So begins the final installment of my “trilogy” of Donald Barthelme essays, which concerns Barthelme’s first novel, Snow White. While the title of may sound familiar, I am sure it is not what you have in mind. The story includes a character named “Snow White,” as well as seven men who live together (and work) with Snow White, but that’s about it-at least until page 82.
Page 82 is the best page of the book. If pages 82-83 were omitted, I would not have had much to say about this book.
Lest you try to make sense of such a statement with a sensible inference like “Pages 82-83 must record a great denouement,” I will head you off with some additional information: Snow White is a quick read; my copy is 200 pages, which are divided into parts 1 & 2. Page 83 is the last page of Part 1. Pages 82-83 do not advance the action of the story in any way whatsoever.
These pages represent an authorial (or narratorial) intrusion, a quirky sort of “check-in.” The form* of this check-in is a set of survey questions. The first question is “Do you like the story so far?”
* A look at Barthelme’s ouevre will reveal he is, most of all, a short story writer who experimented with different forms.
Did I like the story so far? Not particularly. I occasionally smiled while reading amusing dialogue, but as a whole I did not like the story.
In fact, I’m not sure it occurred to me there was a story. Rather, the book felt more like a series of loosely related “short stories.” Short stories from the same “universe.”
But pages 82-83 gave me the impression the short stories would unify into something I liked. To understand why, let’s consider some of the questions, some of which struck me as hilarious.
For example, Question 2: “Have you understood, in reading to this point, that Paul is the prince-figure?”
This question is amusing because no reader would glean this. The question is jest-Of course the answer is no. No reader should glean this. That’s the joke-Barthelme never intended to actually develop an isomorphism between (1) Snow White’s Paul, and (2) the prince figure of fairytales.
Aside from serving an amusement function (intentional bad taste, “camp”), questions like this one set certain expectations for how Part 2 will go, more or less. The aforementioned question queues readers to infer Paul is the “prince-figure.” Readers then carry that inference into Part 2 of Snow White. But in fact, Paul is no more the “prince-figure” than the character named “Snow White” is the Snow White we know (from Brothers Grimm* or Disney). The question is a device to (1) set our expectations, then (2) defy them.
* Read Grimm’s “Little Snow-White” here.
To set expectations, then defy them, is common enough in storytelling now. For example, earlier this month I saw The Girl On The Train, a movie based on a book, which utilizes this technique. Furthermore, many comparisons were drawn between that movie and Gone Girl, another recent movie based on a book. Or, consider Philip Roth’s The Ghost Writer. At which, if any point, do we know that Zuckerman knows there is no way Amy is Anne Frank?
In any case, in all of these examples, an unreliable narrator or protagonist introduces a set of nuances which, taken altogether, establish a dimension of “meta.” The story becomes “the story as told by the narrator,” or “the story as experienced by the protagonist.” This implies the story could be told some other way, which implies the story could be told many other ways.
Barthelme’s implementation of the unreliable narrator, ultimately, amounts to a ruse. Taken with so many other things (I’ll describe momentarily), I appreciate the cleverness of it, but I did not enjoy its effects.
The “cleverness” of Snow White is that it takes advantage of, to the extent it exposes, the stubbornness of certain expectations. Obviously, consumers will expect a book called Snow White will amount to some take on the story of the Snow White we’re familiar with. To some extent, Barthelme gives us this: there is a character named Snow White, who lives with a troupe of seven men. But still, we expect more-a huntsman, a prince, an evil queen.
Barthelme’s cleverness is, knowing we expect such things, he implies Snow White meets these expectations on pages 82-83. And thus, we continue to expect it Snow White will meet these expectations, until the very end, when we realize our expectations were not met.
“OK, well, I guess ya got me,” I thought to myself as I finished reading (in the parking lot of Sears Auto, while I waited for them to finish an oil change).
Later, I asked myself, would I prefer the book (1) as is, i.e. with pages 82-83 or (2) would without pages 82-83? In the case of (1), my last impression was “Well, I guess ya got me”; in the case of (2), my last impression may have been “Well, that was mediocre and forgettable.”
Snow White doesn’t gain much in either case (1) or (2). Yet, (1) wins it. The “expectation device” adds, if no other value, a meta element which carried me through the story, even if ultimately it proved false. Furthermore, it’s a creative, provocative narratorial strategy I never before experienced.
Like Barthelme’s other books, Snow White amused me now and then, but I can typically isolate the amusement to an instant, not to any lasting aspect of the story. This is predictable, in a sense, considering short stories comprise the majority of Barthelme’s ouevre; in a sense, his novels are anthologies of short stories taking place in the same “universe.”
I worry this thought is cheap, in the same sense as my high school friend’s observation: every musical album could be considered a “concept album,” if only because they are contained in a form that implies a relationship.* It’s true, in a sense, but ultimately it depends on an impoverished understanding of what we consider to be a “concept album.”
Any collection of words and pages packaged in a book is not a novel. The form does not imbue it content with contingence.
In any case, amusing instants pepper Snow White. For example, funny idioms such as “sucking the mop,” which conveys a certain mopey feeling. Or, Snow White’s novel observations such as “Oh I wish there were some words in the world which were not the words I always hear” (pg 6). Or, consider her exchange with Henry after he presents her with a glass of water. She asks him, “Aren’t you going to ask me what I want this glass of water for?” Then, irked at his assumption she would drink the water, she informs him it’s for the flowers (pg 16).
Snow White employs this device, not unlike a punchline, often. Mundane conversations end unexpectedly, in an ironic or humorous way. For another example, consider Paul’s description of his father: “Paul XVII, a most kingly man and personage. Even though his sole accomplishment during his long lack of reign was the de-deification of his own person” (pg 27).” In the end you wonder, What dooes Paul mean by “kingly”?
In such phrases, however short, you may discover unexpected richness. Consider Paul’s reluctant endorsement of the palinode: “Perhaps it is wrong to have favorites among the forms. But retraction has a special allure for me” (pg 13). In order to fully appreciate this line, I think you need to know a palinode is a poem wherein an author retracts a sentiment expressed in a previous poem. Now, consider some of the things we can glean from this line. First, Paul is interested in, and experiments with, literary forms, like Barthelme. Next, consider Part 2 or Snow White is almost like a palinode is denying some of the expectations set on pages 82-83. That is, Paul isn’t much like a prince-figure after all, among other things.
So maybe the writing was on the wall, maybe not. I feel a bit like the dwarf who says, “Whereas once we were simple bourgeois who knew what to do, now we are complex bourgeois who are at a loss” (pg 88). My edit: Whereas once we were readers of the simple who knew what to expect, now we are readers of the complex who are at a loss.
The dwarf continues: “Now we do not know what to do. Snow White has added dimension of confusion and misery to our lives” (pg 87).
My edit: Now we do not know what to expect. Snow White has added dimension of confusion and misery to our lives. (An exaggeration, but you get it.)
Ultimately, the sentiment which resonated most with me is this one: “There was a moment, however, when equanimity was not the chief consideration” (pg 88).
For him, that moment was when-while his life was otherwise in order-he looked at Snow White and realized he was fond of her. But what could that moment be for me-or for you? We approach the our lives-our version of “the world”-with an intention to impose order, but maybe that’s not the point. Or, if not that, maybe that’s not the only point.
5/10