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Bookclub: "The Knife Thrower and Other Stories"
Presented by Jennifer Howard
Washington Post Book World Contributing Editor
Thursday, March 28, 2002; Noon EST
Welcome to the online meeting of The Washington Post Book Club, a monthly program presented by the editors and writers of Washington Post Book World. Book World contributing editor Jennifer Howard will be leading the discussion on this month's selection, Steven Millhauser's "The Knife Thrower and Other Stories."
The transcript follows.
Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
Jennifer Howard: Hello, and welcome to the Washington Post Book Club online discussion of Steven Millhauser's "The Knife Thrower and Other Stories." Abuut a month ago, I read Millhauser's novel "Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer" (which won the Pulitzer Prize a couple of years ago), and was struck by how its themes are all anticipated by the stories in "The Knife Thrower." Anybody else notice the similarities? To tell you the truth, it made the novel a little disappointing for me; the ideas seemed so fresh when I encountered them in the stories, and there they were again, being worked out in a longer form. And yet that's very Millhauser, I think. He's a tinkerer, an inventor, a creator of miniature worlds, and it makes sense that he'd return again and again to the wonders he invents, turning them around and around to see them from every angle. I'd enjoy hearing from anyone who's read "Martin Dressler" and has some thoughts on this.
Lenexa, Kan.:
Ms. Howard: The young girls on the cusp and their night antics are favorite Millhauser leitmotives for me. Woody Allen tells of a kingdom where flutes had to be banned for seduction of the virgins (Millhauser's children were piped out in Enchanted Night). The poet Brigit Pegean Kelly has a line: "I was a girl then, my chest its own walled garden." Virginia Scott Minor's poem:
Lilacs are a brief affair,
A practicing for roses,
As beautiful as young girls are
Before youth closes.
Millhauser really does that realm well, doesn't he? I see he has at least two children. Daughters? Also, any idea when we may see his next book? Thanks much.
Jennifer Howard: Hello, Lenexa--always good to hear from you. Yes, Millhauser is remarkably sympathetic to that shadowy world of adolescence. He's got two children--daughters, I think, although I'm not sure about that--and maybe that explains his interest in and sensitivity to the pains and pleasures of growing up. It's interesting, though, that he doesn't necessarily presume to work his way into the heads of teenagers; in "Sisterhood of Night," the perspective's that of a sympathetic but bemused adult. I like it that, unlike so many adult writers, he leaves teenagers their domain, even as he expresses curiosity about it. Even the young narrator of "Flying Carpets" doesn't do too much speculating about what his summer flights mean; we draw our own conclusions about what's being explored and what's being left behind.
Bethesda, Md.:
We were impressed by the first 4 stories -- The Knife Thrower, A Visit, The sisterhood of Night, and The Way Out. They were all cleverly crafted, built excellent suspense, and posed debatable issues. Thje other stories seemed very fanciful and extreme in a sense. Can you comment on why those other stories were included in this book because they could confuse a reader as to the author's dominant style, message, and impact?
Jennifer Howard: Fanciful and extreme (or extremely fanciful) certainly describe a lot of Millhauser's work. Like you, I'm partial to "The Knife Thrower" and "Sisterhood of Night." The later stories in the collection, while they may not be as satisfying in certain ways, do take up themes very dear to Millhauser, so they are representative of his larger project. "The New Automaton Theater," "The Dream of the Consortium" and "Paradise Park," for instance, explore his fascination with mass entertainment and consumption. That's putting it in too-economic terms, but you get what I'm driving at: the mythology of the department store, the amusement park, the technological entertainment (add movies and video games and other diversions to that category). Looked at that way, the later stories can be read as commentaries on how we (emphasis on the plural) live.
So it makes sense to me that these stories were included in the collection. Not to mention the fact that Millhauser needed a certain number of stories to make a book-length collection in the first place!
Somewhere, USA:
Hensch, something like a David Copperfield?
Jennifer Howard: Very much so, although a more intense and philosophical version of today's master magicians--and it's hard to imagine Hensch dating Claudia Schiffer. Hard to imagine him dating at all, actually. He's more of an ascetic type, concentrating on the art of what he does. But in his own quiet way, he's a manipulator of the audience's feelings and desires. He takes to an extreme the magician's knowledge that audiences like to be scared and perplexed; it keeps them interested.
