Trying to Save Piggy Sneed

I finished another book by John Irving, this time a compilation of short stories titled Trying to Save Piggy Sneed. His short stories are interesting enough – I read the entire compilation over two days – but after reading four other full-length novels by him, his short stories are, well, too short. I’m usually left with the thought, “What! Is that it? What happens to so-and-so after his long drive to Iowa? What did that entire dinner conversation mean?” There were some stories where I didn't have a clue what Irving was trying to get at.

This compilation includes The Pension Grillparzer, previously found only in The World According to Garp. The title is derived from the first story of the compilation, Trying to Save Piggy Sneed. In a way, this story is an explanation of how and why Irving became a writer. It is a bit like jumping into cold water to suddenly have Irving as Irving address you – refreshing, different, intriguing. This was my favourite story of the compilation (not counting The Pension Grillparzer), and it starts thus:

“A fiction writer’s memory is an especially imperfect provider of detail; we can always imagine a better detail than the one we can remember. The correct detail is rarely exactly what happened; the most truthful detail is what could have happened, or what should have… Being a writer is a strenuous marriage between careful observation and just as carefully imagining the truth you haven’t the opportunity to see. The rest is the necessary strict toiling with the language…”

And he goes on to tell a fantastic and believable story.

In another strand of thought, remember what I said concerning dreams in The Fourth Hand? I was wrong in thinking that dreams and premonitions were a new theme in Irving’s latest novel because there is a story all about dreams in this compilation titled “Other People’s Dreams”. In this story, the main character has the gift (or curse?) of dreaming other people’s dreams when he sleeps in their bed. In the last two paragraphs, there is a hint of premonition as well, which is how dreams feature in The Fourth Hand. So there, mystery solved.
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