Having declared my dissatisfaction with realism, I have to figure out how the hell to label Alice Munro, whom I love so very very much. I also have to figure out what it is that connects her with other writers whom I love so very very much. And so, here is a list of some of the contemporary writers who sweep me away:
Penelope Fitzgerald, Hilary Mantel, John Berger, Toni Morrison, Leslie Marmon Silko, W.G. Sebald, Roberto Bolano, Grace Paley, Italo Calvino, Kathryn Davis, Bruno Schulz, Peter Carey, Flann O'Brien, Jim Crace, Ursula K. LeGuin, Chinua Achebe, J. M. Coetzee, Ben Okri, Don DeLillo.
I list them because in my mind, a wonderful, barely visible halo exists around each of them. I can't say exactly what I love about them because when I read them I am transported to a place beyond words. I immerse myself in these novels and stories; I experience them, simply and transcendently. The pleasure is so acute that at times I stop reading in order to savor and wonder at it.
My instinct is to say that it has something to do with the way these authors train their gazes on their subject. They may be exploring psychological realism, fantastic realism, postmodernism, what have you. And yet, as they write, they disappear into the writing. That, anyway, is what I imagine. In the course of writing these works, they give themselves up. And in the course of reading their works, I give up myself.
Hypnogogic Realism. The allure of the liminal; the eluding of boundaries. To be seduced, and not disappointed.
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