Re: JCO: Upon the Sweeping Flood & uplifting fiction

Hi, Steve. Most of the fiction that I consider worth reading has sad or
ambiguous endings. "Uplifting fiction" to me suggests traditional (but not all)
romance fiction or stories about unbelieveably "good" people. I love the way
JCO shows the double-sided nature of most things, i.e. in the story "Swamps"
(in BY THE NORTH GATE) an old man wants to help a pregnant, vagabond girl. She
needs help, and his instinct to provide it is good. But he also wants to do it
all himself and be -- as my grandmother would say -- "a big shot." This
leads to the disaster at the end of the story. That's my idea of a good story.
The story "Ceremonies," also collected in BY THE NORTH GATE shows a
family, a precursor of the Mulvaney family perhaps, who are so rich and
self-sufficient that they are totally alienated from their poorer neighbors. A fire
burns down their property, but a community-wide effort to fight the fire --
though ineffectual -- breaks down the barrier between the community and the proud
family. (I can't help thinking about other countries who have offered to help
the US in the wake of Katrina: and how their offers have been received by the
folks who presently run this country.)
Yes, BELLEFLEUR has the happy ending of the younger generation escaping
the older generation's bad influences. JCO's great essay on WUTHERING HEIGHTS
speaks eloquently on this topic too. I think that essay appears in the essay
collection PROFANE ART, long out of print, alas, but no doubt reprinted various
other places. The introduction to some edition of WH, no doubt.
Winterthurn has a very "black comedy" happy ending. The worm turns.
JCO and Drabble had a friendly exchange of reviewing each other's
novels in the early 1970s. In THE NEEDLES EYE Drabble even gives JCO a cameo
appearance when the heroine recalls a childhood friend named "Joyce."
Best,
Cyrano

PS My message to Christa got bounced back. I think I misaddressed it. Would
someone confirm it back here to me at Cyranomish@aol.com?

In a message dated 9/10/2005 9:42:14 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
jandsmerritt@earthlink.net writes:

<< I certainly don't want to suggest that all good fiction should have a sad
or
ambiguous ending, but my own interests and prejudices are such that when I
see a term such as "uplifting fiction", my first reaction is to think of
Socialist Realism (can you imagine JCO being forced to work under the Soviet
system!). Note that when I say this, I'm describing my own personal
reaction. I absolutely don't mean to suggest that books that leave readers
with a positive feeling must be the moral equivalent of romances set in
tractor factories. I think, though, that I may be a bit like JCO in being
very attuned to how easily things can go wrong. Perhaps that's all the more
reason to benefit from being reminded that sometimes things go well.

SPOILERS FOLLOW RE "WINTERTHURN" & "BELLEFLEUR"

When I tried to think of works by JCO with a "positive" ending, "Bloodsmoor"
and "Winterthurn" were the only things that came to mind at once (and isn't
it like JCO to write a novel in which a couple achieves happiness by means
of axe murder?). On reflection, I'd say that some of JCO's other novels
have a different sort of uplift. For example, in "Bellefleur", you could
say that there's a distinctly positive aspect to the ending, both because
the world is a better place without the majority of the Bellefleur family in
it, and because some of the younger Bellefleurs escape, and have the hope of
living healthier lives than they could have done had they retained their
family connections. Once you start thinking in those terms, some of JCO's
other novels suggest positive elements in the end, if only because terribly
dysfunctional characters are beginning to assert themselves, even if they do
so in unhealthy or ineffective ways; we can imagine that, just possibly,
they may do better later on ("them", "Do With Me What You Will", "Man
Crazy"). But it's hard to think of works by JCO that give a final
impression of "Oh, how nice!"

One author who comes to mind as having great artistic integrity but
sometimes (not always!) providing more positive endings than JCO is Margaret
Drabble. Has your other group considered anything by her? Good luck!

Steve

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