Just a reminder that over beyond the very low, really quite minor paywall, we’re going to be discussing a Chekhov story that, in my view, is in the mid-range of his brilliance - it isn’t quite as great as his best. We can, of course, disagree on this (and I suspect some of you will) but the point is to consider that any writer is going to exhibit a range in quality, and looking at which distinguishes his (say) B-minus stories from his A-pluses will tell us important things about, not only the flavor of that writer’s approach, but also about the story form itself.
Join us over there for what I’m sure will be a lively discussion on Sunday.
Now for our question of the week:
Q.
I was listening to your interview with Ezra Klein, and I’m most of the way through “A Swim in a Pond in the Rain.” The question I have is not a writing-related question, I realize, but I’m asking anyway. In “A Swim...” you told the mesmerizing story of flying in a plane that was being tossed around and was plummeting at one point and seemed certain to crash, and a boy sitting near you asked if this was normal, and you lied and said yes. I may have gotten the details a bit off, but I remember the story because, in the discussion of “Master and Man,” you brought it up, to expand on the theme of a “better death”--that Vasily is terrified when he sees the wormwood and realizes nothing is left but death, but when he comes upon the freezing Nikita, Vasily feels emboldened--there is something he can control, after all--and he lies on top of Nikita, thereby saving him. You said that telling the boy calming words also calmed you, and if the plane had crashed, it would have been a “better death” for you--whatever that means (a death as a human who has shown his humanity one last time).
In contrast, at around 40:00 of the interview, you discuss the nature of comfort, and you say comfort is truth. You give the example of being stuck in a cabin and the wolves are outside. Comfort is not found in failing to acknowledge the danger, but in admitting it; there are wolves, and that’s awful.
I was trying to reconcile the seemingly opposite thoughts: is comfort telling the lie or the truth? But I realized it’s a matter of context, right? For adults, who fear the unknown more than anything, comfort is knowing the truth, and knowing that it’s bad (when it is), and having their fear accepted and acknowledged. Maybe because, when we know the worst, we see that we can stop trying for better, and it’s a relief. But comforting a child may be in lying to them: especially if the situation is dire, allowing them to believe that things will improve is best--because this lie will work, if told by a trustworthy-seeming adult, and since the future (in the case of your near-crash) was only minutes long (or, at least, that seemed likely), there was no point in making it a harrowing one for the child.
In a way, then, Vasily took the truth of being about to freeze to death upon himself, but at the same time, he gave the possibility of life to Nikita. So the lie became true, for Nikita.
Thank you.
A:
How interesting. I think part of the reason I felt all right telling that kid that everything was fine was because – well, at that point, it wasn’t a given that we would, for sure, die. Things were looking bad but we weren’t exactly plummeting earthward quite yet. So for me to say, “We’re about to die,” wouldn’t have been true.
I also suspect that I tell that story in a pithier way than it actually happened. I may have said, “Yes, it’s supposed to be like this,” or I might have said “I’m not sure but I think it will be fine.” I like to think that if it had become more dire, I would, in fact, have leveled with him – but I can’t say for sure. I can imagine a world where, had things got worse, and he’d started screaming or something, that might have pushed me into a more honest mode (assuming I wasn’t screaming myself, in that conjectural future.)
**
I know that the struggle for me in that moment was trying to get myself squared away with the truth that it might go very badly. That was a lot. And I didn’t get there, because the true pre-crash moment didn’t come. I only got as far as the denial step – basically my mental tapeloop was just going, “No, no, no, not yet, no.”
What I remember most from that moment was that, as soon as I noticed that kid there beside me, and became aware of how scared he was, and turned my mind toward him, some old instincts took over – teaching, parenting. This gave me some relief, stepping outside of my own fear like that, being drawn out by old and good habits.
The comfort for me consisted in the fact that I turned my energy outward and, in that process, remembered who I was – or who I had been in my better moments (who I had tried to be all my life).
For the kid, I imagine that if there was any comfort, it was just the fact that I’d heard his question and responded and so now we were in it together – he wasn’t just sitting on that plane, that might be crashing, all alone.
