A wide-ranging and eclectic collection of short stories on the theme of love in its various forms: romantic, erotic, impossible, undying and exhausted. No other aspect of the human experience regularly inspires such an outpouring of poetry, prose and philosophy as love. From passionate declarations to clinical analysis, writers of every age have been fascinated, tormented and inspired by love. This beautifully produced collection of short stories will combine the best of contemporary and classic fiction on the theme of love, from Catullus to Alice Munro. Edited and introduced by the Pulitzer prize-winning author of 'Middlesex', this wonderfully heterodox look at love will include, amongst others, 'A Rose for Emily' by William Faulkner, 'The Lady with the Lapdog' by Anton Chekhov, and stories by Lorrie Moore, Milan Kundera and Guy de Maupassant. 'The Greatest Love Stories of All Time' will be the perfect gift for Valentine's Day 2008 -- elegant, covetable and timeless.
--This text refers to an alternate
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
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Book Description
"When it comes to love, there are a million theories to explain it. But when it comes to love stories, things are simpler. A love story can never be about full possession. Love stories depend on disappointment, on unequal births and feuding families, on matrimonial boredom and at least one cold heart. Love stories, nearly without exception, give love a bad name . . . .
It is perhaps only in reading a love story (or in writing one) that we can simultaneously partake of the ecstasy and agony of being in love without paying a crippling emotional price. I offer this book, then, as a cure for lovesickness and an antidote to adultery. Read these love stories in the safety of your single bed. Let everybody else suffer."—Jeffrey Eugenides, from the introduction to My Mistress's Sparrow Is Dead
All proceeds from My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead will go directly to fund the free youth writing programs offered by 826 Chicago. 826 Chicago is part of the network of seven writing centers across the United States affiliated with 826 National, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills, and to helping teachers inspire their students to write.
A Q&A with Jeffrey Eugenides
The author of bestsellers The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides talks about his turn as editor of My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead, with Andrea Hoag, a book critic in Lawrence, Kansas, whose reviews have appeared in the Los Angeles Times Book Review, Film Comment, and Kirkus Reviews.
Q: What was the process of elimination like? Can you discuss which stories you decided to leave out?
A: The story I miss most is "Brokeback Mountain" by Annie Proulx. I picked it, but we weren't able to the secure the rights to reprint it, even though the anthology supports a charitable cause. The UK edition lacks James Joyce's "The Dead" for similar reasons. (Happily, "The Dead" is in public domain in the U.S.) The first thing you confront when you compile an anthology like this, however, is the painful obligation to exclude wonderful work. Lots and lots of it. The only way I could sleep at night was to remind myself it was all for a good cause. How did I choose? The way people choose their mates: for intelligence, beauty, humor, and a sense that they'll be around for the long haul.
Q: You say in your introduction that "sober middle-age had made me less susceptible to [Nabokov’s] lush lyricism." In a way, editing this collection brought you back into the proverbial fold where he was concerned. Why do you feel that he is "much better…than everybody else…"?
A: In all honesty, I was never out of the fold. Nabokov has always been and remains one of my favorite writers. He's able to juggle ten balls where most people can juggle three or four. "Spring in Fialta" works on so many levels: as an affecting tale of thwarted love; a reinactment of the literary process by which we fall victim to, and memorialize, our loves; and a philosophical rumination on time and fate. The sentences are perfect, the emotion deep, the intellectual scintillation nearly blinding. Pure bliss, in other words.
Q: I’ve been building up an imaginary shrine in my home dedicated to the cult of Lorrie Moore and I almost wept when I read the line from "How to Be An Other Woman" that goes… "he laughs, smooth, beautiful, and tenor, making you feel warm inside of your bones. And it hits you; maybe it all boils down to this: people will do anything, anything, for a really nice laugh...." I truly believe that. Don’t you think most people--smart, thinking people--would do just about anything for someone with a nice laugh?
A: I'm glad you like the Lorrie Moore Story. Lorrie herself doesn't. She wrote it when she was twenty-four, and neither my own appreciation of the story, nor my assurances that many people insisted I include it, were enough to dissuade her from detesting her own "immature" work. This is a sign of a great writer, by the way. But "How to be An Other Woman" remains a great story. In addition, since a lot of the stories in the anthology share a traditional narrative structure, the Moore story comes as a nice shift in tone and strategy. I was conscious of that, too, in putting the book together, the DJ aspect of the whole thing, moving from fast numbers to slow dances and back again.
