A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Dog
(Dylan Thomas)
I have never done well with poetry. I prefer prose. I need the bits and pieces of syntax to hold the images together. Unfortunately, I have missed out on many excellent writers, Dylan Thomas among them. So it was a pleasant surprise to come across a copy of this book, parodying the title of Joyce's collection of stories from his youth.
Thomas writes with great description; his attention to detail is tremendous. The stories tell of his childhood and youth; his innocence and coming of age. Each one of the ten was an unaccustomed treat. The first tells of a visit by a rich friend of the narrator who is himself staying with his aunt and uncle and a cousin who preaches in the barn. The visit is doomed to fail when the boy's affluent mother refuses a serving of canned peaches, saved especially for the occasion. (Peaches)
My favorite was the last one (One Warm Saturday) where the narrator admires a young woman, but once he gets her attention, his shyness takes control and he runs off and drinks himself into a stupor, only to go home with the woman late at night...or does he?
These stories don't have high drama or suspense. Anyone could find himself in a similar situation, and often has. What stands out is the author's style, his ability to make a scene come real by his mention of everything happening. The reader likes to believe that what he is reading really happened, and is not contrived. On the other hand, he doesn't want a list of facts, or factual statements. He wants Truth; and that is what Thomas gives in his stories.
Stay tuned for an abstract on his collection 'A Prospect of the Sea'.
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