Thursday, February 20, 2014

This Schlumpy Fellow

I love Lorrie Moore. I haven't read her new story collection, but it was reviewed in the New York Times today and when the reviewer said, "Ms. Moore never makes Ira believable as a sad-sack guy... Would this schlumpy fellow really look at a friend’s garden and think, 'The crocuses were like bells and the Siberian violets like grape candies scattered in the grass'?" I thought, "Well, sure. I mean, why not! I mean, I bet he would ESPECIALLY." This is something I know from personal experience. So that criticism seemed crazy to me. A schlumpy fellow can think all kinds of things about flowers.