The Tent

by Margaret Atwood

I really don't imagine that any writer started their literary career yearning for the day when they'd hear me say that their work was all that got me through having the last shards of a wisdom tooth removed. I consider myself to be pretty hard up for praise, and even I'd have a hard time going warm all over from an alleged compliment like that. It reminds me of that bit in Stranger in a Strange Land when the bimbo tells Jubal Harshaw how much she loves his writing. "I put one of your tapes on and let it lull me to sleep almost every night," she confides. He answers that a writer can't expect higher praise than that. I always thought that he was just being ironic, but maybe he meant it. Maybe, in terms of compliments from civilians, that's as good as it's going to get. And better than most. Surely knowing that your words are the last ones ringing in a reader's ears every night before oblivion takes its turn is better than hearing how pretty your prose is when read by the fluorescent glare of the dentist's lamp.

But still, there must be something after all worth having from the fact that your words were someone's stay and comfort, a much-needed distraction, in times of trouble. And I defy anyone to tell me that having full-grown teeth from their wombs untimely ripped is not a time of trouble. Sorry to go all Shakespeare on you, but the bard did at one point equate the death of one's child with the pain of a toothache, at least so far as pains no philosopher could patiently endure. Granted, they didn't have ibuprofen back then. (Have I mentioned that between that skull surgery earlier in the year and this recent robbery of my teeth, my new motto is Make Mine Motrin? I'm sure you were waiting to hear it.)

I just want to add that it's a little embarrassing even for me, the queen of parentheticals, to have to admit that I've digressed before I've even technically begun the book review in question, but at least I'm big enough to admit it.

So. The Tent is a collection of very, very short pieces of writing by Margaret Atwood. My first introduction to Atwood's skill in the arena of the swift and succinct was the purchase of her Murder in the Dark to celebrate a birthday a decade or so ago. The birthday was just all right, but the book was so memorable that I can (and will) recite on far too slight a provocation Atwood's rules for the game that supplies the title of the book. I've never actually played murder in the dark -- I just don't seem to swing with the right crowd for that kind of thing -- and I'd like to, but I can't imagine that it could be more enjoyable than that first elated reading of the story in question, or the many rereadings that followed.

Having just now given in to the temptation to slip that slight, hot-pink volume off the shelf (and what is it with hot-pink colored books that makes them so irresistible? I only own a few -- Murder, and Weetzie Bat, and the Edward Gorey illustrated version of The War of the Worlds -- and they are all the darlings of my heart and the delight of my eyes), I find myself at my second-favorite story in the collection, "Making Poison." "When I was five my brother and I made poison," Atwood explains, and please tell me if I ever manage a first line as good as that one so I can die happy. The story, or whatever you'd call it, is at once about two people in particular and all the people in the world. It covers more territory in its sum total of four paragraphs than most novels manage to even touch on. I need more than four paragraphs to sign my name. I'm on my third page here, and I apparently still haven't had enough space to say a word about the book I'm supposedly reviewing.

There's a reason for that. Other than congenital brain-deadedness, I mean. It is far more difficult to turn out a beautiful, meaningful extra-short piece than to produce a readable full-length novel. (Or a novel-length review, for that matter.) The pressure is on for every word to be perfect; and unfortunately such pressure doesn't always turn out diamonds. But Atwood's tinies are as accomplished as her novels. Which is a blessing if you're short enough of reading time that the dentist's chair starts to look positively inviting. You can chew through several of her new pieces in that peaceful little stretch of time between being pricked by the needleful of novocaine and prodded with a malignant steel hook -- "Is it working? Do you feel anything?" (I feel like being left alone; does that count? Which of course I don't say. There's something about that tray of instruments they always leave at eye-level, the one that I'm sure the Nazi dentist in "The Marathon Man" would have rejected on the grounds of its being too scary-looking, that sucks all the smarm out of me.) And then when you're trying hard not to wonder just how different that pair of pliers currently having its way with what used to be your teeth really is from the one in your own toolbox, you can distract yourself with thoughts on how easy perfect writing always looks once someone else has managed it.

I'm going to go ahead and hold a grudge against Margaret Atwood because she makes succinct just look so simple. Why shouldn't I? She doesn't care what I think of her. She's even wishing me well, at least in theory. One of the pieces in The Tent is called "Encouraging the Young," and if forty really is the new thirty I'm practically a teenager. So I definitely qualify for some encouragement, and Atwood claims she's happy to give it to me. "Once I wouldn't have done this," she explains, "but now I have nothing to lose. The young are not my rivals. Fish are not the rivals of stones."

Fish are not the rivals of stones. Another reason for me to sit here and hate her. I can't manage to memorize even half of the really good bits from all the important old dead guys. Now someone who's still alive has the nerve to knock on my memory door and demand admittance. I don't have the time for this kind of thing, people. I don't have time for one more book with plenty of turned-down corners (or, when I'm feeling really chic, those little brass arrows that you can slip onto the page at just the right place) calling to me when I'm supposed to be reading all those other books I haven't even opened yet.

But there it is. Tess of the D'Urbervilles sits unfinished on my shelf, and here I am giving the title story from The Tent another reading. I can't help it.

Did you ever read something so good that you had to stop reading it, at least for a while? Maybe because it's that good and you're not the one who wrote it and you have to take a little time to reconcile yourself to that fact; maybe because the prose is so rich that one bite leaves you full for hours. This is like that.

As I plow through the copies of the New York Times Book Review my stepmother kindly saves for me, I find myself scanning the reviews for quotes from the works in question long enough that I can make up my own mind as to whether or not to buy the damned book, since I hate taking anyone else's word for that kind of thing. The following is for the like-minded skeptics out there. You know who you are. It's from a piece called "Orphan Stories":

You're not my real parents, every child has thought. I'm not your real child. But with orphans, it's true. What freedom, to thumb your nose authentically! For orphans, all roads are open. For orphans, all roads are the one not chosen. For orphans, all roads are necessary. How can they be kicked out of home? They're out of home already. They hitch through life, one casual ride after another. Their rule is the rule of thumb.

Now: do you want to read the rest of the piece, or not?

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