The Complete Stories

I finally made it through one of the most difficult books I have ever read, Bernard Malamud s The Complete Stories One reason it took me so long to read is because short stories are not really my cup of tea So I chose a story here and there from the fifty three to read with lunch or a quiet midnight snack I found myself gaining weight I had to comfort eat while I read these sad, intense, Jewish stories Drama and absurdity Tragic immigrant lives Merchants and artists all longing, only to be cut d [...]

Bernard, you will deny your Jewishness three times before the cock crows Sorry, just a random reflection on The Lady in the Lake, which is pretty much bunk but bunk with a point From what I ve gathered, Malamud has about an ounce or two of cleverness, but that s pretty much it Besides that, he s a mainstream hack who writes about ordinary schlubs who fantasize about Italian aristocratic beauties, run delicatessens, or contemplate suicide Or maybe all three His intentions are probably good Basica [...]

As I ve mentioned before, if Malamud is known for anything its as a novelist, with one of his novels being adapted into a semi famous movie and another winning the National Book Award However, he was no slouch as a short story author either, with his first collection The Magic Barrel also winning the same award Its the rare writer that can manage both formats with aplomb, as I ve generally found that most short story writers who try to tackle novels wind up overwriting or taking an idea that sho [...]

Favorites include A Choice of Profession, Rembrandt s Hat, The Loan, The Bill, The Magic Barrell, The Jewbird, Naked Nude, A Pimp s Revenge, My Son the Murderer, and Glass Blower of Venice This is by far the largest collection of short stories I ve ever read and probably the best It rivals Flannery O Connor s both in quality and quantity The varied styles of writing are intriguing Many of the stories end in complete chaos after brutal revelation by the protagonist The stories about depressed sho [...]

My favorite short stories ever, especially The jew Bird, the Silver Crown, the Magic Barrell wow, including everything, I guess, but especially The Angel Levine, perhaps the best short story of modern times Seriously.

Difficult to rate this collection of short stories, because some were really brilliant 5 stars , others were quite boring 2.5 stars , and very few I honestly couldn t understand at all 1 star It s said that Bernard Malamud is one of the masters of short stories, and this is certainly not untrue, but this collection is complete and it therefore also includes early stories where I m sure a lot of readers today have problems getting it Some of the later stories are almost try outs for a artistic w [...]

What an amazing collection this is, and fascinating to experience the arc of his work moving into experimentalism and ultimately becoming a very personal amalgam of tradition and stylistic innovations.I am struck by how pure a fiction writer he is his life experiences are pounded into the ore of his stories in such a holistic and non egoistic way that they are simply another literary implement in the craftsman s tool kit Modern writers often over use biography to the point of artlessness.Not Mal [...]

I ve been told I like movies that have no plot I suppose one could make the same indictment of my taste in books Malamud s novels often seem to have no solid beginning or end, and some of his short stories share this quality But in this way they feel real, lifelike Malamud is an expert at showing us parts of ourselves that we d rather not face His characters make terrible choices and the reader is left wondering if they d possibly do any better Life, despite their frantic yoohooings, had passe [...]

Some of the early stories didn t really grab me, probably because I d just read The Assistant and they were obviously early attempts at the themes and situations of that novel But it picked up, and there are some very funny, insightful, and engaging stories about urban Jewish life, Italian tourists, art, and relationships Mostly well written, although Malamud occasionally experimented with form and wasn t always successful.

It is interesting that Flannery O Connor felt Malamud was even better than she at writing short stories Perhaps it is the subject matter of the stories immigrant Jews in urban America but it just didn t grab my attention like O Connor s stories, for example This is a situation where I would love to take a short story course that discussed Malamud and O Connor, Monroe, Carver, Lahiri so that I could better understand and thereby appreciate his work.

Malamud has long been a favorite after having been introduced to his stories in Freshman English at the Univ of Mass in the 70 s I have read all of these in the past, but thoroughly enjoyed the re read, especially The Jewbird.

I enjoyed Bernard Malamud s collection of stories, which run the gamut from sad to surreal to very funny The Sad The Mourners the eviction of a long term tenant provoked by a minor argument between him and the superintendent Black Is My Favorite Color a Jew feels a connection with his black neighbors that will never be reciprocated.The German Refugee The King s Speech with no happy ending.And there s also The Loan, The Cost of Living still relevant today with its tale of a Mom and Pop store thre [...]

Malamud is an extraordinarily fine writer.His novels are solid, but his short stories are transcendent.It s so difficult to write a short story that works,and, of course, since few people read short stories any, it s a lost art form Malamud is one of the best I suppose because of his subject matter Judaism with occasional forays int magic realism he is often classified with Isaac Bashevis Singer I always think of him as the literary male equivalent of Alice Munro, though Deep insights mined from [...]

For such a massive volume, it is difficult to arrange my thoughts Malamud achieved a feat I ve never seen before He failed to write a single uninteresting short story in his entire life Some stood out, but none bored Each of the Fidleman stories save the last is a masterpiece Still Life may be the greatest short story I ve ever read, certainly in the top three The First Seven Years , too, is extraordinary.As one who had read several of Malamud s novels, and adored his long form fiction, I wonder [...]

There are many memorable and heartbreaking stories in a vast collection that spans Malamud s 40 year writing career The stories are arranged chronologically and the reader experiences his maturation as both an author and a man While tragedy and loss are themes that run through much of the work, Malamud can also be darkly funny see the Jewbird and delicately sentimental see Angel Levine This a lengthy anthology and some stories drag especially the ones from his protracted Italian phase but as a c [...]

Five stars feels silly, but four what is the point I like the Silver Crown I also like Rembrandt s Hat Malamud seems like he was very sad He seems like he was a realist to the point of everything being gray, and everyone being ugly The Silver Crown is nice, because it is about a realist like that trying to get out, and trying to believe in something Rembrandt s Hat is just about failure No escape stuff.

Malamud chronicles the lives of mid 20th century immigrants and working class Jews, along with a few tales of American scholars and artists visiting Italy, in this repetitive collection of stories The best short stories in this book are those where the author allows his imagination to run wild half of these stories could have been cut and it would have made for a shorter but powerful read.

From this collection I have read the following The First Seven Years, The Magic Barrel, The Mourners, Angel Levine, Take Pity, The Last Mohican, Idiots First, The Jewbird, Man in the Drawer, and The Silver Crown

This is a large collection Some stories were winners, some were not Even the good ones seem a little dated now, but Malamud really is a wonderful writer of short stories I think it might be his near perfect framing of a situation.

55 stories spanning a 45 year career Aside from a few stinker stories from the 1960s and 1970s this collection is very enjoyable As good as most of these stories are, however, none of them equal the elegance and beauty of his prose in the novel, The Assistant Still, recommended.

Mr Malamud is a great short story writer His characters are so human that you can feel and meet them in any society you go to His stories represent an astonishing abundance of narrative smarts and brilliant prose.

If you want to read THE definitive collection of Short Stories of the 20th century Malamud is your guy.You can read pretty much everything he wrote here Life is for the Living A Pimp s Revenge Will take your breath away

If I only give this four stars, it s simply because the stories now seem a little dated That said, Malamud is a genius and a big influence on my writing No serious short story writer should be ignorant of his work.

Back on the shelf for a while.

I think the Jewbird short story is in this That is an amazing piece It still touches me.

He sure can write

a melancholic footrest

The master of the killer last line Oy, Bernie, so good.

i tried i tried i really tried to understand why this is so good

Incredible collection of short stories must read if you are Jewish