The Little Disturbances of Man (Contemporary American Fiction)

I was pleased with this purchase. I enjoyed reading the stories.

"The Loudest Voice," whips eight pages of truth and delight into the best short story I ever read, Therse are my people, the way they really were.

Grace Paley's stories are of a type--somewhat Jewish and feminist--but her style and wit is so sardonic and original that she escapes stereotyping. Whereas some of her collections are uneven, these stories are uniformly droll and wise. "Goodbye and Good Luck" should not be missed.

excellent

after reading these stories, go to the collected works! as ever the language is compressed and allusive and the voices ever shifting they require one to re-read passages now and again, but it's like opening a present and finding other presents inside even more delightful than the first. once read through, one has a much clearer handle on the brilliance of her take on the lives of women and children, and men, "when they're around". empathy is a key element of her work as well as a profound sympathy for the devil.

Many of these stories were written more than fifty years ago, yet their humor, humanity and life still literally leap off the pages to make you chuckle, wince and empathize with the various characters that populate them. And the collection's subtitle is particularly apropo - "Stories of Women and Men at Love." Not "in" love, you should note, but "at" love. Because, after reading these sharply hewn tales, you begin to suspect that Grace Paley does not put all that much stock in romance, or the kind of love that the women and men here are engaged in. The title itself, THE LITTLE DISTURBANCES OF MAN, might even indicate that man is not quite so important as he'd like to think. Indeed, that subtitle again: note that "women" come first.Before I forget to say it: I loved these little stories. Grace Paley was not a prolific writer, producing only a few collections of stories. But she was good, damn good. She spent much of her life engaged as a political activist, marching, protesting and demonstrating. Married a couple times, with a couple of kids, writing was something she worked into the creases of her active and busy life. Perhaps the proof of this can be found here in "Two Sad Stories from a Long and Happy Life."The first, "1. The Used-Boy Raisers," introduces us to Faith, along with her current husband, 'Pallid,' and her ex-husband, 'Livid.' Who are both hanging out in her kitchen complaining about the food, but the husbands seem to get along, to understand each other - and their names fit well. Livid needles her about another "old boyfriend Clifford," who shows up int the second sad story, "2. A Subject of Childhood." Clifford comes across as a self-absorbed creep, who she throws out after he accuses her of doing "a rotten job" as a mother, "lousy," in fact. She beans him with an ashtray, then considers -"For I have raised these kids, with one hand typing behind my back to earn a living. I have raised them all alone without a father ..."Reading these lines, I strongly suspected, Yup. This is how Grace Paley lived her life. Raising her two kids alone, writing when she had to, to make a living. In the same story, the boyfriend gone, the kids sleeping, she continues -"I organized comfort in the armchair, poured the coffee black into a white mug that said MAMA, tapped cigarette ash into a ceramic hand - hollowed by Richard. I looked into the square bright window of daylight to ask myself the sapping question: What is man that woman lies down to adore him?"What is man indeed? In another story he might be "The Pale Pink Roast." In another a washed-up Yiddish actor who likes to keep a mistress on the side. In another, Charles C. Charley, an air conditioning guy in his late thirties who gets involved with a teenager ("An Irrevocable Diameter"), or a sleazy Army corporal who romances a thirteen year-old at the same time he's dating her aunt ("A Woman, Young and Old"). Bottom line: men are mostly cads and opportunists. And Grace Paley is a very discerning and FUNNY writer. Philip Roth called these stories "splendidly comic and unladylike." Bingo!Grace Paley, I suspect, enjoyed the men in her life - until she didn't. And she was not above poking gentle fun at herself either. That's a great trait in a writer. I'll say it again. I loved these stories. Thank you, Ms. Paley, and R.I.P.- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER

What makes Paley worth reading and important is her language, which is plain, simple english, but the order in which she places the words create sentences that burst with gut-life. Her sentences are like clever, immigrant hands--hard-won wisdom with an untiring lust for life. Most of the stories are set in a New York reminiscent of The Honeymooners, unfortunately due to my age my only point of reference. But ultimately, as the subtitle says, these are clear, gritty stories of men and women at love. This is writing that your mother would understand; and make you glad to be alive.

She is incredibly funny and very gifted and I wish she hadn't died.

livre agréable, qui se lit agréablement .Incursion très interessante dans le milieu juif New-Yorkais des Années 1950-60. J'ai beaucoup aimé cette écrivaine que je ne connaissais pas et ai l'intention de lire d'autres oeuvres d'elle!