Living in a New York City apartment when things quickly go wrong. This is Stephen Dixon territory.
I first encountered Stephen Dixon’s fiction back in the late 1980s in magazines of experimental fiction such as Asylum. No doubt about it – Stephen Dixon has a distinctive voice. He was born and raised in a large family in New York City and there’s a good helping of urban grit that sticks to his writing.
And Dixon has written a lot of fiction over the last fifty years: eighteen novels and eighteen short story collections. Although he’s written so much and is difficult to categorize, I think there are a few things that would qualify as prime Stephen Dixon, as per the following:
1) frequently a Stephen Dixon story features a male protagonist on the cusp of a meltdown or fizzling out, either a fizzling relationship or his own mind fizzling;
2) frequently we listen in on the narrator’s stream-of-consciousness combined with his conversations and actions – this to say, his spinning mind keeps spinning as he speaks and acts and reacts to those around him;
3) frequently his language is simple and straightforward and occasionally, as in his novel Frog, his sentences can go on for pages;
4) occasionally the narrator spins out a number of possible scenarios for his story before telling us how things really happened.
By my judgement, All Gone, 18 Short Stories is a perfect place to start with Stephen Dixon. All the stories are short - each about 8 pages - and all are written in clear, accessible language that will instantly grab a reader.
For a specific taste of what I mean, there's no better way than for me to share a retelling of one Dixon snapper entitled The Student and the beginning of another story - Bo, as per:
THE STUDENT
Vintage Stephen Dixon short story about a young man who has the ultimate bad day. An unforgettable yarn I'll review using Stephen Dixon-style language. Here goes.
Mister Average – The tale’s opening lines: “This begins more than four years ago. It was when I was driving a cab in the day and going to college at night. I was a pre-dental student. I lived in a single room. My folks were dead. I had no close relatives.” A typical guy, a student planning to get married to his girlfriend . . . but, but, but, one Saturday driving his cab he has an encounter, or, I should say, THE encounter.
Steely Encounter – I’ll give our luckless unnamed narrator a name – Norman. “I was driving a man through the factory part of the city. I suddenly felt this cold thing on the back of my neck. I swatted if from behind. The thing came right back to the same spot. “”It’s a gun,” the man said. “Make another move it doesn’t like and it’ll bite off your head.”
Round and Round, Round One - The man, a gentleman by the looks of it, dressed in his suit, tie, overcoat and hat, tells Norman to keep driving around the block. Norman asks: how many times? “Till I say you stop.” “And if I run out of gas?” “No funny remarks.” “That’s wasn’t intended to be funny. I’m low.” “You’ll be lower if you make any more funny remarks.”
Gas Station - Round and round they go til the taxi bucks, nearly out of gas. The guy in the back seat with the gun I’ll call Gus. Gus tells Norman to pull into the nearest gas station. Norman does and asks for seven dollars of economy. And a receipt. Gus doesn’t like that Norman asked for a receipt. He tells Norman no receipt. Too late. The attendant comes back out with three dollars and a receipt. After some back and forth between Norman and the attendant – no thanks, thanks, no thanks, thanks - Gus finally orders Norman to take the three dollars and receipt and get moving. Norman tells the attendant he’s in a rush and drives off.
Round and Round, Round Two – Again, Gus orders Norman to drive around the block, the block with the gas station. First and second time round, the attendant waves to Norman. Third and fourth time round he waves and his scratches his head. Fifth time he yells, “Hey, you’re driving in circles." But then it happens: Norman sees a policeman calling out for him to stop. Next time round, the policeman waves his nightstick and comes running since Norman’s stopped at a red light. Gus says, “Go through it and around the block again and then stop where he says stop.”
Climax – Next time around Norman stops. An ugly exchange with the policeman that turns violent. Norman drives off. But soon comes to two police cars forming a road block. Norman jumps out of the car and crawls underneath the cab. Gus begins shooting at the floor, hitting Norman in the shoulder and in the arm. The policemen open the back door. Gus cries out between loud sobs and tears, “This bum . . . this man . . . he forced me to drive with him as a hostage. I luckily disarmed him of that things seconds before he was going to drive us straight into your cars and shoot every policeman he could see." The police drag Norman out, stand him up, push him against the car, wack him a couple times before slapping on the cuffs.
