The Moon in Its Flight, by Gilbert Sorrentino

The Moon in Its Flight
Gilbert Sorrentino

I don’t know what I was thinking when I purchased this book, because I apparently had no clue about who Gilbert Sorrentino is. Based on his name (and, I suppose, a review of his that I must have only half-read), I pictured him writing in his Italian vineyard, sipping wine and penning another line. I pictured a contemporary of Italo Calvino, and I assumed that his writing would be of the same nature. While this is not entirely true, I was at least pleasantly surprised. Sorrentino is Italian, it seems, but he’s a tough New Yorker, and his stories have none of the Old World in them; rather, they are all American.

The Moon in Its Flight is a collection of 20 stories which have been written from 1971 until just two years ago. I can’t say that every story brought me an intense level of enjoyment, but I did like most of his stories. They are filled with recurring people and situations, and I can’t help but think that Sorrentino is dealing with past friends and mistakes here. For example, in several stories, the lead character (a man who thinks he has talent enough to make him a writer, even though all he writes are small scraps of garbage) has an affair with a friend’s wife. Sometimes the repetition of this storyline became a bit trite, especially as names are repeated also (making it seem all the more likely that these people were real to him).

Also important is Sorrentino’s style; he has a way of directly addressing the audience about his writing, which I found refreshing. For example, in “Decades,” the first time we meet Clara (one such name that he will use in other stories), the woman with whom the narrator has an affair, he writes:

When I say it was interesting, I mean that I saw that Ben was not that romantic Byronesque figure I had taken him to be. He somehow had a goal, a—what shall I call it?—“stake in life.” On the other hand, I am more or less still searching for myself, if you can stomach that phrase. Well, let that be; this is the Steins’ story.

This technique does not become clichéd or overused; in fact, it was what I enjoyed most about his work. It is used to the strongest effect in his final story (also his most recent), “Things that Have Stopped Moving.” In it, the narrator admits that he is going to try and relate something personal that he has never been able to write about before; he hopes this time he will be successful. Again we are given a story about a struggling writer and a friend’s wife. However, this time, certain lines and phrases really struck me; this story also illustrates Sorrentino’s growth as a writer (the story I’ve quoted above appeared in 1977). Consider the final paragraph of the story, when the narrator explains,

In any event, I’ve spent a fair amount of time and attempted a degree of care in the creation and arrangement of these fragments. There are moments or flashes when I believe that I have seen myself, in a quirk of syntax, as I really was, when I can swear that Ben or Clara are wholly if fleetingly present in these simulacra of the past. Moments, flashes, when this admittedly inadequate series of signs seems to body forth a gone time. But I know that this is nonsense, nothing but a ruse with which I have been faithfully complicit so as to make the landscape of my life seem more valuable and interesting than it ever was.

Sorrentino raises some interesting points here. How well can any “truth” (consider the Frey ordeal) translate into prose, even when one is striving to render it faithfully? This is a fitting way to end a collection of stories that seems, at any rate, extremely autobiographical—although how much does one know about Sorrentino after reading these stories? I can’t say much, although I suppose I know he isn’t writing while sipping a glass of red wine and staring down on his Italian vineyard. Or, maybe he is. Maybe he just chose not to include that in his stories.

In a nutshell: These stories did not shake the ground I walk on, but they were enjoyable to read. I recommend them.

Bibliolatry Scale: 4.5 out of 6