Q: Can you talk a little bit about the charity the proceeds for this book will go to?
A: 826CHI is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills, and to helping teachers inspire their students to write. Their services are structured around the understanding that great leaps in learning can happen with one-on-one attention, and that strong writing skills are fundamental to future success. 826CHI provides after-school tutoring, class field trips to our location, writing workshops, and in-schools programs--all free of charge--for students, classes, and schools in Chicago. All of the programs are challenging and enjoyable, and ultimately strengthen each student’s power to express ideas effectively, creatively, confidently, and in his or her individual voice. Driving the mission home are more than 500 volunteers--the professional writers, teachers and artists, to name a few, who staff each and every program enables 826 CHI to serve 5,000 students annually with a small, efficient staff of four and an operating budget of about $282,550.
Review
'[A] brilliant collection of love stories!An absolute must--read.' Harper's Bazaar, Editor's picks of the month 'Better than a bunch of flowers, if not so sweet.' Metro 'Eugenides has written a marvellous little essay on the love story to introduce his choices! an outstanding collection' Joanna Trollope, The Times '[Eugenides's] artful arrangement of the stories adds to their pleasure. The collection is full of intriguing echoes that complement...one's responses' Sunday Telegraph 'There are plenty of stories here which any lover of good writing -- if not perhaps every lover -- will enjoy.' The Scotsman 'Probably the most scintillating company anyone could hope to take to bed with them on February 14' Image 'Better than a bunch of flowers, if not so sweet.' The Metro 'Fiction of the Week' 'A wonderful anthology of short stories.' Red '"Classy" and "love-themed" are not phrases often found together, but this collection of stories, edited by a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, is just that.' LondonPaper 'The mix chosen by Eugenides is wonderful!The plots are wildly different; the range in tone, form and style is immense. This brings unexpected delights! And it is a bigger thrill to realize that however painful the heartbreak, love offers real rewards -- and these stories are among them.' LA Times 'A must-read for lovers of great writing -- and of love.' Yorkshire Post 'Love, they say, makes the world go round. So it makes sense that each of the marvellous love stories in "My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead" succeeds in creating a world of its own - and then sets it spinning on its axis! this collection makes us remember how powerful and essential the best short stories are, and how -- very much like love -- they can make us feel as if some mischievous god has shot an arrow that has ever so sweetly and painfully pierced its target: the human heart.' Francine Prose, O Magazine 'Eugenides offers a perfect Valentine's Day gift for lovers of literary fiction. His witty introduction, which channels Roman love poet Catullus and woolgathers engagingly about the "perishable nature of love", is only the first among numerous pleasures that await the reader of this generously proportioned -- only a cad would call it "fat" -- gathering of 26 stories, written within the past 120 years.! One of the best anthologies of recent years, as well as commanding proof that its editor is as expert a reader and critic as he is a novelist.' Kirkus Praise for 'Middlesex': 'Expansive and radiantly generous!a colossal act of curiosity, of imagination and of love.' New York Times 'This year's most sumptuously enjoyable book!superb.' Sunday Times, Books of the Year 'The best American novel since "The Corrections"!exuberant, ambitious, deeply compassionate and wildly funny.' GQ 'This is a truly original and compelling novel, by turns sad, funny and moving.' Daily Mail Praise for 'The Virgin Suicides': 'Beautiful funny and touching!Eugenides is a skilful craftsman and a hypnotic storyteller.' Jay McInerney 'One of the finest novels in many years -- a "Catcher in the Rye" for our time.' Observer '"The Virgin Suicides" is wonderfully original. It could prove to be the start of an important writing career.' Independent
--This text refers to an alternate
Hardcover
edition.
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43 of 43 people found the following review helpful
Eugenides says "the perishable nature of love is what gives love its profound importance in our lives."
January 28, 2008
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Jeffrey Eugenides titled this book from a Latin poet, Catullus (84 BC), who wrote a poem which includes the title line in translation. It's a foreshadowing of the themes of the collected stories within, themes involving the bittersweet, well that's an understatement, aspects of love. Love affairs are often just that -- affairs. Eugenides remarks that Catullus' poems "speak to the stories in this collection that burn, dazzle, delight or sadden, depending."