**
Speaking for myself, I know I experience more anxiety when I’m trying to keep a truth from myself and, conversely, less anxiety in that moment when I’m able to turn and look at what the truth really is.
This is true in writing too. I think we all know that feeling when part of the mind realizes something isn’t right in our story or novel, while another part of the mind frantically defends the thing. (“It’s been good for many months now!”) That tension makes for anxiety and unpleasantness – but these are probably necessary, because, in time, the unbearability of it all might make us consider a new path, or a solution we hadn’t considered might come into sight, just from the sheer discomfort of trying to maintain a conflicted mind.
I’ve had some very good experiences in that holy moment when you turn to yourself and go, “Yeah, this really isn’t working.” What a weight gets lifted! Everything is possible again.
So, I do think that truth is comfort – but I think Ezra’s question was coming out of some issues raised in my recent novel, Vigil, specifically if I thought Jill was good at comforting Boone (I think she was not) and, if not, what such comfort might have looked like. We might say that the Frenchman was closer to the mark – he was trying, it could be said, to shock Boone into taking some responsibility for his actions, in the “wrathful deity” tradition, in which a teacher can be rough and crude and even insulting, if this is what it takes to dislodge a student from a harmful habit of way of thinking.
Anyway, thanks for the question.
I find myself thinking of a great story by Robert Stone, called “Helping,” that ran in The New Yorker back in 1987, and takes up the question of if one person can ever really help another, and, if so, how, exactly. It’s a classic - so deep, funny, and tightly written.
Story Club, any thoughts on this question of comfort and truth? Examples from your life, when telling the truth felt like comfort (and when it might not have)?
Okay, I’m back momentarily. (I’ve been busy in my own world the last few weeks, writing.)
I had to pop in here to say to the Questioner that everything relates to writing! Your question is definitely a “writing-related” question! Especially as it concerns “comfort,” “lies,” and “truth.” We all know that a lot of writing is telling a lie in order to get to a truth. I mean, that is more or less the definition of fiction, no? And non-fiction as well, as one person’s memory or re-telling may vary distinctly from someone else’s. Who really knows the Truth? What is fiction and what is not?
When George told the boy that the plane wasn’t crashing, it was “true.” The plane wasn’t crashing. But George was offering the boy the comfort the boy needed in that moment. And by comforting the boy, George found some comfort himself—the comfort in knowing he’d offered comfort. May we all offer that kind of comfort to others!
Now, does “comfort equal truth” or did George mean that “Truth is comfort”? I think he meant the latter. And I don’t agree with him. Truth isn’t always a comfort, though it may be partially a comfort. I wouldn’t tell a clearly dying man that his wife just died if he asked if she was okay. I’d say, I’ll check soon, but let’s take care of you right now, or some such. Right? Sometimes you have to lie to comfort a person. I knew an old woman who’d slept with one man her whole life. She wanted to know if she’d missed anything and I said, No, they’re basically all the same. (HA!) She was glad to hear it. So. A friend who keeps kosher wanted to know if non-kosher pizza was better. I said, no, about the same. (HA!) Maybe I just like lying.
Anyway, comfort and truth—both are wonderful aims, but sometimes you have to let comfort win out.
Off to read the Robert Stone story. And then back to my writing. I don’t know if anything will come from all the words I’ve put on paper in the last three months, but I’m so happy (and comforted) by the release.
Thanks so much for this: “…he was trying, it could be said, to shock Boone into taking some responsibility for his actions, in the “wrathful deity” tradition, in which a teacher can be rough and crude and even insulting, if this is what it takes to dislodge a student from a harmful habit of way of thinking.”
I taught a professional practice class a couple of years ago, to masters students who I thought should be taking more responsibility and showing initiative instead of being purely grade driven and looking for shortcuts. Eventually I got sort of blunt with them about it and they were offended. They said I was too rough/disdainful/unfair/incompetent, etc. But now…..I can take solace in being in the tradition of the wrathful deities. Yes! Thank you!