not sure he met them.
Hey guys, sorry it took me so long to post up - i left school (i don't want to say dropped out, too punk) cause of a sleepin problem i've been having. it's totally lame. so sorry for slowness.the aspect i liked most about this story was how it showed that we've trained ourselves to be paranoids, to always assume the worst. that we've been so entertained to thrills by disaster destruction (recent examples i dunno 9.11, Saw movies... Cloverfield... that sort of mentality) that we'd almost be fulfilling a fantasy if we actually met disaster.
this reminded me a lot of david bowie's "five years" off of ziggy stardust too. like he says to start off:
"Pushing through the market square
So many mothers sighing
News had just come over
We had five years left to cry in
News guy wept when he told us
Earth was really dying
Cried so much his face was wet
Then I knew he was not lying"
--only in Invasion the less sincere broadcaster been waiting for this moment his entire life, and a disaster is his chance to shine.
My fav line was probably this here one:
"Through our windows we could see people at their windows, looking up at the sky."
That's all I got for now, got to pick up sis from school.
http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/feat...
I guess we can start the discussion now or later this week. I haven't read the story yet, but I will probably Monday and then I will come back and read the discussion and then I will post.
So if you've read the story and would like to comment, go ahead.
Oh yeah, if you'd like to discuss group procedure, go to this thread: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...