Invent Your Way Out

Here's a thing: I trust the label "classic." So when I saw the red spine of Bernard Malamud's The Magic Barrel, a collection of short stories first published in 1958, and republished in Penguin's Vintage Classics series in 2002, I happily plucked it off the library shelf and brought it home with me. Malamud is a very famous American writer, with a major short-story writing award named after him, but I had never heard of him.

The Magic Barrel by Bernard Malamud

Discovering his stories was marvelous fun, not least because they are well-crafted and wise. Take, as a delightful example, this conversation about writing between the two characters of "The Girl of My Dreams":

Olga reached into her market bag and brought out several packages. She unwrapped bread, sausage, herring, Italian cheese, soft salami, pickles and a large turkey drumstick. 

 'Sometimes I favor myself with these little treats. Eat, Mitka.'

Another landlady. Set Mitka adrift, and he enticed somebody's Mama. But he ate, grateful she had provided an occupation.

The waiter brought the drinks. 'What's going on here, a picnic?'

'We're writers,' Olga explained.

'The boss will be pleased.'

'Never mind him, eat, Mitka.'

He ate listlessly. A man had to live. Or did he? When had felt this low? Probably never.

Olga sipped her whiskey. 'Eat, it's self-expression.'

He expressed himself by finishing off the salami, also half the loaf of bread, cheese, and herring. His appetite grew. Searching within the bag Olga brought out a package of sliced corned beef and a ripe pear. He made a sandwich of the meat. On top of that the cold beer was tasty.

'How is the writing going now, Mitka?'

He lowered the glass but changed his mind and gulped the rest.

'Don't speak of it.'

'Be uphearted, not down. Work every day.'

He gnawed the turkey drumstick.

'That's what I do. I've been writing for over twenty years and sometimes--for one reason or another--it gets so bad that I don't feel like going on. But what I do then is relax for a short while and then change to another story. After my juices are flowing again I go back to the other and usually that starts off once more. After you've been writing so long as I you'll learn a system to keep yourself going. It depends on your view of life. If you're mature you'll find out how to work.'

'My writing is a mess,' he sighed. 'a fog, a blot.'

'You'll invent your way out,' said Olga, 'if you only keep trying.' (The Magic Barrel, pp 30-31) 

Inventing their way out seems to be something all of Malamud's characters do, in one way or another. The astonishing final story, 'The Magic Barrel', features a hapless rabbinical student, Leo Finkle, employing a matchmaker to find him a wife. To one of these prospective brides, Finkle explains his religious calling:

'I am not,' he said gravely, 'a talented religious person,' and in seeking words to go on, found himself possessed by shame and fear. 'I think,' he said in a strained manner, 'that I came to God not because I loved Him, but because I did not.' This confession he spoke harshly because its unexpectedness shook him. (The Magic Barrel, p. 164).

"A talented religious person," is a wonderful resonant phrase, and The Magic Barrel is full of moments like this. I recommend it.