Justice - Norman tells his story to his lawyer. The lawyer says he doesn't believe him. Turns out Gus is solid citizen, family man, university professor who wrote highly regarded textbooks on forensic psychology and medicine. The lawyer tells Norman if he pleads not guilty he could get at least thirty years but he pleads guilty he'll get off with a few years. Norman pleads guilty and is sentenced to six years in prison.
Scholar and Student - Norman spends most of his time reading in the prison library. He gets out after four years for good behavior. By this time, his girlfriend has another boyfriend and he decides to switch his major to restaurant management.
Finale - Norman's working as a waiter in a restaurant when Gus walks in and takes a seat. You will have to read this Stephen Dixon shorty to find out what happens next.
BO
One day I’m just not in my right mind. That’s about the best way I can put it. I might have felt pretty bad other days but this day on the subway I’m really feeling things aren’t right in my head and I’m definitely not in my right mind. That’s closer. I’ll begin when and where. I’m heading uptown. The express. IND. Months ago. Heading to my girlfriend’s house. Not a girl, a woman. Her daughter’s the girl. I got my valise for the weekend. My rough work clothes, my good clothes and the clothes I got on. Also some shorts and sneakers in the valise so I can run once a day the two days I’ll be there. I’m going to help on her house. Fix up the basement with her. Plaster th floor, point up the brick walls as she says. What do I know from pointing? One the phone the night before she told me. Got a call from her. Big surprise: “Come up, all is forgiven. I love you very much. You must hate me by now the way I go back and forth in my emotions with you, but now I know how wrong I was and that you’re the man for me. Leonore misses you too.” Leonore’s her daughter. I call her Lee. So does here dad. “All right,” I said, “all is forgiven, and probably forgotten. I love you very much too, so when should I come up?”
“Right now if it was possible. But you won’t take off unless you’re really sick so come up tomorrow after work.”
“All right. I’ll catch the 6:10 bus.”
“Just take the subway to the bus station and I’ll drive down and pick you up there.”
“Why bother? I’ll take the bus from the bus station and be in your cute little town by seven.”
That’s what it is. Cute. She too. Her daughter also. Their house, the town, the main street and surrounding countryside, all cute. “Till then sweetheart,” and I said “Same here,” but felt a little as if I didn’t know if I was doing the right thing going up there. I’d thought it was over between us. Glad it’s not. All right, I’ll go. I want to be with her. I love them both. So I go to sleep, to work the next day and half past five I’m on the A train that’s to take me to the bus station at George Washington Bridge. But on the subway I suddenly feel peculiar. I don’t know what it is or where from. People looking at me strangely, maybe me at them too. The newspapers. Talk of war, other countries’ wars, sex murder, scandals, gossip, all kinds of statistics and reports. People reading. Magazines too. The subway ads seem strange and horrible to me too. Everyone seems exhausted. Everything seems stupid and inhuman, like none of us should or don’t belong. Like I especially don’t belong. Subway rocking side to side. Screeching noises of passing trains and our train and whistles too. People pushing, some don’t. Getting off, on. I’m standing. Need a seat. None. Crowded. I’m feeling crowded in by everyone and it seems everything and almost want to scream. I hold one back. I’m feeling scared. The subway. Where’s it going? Uptown the passing local stations say. Where am I going? Rochelle’s, or I’m not sure. I’m sweating. Back, neck and face. I wish I was there already where I’m going. Rochelle’s, but I don’t know if I belong there now. With her. Here. Anywhere in the world in fact. I have to get off. Maybe it’s some different kind of flu. I better wait till the train stops. It stops. I run upstairs. It’s not the bus station stop. That one I know where everyone from the front cars jam themselves in to get on the bus-station stairs. I have to call someone. I get the wrong number.
The above is only the first two pages of Bo. There are six more pages. I can assure you the story spirals in weird, unexpected directions. If you like what you've read, pick up this collection. If you like the collection, read more Stephen Dixon, maybe even his novels Garbage (my personal favorite) or Frog, perhaps his most ambitious.
American author Stephen Dixon, Born 1936
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