This anthology of 26 short stories by authors such as William Faulkner, James Joyce, Guy de Maupassant, Mary Robison, Eileen Chang, and Alice Munro among others is carefully edited by Eugenides. He has undertaken this project for charitable proceeds; indeed, all proceeds from My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead will go directly to fund the free youth-writing programs offered by 826 Chicago, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 - 18 with their creative and expository writing skills and to help teachers inspire their students to write.
A passage in the introduction hints at a possible reason Eugenides felt compelled to put this collection together:
"...I can still hear our Latin teacher, Miss Ferguson, piping out in her most piercing sparrow's voice, "passer pipiabat," getting us to notice how much the plosive rhythm resembled a bird singing. That words were music, that, at the same time they were marks on a page, they also referred to things in the world and, in skilled hands, took on properties of the things they denoted, was for me, at fifteen, an exciting discovery, all the more notable for the fact that this poetic effect had been devised by a young man dead for two thousand years, who'd sent this phrase drifting down the centuries to reach me in my Michigan classroom, filling my American ears with the sound of Roman birdsong..."
The reader is treated to a loose translation of "passer pipiabat" by Eugenides -- "Better a sparrow, living or dead, than no birdsong at all."
I recommend this collection with the notice that one not expect happily-ever-afters. It can be disturbing, thought-provoking, and heartbreaking. For instance, the first two I read, one by Grace Paley and one by Lorrie Moore, were somber and vaguely depressing.
Another plus: all of the contributors have a short bio in the appendix. The cover art is amazing and creative.
This anthology of 26 short stories by authors such as William Faulkner, James Joyce, Guy de Maupassant, Mary Robison, Eileen Chang, and Alice Munro among others is carefully edited by Eugenides. He has undertaken this project for charitable proceeds; indeed, all proceeds from My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead will go directly to fund the free youth-writing programs offered by 826 Chicago, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 - 18 with their creative and expository writing skills and to help teachers inspire their students to write.
A passage in the introduction hints at a possible reason Eugenides felt compelled to put this collection together:
"...I can still hear our Latin teacher, Miss Ferguson, piping out in her most piercing sparrow's voice, "passer pipiabat," getting us to notice how much the plosive rhythm resembled a bird singing. That words were music, that, at the same time they were marks on a page, they also referred to things in the world and, in skilled hands, took on properties of the things they denoted, was for me, at fifteen, an exciting discovery, all the more notable for the fact that this poetic effect had been devised by a young man dead for two thousand years, who'd sent this phrase drifting down the centuries to reach me in my Michigan classroom, filling my American ears with the sound of Roman birdsong..."
The reader is treated to a loose translation of "passer pipiabat" by Eugenides -- "Better a sparrow, living or dead, than no birdsong at all."
I recommend this collection with the notice that one not expect happily-ever-afters. It can be disturbing, thought-provoking, and heartbreaking. For instance, the first two I read, one by Grace Paley and one by Lorrie Moore, were somber and vaguely depressing.
Another plus: all of the contributors have a short bio in the appendix. The cover art is amazing and creative.
21 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
If you purchase "My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead" you not only obtain a wonderfully entertaining yet complex anthology of "love" stories, you also contribute to a worthy charity that supports budding writers. Win-Win!
I picked up this anthology expecting to just dip in and out of it, but the selections are so engrossing and lively that I was instantly mesmerized.
Another reviewer has wisely pointed out that these aren't all "happily ever after" love stories - far from it. They are BETTER than anything trite and saccharine.
Best yet, these classics can be read over and over. Bravo Jeffrey!
I picked up this anthology expecting to just dip in and out of it, but the selections are so engrossing and lively that I was instantly mesmerized.
Another reviewer has wisely pointed out that these aren't all "happily ever after" love stories - far from it. They are BETTER than anything trite and saccharine.
Best yet, these classics can be read over and over. Bravo Jeffrey!
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jeffrey Eugenides (MIDDLESEX) edited a Valentine's Day 2008 collection of love stories entitled MY MISTRESS'S SPARROW IS DEAD (the title is derived from the work of Roman poet Gaius Valerius Catullus). The book's cover features an anatomical heart, indicating that this is not your standard Valentine's Day mush. The editor describes the collection as such: "A love story can never be about full possession. The happy marriage, the requited love, the desire that never dims -- these are lucky eventualities but they aren't love stories. Love stories depend on disappointment, on unequal births and feuding families, on matrimonial boredom and at least one cold heart. Love stories, nearly without exception, give love a bad name."
