Customer Reviews

Fat Man in History

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It must be something to do with Australia. Shortly after Patrick White would win the Nobel Prize for literature, a young author named Peter Carey would publish his first book of short stories, quickly followed by another. Both of these books would be compiled in 1980 and released as "The Fat Man in History," which is, quite simply, one of the greatest collections of short fiction I've ever read, ranking easily with the best of O'Hara, O'Connor, Borges and Calvino. Though the first two stories get the book of to a slow start, the third hits the ground running and the book never looks back. "Do You Love Me?" is a brilliant meditation on the nature of love and memory; in a world where reality is based on the census, what happens when the census is wrong? Buildings begin to disappear, quickly followed by people. All of these stories occur in a mirror world not quite our own, where, perhaps, Australia and the US share a border. Where, maybe, pleasure giving birds from another planet begin to pollinate trees from their homeworld, trees that threaten the very balance of life as we know it. Read this book. It will make you think. It will make you smile. It will make you cringe. It will make you want to read more Peter Carey.

This collection of short stories by Peter Carey are the most imaginative stories I think I have ever read. Not only does he create such fantastic settings and characters, but the actual ideas and metaphors he creates for each one are stunning and contain so much meaning. There is the strange and absurd in his storytelling, but they don't distract you from the main idea, on the contrary, the strange and absurd give his ideas a real life of their own.

I will call these excellent works surreal and somewhat similar to efforts by Steven Millhauser, John Cheever and Paul Bowles. If you enjoy trips through The Twilight Zone then you'll savor these. Not for those who require strict realism.

If there's any rap against postmodernist writers, it might be that they are "too clever for their own good", creating dense stories full of pointless cerebration, with no real regard for the reader.

Peter Carey, blessedly, is none of those things. This volume of stories is accessibly written, stimulating and entertaining without being pompous or impenetrable. These stories stand up well after 30 years because of Carey's ability to mix a few supranormal or science fiction elements into a base of complete naturalism. Most postmodernists tend to get a little cute with the conceits they create, but Carey is a very cosmopolitan writer--the comparison with Calvino is very apt. The best stories in this collection ("Fat Man in History", "War Crimes", "The Chance", "Puzzling Nature of Blue") examine human nature from many angles, as through a lens, but never losing sight of the characters' humanity. If I were pressed to choose a favorite, it would be "War Crimes", which is the story of two nearly psychotic gonzos who take over a frozen food conglomerate. It's a very funny and perceptive pastiche of cutthroat capitalism.

Only a few stories disappoint. There are a couple, including "Last Days of a Famous Mime" which bring to mind Stephen Millhauser, and only serve to show that at the top of his game, Carey is a much better writer than Millhauser. Applause, applause, for this splendid writing!!

Yes, Flannery O'Connor does come to mind, but actually Carey reminds me more of Charles Bukowski or Paul Bowles. As profane as Bukowski can be, though, I think that Bukowski was much more optimistic than Carey, who seems to share Bowles' view of man as an insect. Cruel, yes, but the cruelty of nature seems to be the prevailing view here. Man is a brute, with an impulse for perverse, sadistic acts, but what makes it all tolerable is the knowledge, Carey seems to suggest, that nature finally is capable of an even greater cruelty. Man acts with the hope of having an effect, but nature's final cruelty is to show once again that oblivion will be our reward. Is it the brutality of great empty spaces that teaches such a brutal metaphysic? Perhaps. Carey is exhilarating because his imagination stabs at our greatest fear. He writes completely free of the need to please. Yes, life is horrible. We read on because, as Nietzsche argued, we are stimulated by the truth.

Peter Carey is a writer who lives in NY but is mostly known in the British Isles. He has won the Booker Prize--the most prestigious award in the book world over there--a couple of times. He is a writer that offers a truly unique perspective on obsessions about fame and glamour--thoughts that this gossip and personal appearance fixated society should consider. The writing is always tight and surprising, and something that stays in your thinking. This may not be beach reading, exactly, but it is really excellent literature.

According to multiple book review sites and online booksellers, the early Carey short story "Crabs" is included. ([...]). So, why are there only 10 stories and not 12? And why is "Crabs" not included? I've wanted to read it ever since watching the low-budget flick it inspired, "Dead End Drive In". I wasted my money on this rip-off.