The Start of Something
The Selected Stories of Stuart Dybek
Published on 2. November 2017
Book
Paperback/Softback
352 pages
978-1-78470-285-4 (ISBN)
Description
'One of the most soulful writers in America, and a national treasure' George Saunders
Nineteen tales of growing up, wising up, and falling in love, spanning more than three decades of prize-winning work by a North American master of the short story
The Start of Something is a visionary work following the lovelorn beatniks, hard-boiled gangsters and jaded academics of America, journeying through a haze of drugs, dreams and lucid memory. Seductive and freewheeling, each story glittering with the found poetry of the street, this is the definitive introduction to a life's work by a writer who has re-enchanted short fiction with every new collection.
Nineteen tales of growing up, wising up, and falling in love, spanning more than three decades of prize-winning work by a North American master of the short story
The Start of Something is a visionary work following the lovelorn beatniks, hard-boiled gangsters and jaded academics of America, journeying through a haze of drugs, dreams and lucid memory. Seductive and freewheeling, each story glittering with the found poetry of the street, this is the definitive introduction to a life's work by a writer who has re-enchanted short fiction with every new collection.
Reviews / Votes
One of the most soulful writers in America, and a national treasure -- George Saunders A poet of the short story, Stuart Dybek is a strange and exceptional talent... Impressive. -- Phil Baker * Sunday Times * [Dybek's stories] are strikingly with-it, distinctly 21st century in their shape and method... Dybek has also always stirred understated, powerfully realized and ravishingly beautiful images almost casually into his work. -- Kate Clanchy * Guardian * [The Start of Something is] worth leaping on. -- Hephzibah Anderson * Observer * A great deal of the art of the short story is to do with exits and entrances... [Dybek] has a knack for getting both things right... Dybek is - and this he certainly has in common with Ishiguro - a writer doing completely his own thing. -- Sam Leith * Financial Times * Life in Dybek's world is messy, and sometimes criminal, but full of heart. -- William Leith * Evening Standard * Dybek has an uncommon knack for both the short story and the poem. This collection mostly plumbs his American youth, producing mesmeric stories in which enchanting details leap off every page. * Daily Telegraph * Crafted, well-made stories that give permanence to those fleeting moments that define lives. -- James Doyle * Bookmunch *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Vintage Publishing
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 198 mm
Width: 129 mm
Thickness: 21 mm
Weight
422 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78470-285-4 (9781784702854)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
11/2016
Vintage Digital
€8.99
Available for download
Person
Described by the Atlantic as 'one of America's living masters of the short story', Stuart Dybek has been accoladed on all fronts, receiving fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the MacArthur Foundation, a PEN/Malamud Prize, a Lannan Award, a Whiting Writers Award, and four O. Henry Prizes. His fiction, poetry, and nonfiction have appeared widely in journals such as Harper's, Poetry, Tin House, the Atlantic, and the New Yorker.