Stories by classic authors such as Anton Chekhov, Vladimir Nabokov, and William Trevor are included, but the collection also includes works by literary talents of the moment like Miranda July and and Lorrie Moore. Love topics include adultery ("How to Be an Other Woman" and "Lovers of Their Time"), forbidden love ("The Moon in Its Flight" and "Spring in Fialta"), and celebrated, ambiguous stories of love such as Chekhov's "The Lady with the Little Dog." There are a total of 27 stories in all - plenty of material to cure any reader's broken heart or fend off thoughts of an affair.
All proceeds from of the sale of this book fund the free youth writing programs offered by 826 Chicago.
Stories by classic authors such as Anton Chekhov, Vladimir Nabokov, and William Trevor are included, but the collection also includes works by literary talents of the moment like Miranda July and and Lorrie Moore. Love topics include adultery ("How to Be an Other Woman" and "Lovers of Their Time"), forbidden love ("The Moon in Its Flight" and "Spring in Fialta"), and celebrated, ambiguous stories of love such as Chekhov's "The Lady with the Little Dog." There are a total of 27 stories in all - plenty of material to cure any reader's broken heart or fend off thoughts of an affair.
All proceeds from of the sale of this book fund the free youth writing programs offered by 826 Chicago.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
You Will "Love" This Book
Eugenides subtitles his book with the phrase "great love stories", but he cautions his readers in his introductory remarks that this is not a book of gooey, sappy stories. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Debnance at Readerbuzz
Love love? Love this book.
This is my favorite book.
I have always loved short stories - and this collection is diverse enough to keep the reader interested. Read more
I have always loved short stories - and this collection is diverse enough to keep the reader interested. Read more
Published 11 months ago by LaxeyLady
Lovely, touching, sad.
I adore Jeffrey Eugenides. Having read both of his novels, The Virgin Suicides: A Novel and Middlesex: A Novel (Oprah's Book Club), I find that I feel smarter when I read his work. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Erin Hanton
I haven't read this anthology but any collection...
...that includes the story with, IMHO, one of the two best closing sentences in the history of the written word must have a lot to recommend it. Read more
Published on February 13, 2010 by DMacKBlack
Particulary unrewarding collection
This book has a particularly unrewarding collection of stories, with the rare exceptions being those of a couple of the best known writers. Read more
Published on January 17, 2010 by L2T
Unique collection! (no chessiness here!)
"Two unexceptional people, for no demonstrable reasons, being exceptionally in love..." the intro essay of Jeffrey Eugenides is very good and memorable in itself in dissecting the... Read more
Published on September 12, 2008 by Judge J Drhedd
4.5 out of 5: Interesting Mix of Stories
My Mistress's Sparrow is Dead is a compilation of short stories selected by Jeffrey Eugenides, Pulitzer-Prize-winning author of Middlesex. Read more
Published on August 6, 2008 by Gwendolyn Dawson
My Mistress's Sparrow Is Dead
Love at it's most fragile exsistence. The stories pull you in, build you up and then defeat you for the most part. Read more
Published on July 20, 2008 by N. Stephens
Just "okay"
I got this book from my public library, and have read several of the stories so far. I had already read most of the classics (e.g. Read more
Published on June 19, 2008 by citygal
Inside This Book
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Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs):
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drummer boy, lady with the little dog, magic barrel Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Mary Jane, Miss Emily, White Rose, Red Rose, Miss Ivors, Freddy Malins, Anna Sergeevna, The Dead, The Bear Came Over the Mountain, Better Otto, Some Other, Wang Shihong, Privacy Tarp, Lovers of Their Time, Little Dog, Baby Amber, The Lady, Other Woman, Something That Needs Nothing, The Hitchhiking Game, The Magic Barrel, Miss Morkan, Lerner Center, The Bad Thing, Homer Barron Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
drummer boy, lady with the little dog, magic barrel Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Mary Jane, Miss Emily, White Rose, Red Rose, Miss Ivors, Freddy Malins, Anna Sergeevna, The Dead, The Bear Came Over the Mountain, Better Otto, Some Other, Wang Shihong, Privacy Tarp, Lovers of Their Time, Little Dog, Baby Amber, The Lady, Other Woman, Something That Needs Nothing, The Hitchhiking Game, The Magic Barrel, Miss Morkan, Lerner Center, The Bad Thing, Homer Barron Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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