I am enjoying Honoured Guest by Joy Williams. The characters are genuinely hilarious and odd. The situations are even odder though Joy writes about surreal events, I absolutely believed that these things could happen. In “Congress” we have a story of an unhappy couple, Jack and Miriam. Jack is not a very nice person. He is smug. Dislike. Miriam is weak, walked all over, refuses to speak up and puts up with a lot. Jack moves his student lover boy in and Miriam is still passive though shows rebellion by striking up a relationship with a lamp made from four deer’s feet.
Surreal but understandable?
I am re-reading “Congress” especially the last paragraph. Simon, my husband is being forced to listen to the last paragraph of it too! We have puzzled over the last two lines and wonder what she means. I am slowly understanding. Should a short story take this long?
Probably!