The definitive collection of a twentieth-century master of the short
story, whose unforgettable inventions revolutionized the form
The short stories of Donald Barthelme, revered by the likes of Thomas
Pynchon and George Saunders, are gems of invention and pathos that have
dazzled and delighted readers since the 1960s. Here, for the first time,
these essential stories are preserved as they were published in
Barthelme's original collections, beginning with Come Back, Dr.
Caligari (1964), a book that made a generation of readers sit up and
take notice. Collected Stories also includes the work that appeared
for the first time in Barthelme's two retrospective anthologies, Sixty
and Forty, as well as a selection of uncollected stories.
Discover, in this comprehensive gathering, Barthelme's unique approach
to fiction, his upside-down worlds that are nonetheless grounded in
fundamental human truths, his scrambled visions of history that yield
unexpected insights, and his genius for dialogue, parody, and collage,
which was for him the central principle of all art in the twentieth
century. Engage with sophisticated works of fiction that, often in just
the space of a few pages, wrest profundities out of what might first
seem merely ephemeral, even trivial. And experience, along with
Barthelme's imaginative and frequently subversive ideas, the pleasures
of a consummate stylist whose sentences are worth marveling at and
savoring.
Introduced with a sharp and discerning essay by editor Charles McGrath
and annotation that clarifies Barthelme's freewheeling, wide-ranging
allusions, the landmark volume is a desert-island edition for fans and
the ideal introduction to new readers eager to find out why, as Dave
Eggers writes, Barthelme's every sentence ... makes me want to stop and
write something of my own. He fires all of my synapses and connects them
in new ways.
