DANCING BY THE RIVER
By Marlin Barton, Frederic C. Beil, Savannah, 320 pages.Black Belt native Marlin Barton is an accomplished writer of short fiction.
In this latest collection he again pushes against the limits of time and space: crossing eras, countries, generations and perspectives, often within the span of only a few pages. For instance, characters from one story might turn up 50 years earlier in the next. What links them all together is the ultimately frustrating pursuit of redemption.
In essence, Barton has mastered here a particularly innovative vision of the short form, and of writing in general. While the order of the stories is sometimes confusing, the reader plays an active role in reading as we try to follow the stories of characters in small Southern towns.
Whether writing about a determined alcoholic or gypsies at the door, Barton gives us believable people merely searching for answers to make sense of their lives. In only a few words, Barton gives us the world. He illustrates the face of a defeated Civil War soldier, still a boy, caught on a littered battlefield, introduces us to a dissatisfied wife struggling to break free in contemporary times, and invites us to follow the path of a French resistance fighter during World War II.
One possible explanation of the book’s title is that only in “dancing by the river” can we understand how the stories of these individuals and our own lives make sense.
The writing itself flows. Particularly bittersweet is “Errands” the story of a boy who matures with his hometown as the community family doctor sinks deeper and deeper into disarray. In the background, we see how blacks and whites lived together in both harmonious and threatening ways. Clearly this could be the story of many towns, not just those in the South.
Make no mistake, this book is Southern through and through. Where else might you find a story of such laugh-out-loud hilarity as “Falling,” about chickens dropping from the sky.
Throughout “Dancing by the River,” the geography, the pace, the wealth of characters could only come from someone intimate with the region and its nuances. In truth, as a Northerner, this reviewer sometimes felt left out or not quite able to understand all the richness this book has to offer.
Still, there is plenty here for any active reader to enjoy, regardless of regional heritage. “Another Story for Catherine” manages to weave in complicated Northerners with so much wiser Southerners in a comprehensive yet poignant way. “We courted on a merry-go-round,” is the opening sentence.
How the unlikely couple got there is only half the story, and in the end brings us close to the lovers in the story.
So do I recommend this book? Yes, especially for those who read Barton’s first collection, “The Dry Well” to which this book serves as companion volume. Part of the enjoyment, of the dance if you will, is merely keeping track of folks who live up and down the river. No different, really, than keeping track of long lost cousins. We knew them once, maybe we’ll know them again.
And finally, if Barton’s stories aren’t compelling enough, “Dancing By the River” is handsomely designed, bound in cloth, a book that’s magic to the touch — and ever so warm to hold.
Lena Schwartz, a native of Chicago, has always lived in the North. She can only imagine the beauty of the South as it’s detailed in Barton’s stories.