Lenexa, Kan.:
Ms. Howard: Had read Martin Dressler and Enchanted Night--nice to get to Millhauser's short fiction. I especially like the magic of his nights (perhaps all the stories are sleep-dreams), young people (especially girls) on the cusp, the pull of the blue....
Knife Thrower: gripping tale--neat narrator
A Visit: "And I tried to imagine frog-love."
Sisterhood: Hawthorne/Miller/Enchanted Night
The Way Out: A kind of Kafka with a reason
Carpets: Also works as nostalgia mis-recalled
Zaubertheater: Art/Creativity/genius/decay
Clair de Lune: Dreamlike/erotic--on the cusp
Consortium: Modernity--a search for a way out
Balloon: Neat hist. setting--pull of the blue
Paradise Park: Another great verisimilitude
Kaspar Hauser: Wundermensch? Whence? Whither?
Beneath Cellars: Childhood/adulthood/death
Your thoughts? Also, do you personally know the author or Paul Auster (similarities, aren't there?)? Thanks much.
Jennifer Howard: The pull of the blue indeed: "The sky surprised me. It was deep blue, the blue of a sorcerer's hat, of night skies in old Technicolor movies, of deep mountain lakes in Swiss countrysides pictured on old puzzle boxes . . . . the warm blue air with little flutters of coolness in it, little bursts of grass-smell and leaf-smell, of lilac and fresh tar." (From "Clair de Lune")
For a dreamy type, Millhauser has a suprising ability to get the sensual details just right--the colors and smells of a moonlit summer night, for instance. It's one of my favorite things about him. I think I owned that puzzle as a kid, too--his references have that specificity about them sometimes. He shares more with lyric poets than with a lot of contemporary fiction writers, some of whom seem afraid of waxing poetic about things like moonlit nights and midnight skies.
Call me repressed, but I shy away from imagining frog love. "A Visit" is one of Millhauser's stranger stories; I don't quite know where it came from.
No, I don't know Millhauser personally. Michael Dirda tells me that he did a long essay on Millhauser for Encarta; I wasn't able to find it but maybe some of you have it in your Microsoft software packages. Anyway, Michael and I were talking about Millhauser's shyness; he's almost as reclusive as Pynchon or Salinger (he does teach, though, at Skidmore) but a mystique hasn't developed around him as it has around them. It's like he's so shy he doesn't even want to be known as shy, for fear of drawing attention to himself.
No thoughts on the Auster comparison--I haven't read enough of A. to compare the two. Sorry.
Silver Spring, Md.:
Were the Knife Thrower stories written before Martin Dressler? I read Dressler a few years ago and really enjoyed it. Alas, I've only read a few of the Knife Thrower stories, so can't really comment.
Jennifer Howard: I believe these stories were written before "Dresser." As I mentioned in my intro, I was not as impressed by the novel as I expected to be--I prefer the stories' more condensed and crystalline versions of the same themes. If you liked the novel, though, the stories are well worth checking out. So is a trio of novellas called "Little Kingdoms"--almost fairy-tale-like. In another age, Millhauser would probably have been an Andrew Lang or one of the Brothers Grimm. One book of his that I haven't read but that gets a lot of praise is his first novel, "Edwin Mullhouse," which purports to be the biography of a pre-teen genius.
Lenexa, Kan.:
Re your Dressler question: I read the novel first but did also feel the similarities in the short stories--particularly a recurring theme--a neat one--of someone attaining success and then not being satisfied until he built something that toppled: the hotels in Dressler, the automatons, the Paradise Park.
Jennifer Howard: That's very American, isn't it? Newer, bigger, better! If one ocean liner is good, a longer, faster one's got to be an improvement, right? But as Millhauser knows and the builders of the Titanic discovered, that way lies great peril. The enigmatic creator of "Paradise Park" plays Mephistopheles to his own Faust; he drives himself to new heights (or depths) until finally the whole thing caves in on itself in a fiery cataclysm.
"The Dream of the Consortium" shows how a good idea can become all-consuming; the department store is so good, so vast, so alluring that reality suffers by comparison. The narrator of that story talks about the strangeness of leaving that complete created world: "As we hurry along the sidewalk, we have the absurd sensation that we have entered still another department, composed of ingeniously lifelike streets with artful shadows and reflections--that our destinations lie in a far corner of the same department--that we are condemned to hurry forever through these artificial halls, bright with late afternoon light, in search of a way out."
