Stories in an Almost Classical Mode [Paperback]

Harold Brodkey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 23, 1989

These 17 short stories represent the best of Brodkey's work over three decades.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

These 18 stories "are freighted with a magnificence of language that reveals Brodkey's singular ability to convey the truth and complexity of a moment in time, frequently as seen through the eyes of a child," found PW , noting the delicacy and sadness of the "exquisitely rendered narratives."
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Since 1958, when he published a book of short stories called First Love and Other Sorrows , Brodkey has become something of a mystery man. The present volume collects, in chronological order, magazine work of the past three decades. The stories are "classical" only in the sense that they avoid trendy experimentation: there isn't a trace of minimalism, metaficiton, or magic realism. Brodkey's subject is the Sturm und Drang of human relationships, especially sexual relationships. Acutely sensitive, intensely analytical, he writes with "the authority of being on one's knees in front of the event" (to quote one of his characters). No matter what the situation, the narrative voice is invariably eloquent and intelligenttoo much so, at times. An important book, but one best sampled in small doses. Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 608 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; First Edition edition (October 23, 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679724311
• ISBN-13: 978-0679724315
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1.4 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #330,657 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars On Building a Personality, November 22, 1998

By 

Charlie Corsair "Charlie Corsair" (Burke, VA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stories in an Almost Classical Mode (Paperback)

Brodkey breaks so many rules of narration in this collection of stories that he can be judged aptly by no standards other than his own. Unfortunately, this means that much of his genius is often overlooked. [e-mail] writes that _Stories in an Almost Classical Mode_ focusses too much on the pain of Brodkey's childhood and adolescence, and its appeal therefore is solely "prurient." I disagree. In _A Story in an Almost Classical Mode_, for example, we see not only his mother's cruelty and madness as she physically and emotionally degenerates. We see the portrait of a boy who must figure out how--against incredible odds--to build his personality, one part at a time. This is his genius. So many of us take the world for granted; our personalities guide us through and allow us to filter out what is harmful or unimportant. Brodkey's protagonists, for the most part, lack this ability--thus, they must constantly be in a state of flux, of becoming, rather than being.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Great American Writer That Never Was, February 13, 2003

By 

louienapoli "louieb" (Chicago) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stories in an Almost Classical Mode (Paperback)

Brodkey is murky, cloudy, discursive, brilliant, static, and often boring--in this collection, not in his First Love and Other Stories, written before he became a literary cult figure. If you've never read him, this is probably the best of his late fiction. Profane Friendship and Runaway Soul are all but unreadable. This Wild Darkness, which was edited by his wife, possibly for intelligibility, is a fantastic memoir and meditation on living and dying. I'd recommend, for a good blast of Brodkey the fiction writer, First Love and also Almost Classical Mode. The former presentes lucid, moving, beautifully written stories. The latter offers mandarin, inaccessible prose that seems to be trying to capture the mind as it oscillates from thought to thought, feeling to feeling. The result is a weird, involuted, sometimes compelling collection.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Poor Follow Up to "First Love and Other Sorrows", September 8, 2003

By 

Hibs "Hibs" (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stories in an Almost Classical Mode (Paperback)

I'm reminded of the Native American character in the Jim Jarsmuch movie, "Dead Man" whose name is something along the lines of "He who talks alot but says very little."

I read First Love and Other Sorrows before this and was outraged that more people hadn't heard of this guy. Brodkey was around 25 or 26 when that first collection was published and sadly he hadn't learned much in the 20 or 30 intervening years. Except how to overwrite.

Can't remember the title but there was one story about a guy trying to give a woman an orgasm that may have the most mechanical and unintentionally funny descriptions of sex this side of Norman Mailer.

A weird combo of Updike and Mailer at their pompous "great writer" worst.

Even so, even bad Brodkey has its moments.