The more we live in an artificially constructed environment, the more of a danger this becomes. In that sense, Millhauser's speaking very directly to the contemporary scene. I read many of these stories not just as fantasies but as cautionary tales.
Crofton, Md.:
Thanks for picking the knife thrower and
other stories, one of my favorties. I think the best one is the The Knife Thrower. Milhauser captures so well the fascination
we have for watching near-violent acts, it's
absolutely astonishing in its power.
Jennifer Howard: Thank you. I agree wholeheartedly--it's powerful stuff, that story, more powerful for being so restrained in its description of barbarous (and yet beautifully staged) acts. So much violence is ritualized, particularly as it's presented for our entertainment in movies.
Even the truly gory stuff on the news has a certain hypnotic rhythm to it--"if it bleeds, it leads"--the way the local news teams select the most lurid stories to kick off their broadcasts. We're all too familiar now with the cycles of violence--a suicide bomber's strike breeds retaliation breeds more bombers, forget about who started it--and while a short story is very far removed from the blood that's actually being spilled in the world, it can remind us of the blood lust that lurks even in the most seemingly civilized places and people. Art or murder? Millhauser asks. Not a comfortable question.
Somewhere, USA:
Would you say then that Hensch is beautiful as the vampire in Anne Rice's novel? The book starts out with young women following him. Does he reject women?
I haven't read the whole book yet.
Jennifer Howard: He's certainly alluring in the way that Rice's vampires can b; there's no dearth of people willing to be his victims. He's masterful, and he's allowed to commit acts onstage that on the street would be wanton crimes. (Note, though, that his audience is just as culpable as he is; it longs for the bloodshed he causes, even while purporting to be squeamish about the event). I don't get the sense that he rejects women, though; his volunteers/victims are men and women, and he doesn't seem to care much either way.
He doesn't reappear in the later stories, by the way; just in the title piece.
Lenexa, Kans.:
I like your Millhauser as "cautionary" notion. I sense a possible Baudrillard influence in him (hyperreality, simulacra, mass consumerism, the blur of boundaries...).
We actually have a little town in Kansas with tunnels: "The tunnels of Ellinwood" they're called. Nothing like the fun and magic of Millhauser's but an extensive (now boarded-up) network connecting the town's businesses--dug way back (no one remembers).
Do you have any idea when we might see the next Millhauser?
Jennifer Howard: Interesting. I wonder whether Millhauser heard of that Kansas town. Seems possible. Combine that with your Baudrillard notion and you have a ready-made dissertation topic!
I haven't heard when the next Millhauser's due. Back in December, he couldn't write something for Book World because he was at work on a short story. I get the impression that he works fairly slowly and immerses himself fully when he is working. Michael Dirda tells me that Millhauser lived in a room over his parents' garage until he was 30; I can see him shutting out the world as much as possible, drowning himself in his own worlds.
Jennifer Howard: That wraps it us for us today. Thanks for all the good questions. Join the Book Club online next month--I think we've got regular mystery reviewer Maureen Corrigan discussing Sara Paretsky's "Total Recall," one of her V.I. Warshawski novels.
washingtonpost.com:
That wraps up today's show. Thanks to everyone who joined the
discussion.
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washingtonpost.com:
That wraps up today's show. Thanks to everyone who joined the
discussion.
Stay tuned to Live Online:
American Presidents Series:
John Adams at 1 p.m. EST
Wolf Trap President Terrence Jones at 1 p.m. EST
Got Plans:
Entertainment Update at 1 p.m. EST
"Fast Girls" Author Emily White at 1 p.m. EST
Maryland & The Final Four with Johnny Holliday at 2 p.m. EST
The Apartment Adviser:
Barbara Burtoff at 2 p.m. EST
Michael Dirda on Books & Hard-boiled Fiction at 2 p.m. EST
Did you know that you can follow more than one Live Online discussion at
the same time? Just open another browser window and toggle back and
forth between discussions! And, if you miss one, catch up with the Live
Online transcripts.
Keep up with the latest in news, sports, politics and entertainment with
washingtonpost.com
e-mail newsletters.
NEW! Personalize your Post with mywashingtonpost.com.
Get customized news, traffic, weather and more.
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