Dismembering the American Dream: The Life and Fiction of Richard Yates

Title page, Copyright, Dedication, Quotes

Dismembering the Ameri­ can Dream Dismembering the Ameri­can Dream The Life and Fiction of Richard Yates Kate Charlton-­Jones Foreword by DEWITT HENRY Afterword by MONICA YATES The University of Ala­ bama Press Tuscaloosa The University of Ala­ bama Press Tuscaloosa, Ala­bama 35487-­0380 uapress.ua.edu Copyright © 2014 Kate Charlton-­ Jones Foreword and afterword copyright © 2014 the University of Ala­ bama Press All rights reserved Inquiries about reproducing material from this work should be addressed to the University of Ala­ bama Press. Typeface: Minion and Helvetica Manufactured in the United States of America Cover photograph: Yates looking out the door of the pump house at Babaril in Mahopac, circa 1958; courtesy of the Richard Yates Estate Cover design: Mary-­ Frances Burt / Burt&Burt ∞ The paper on which this book is printed meets the minimum requirements of Ameri­ can National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-­ 1984. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Charlton-Jones, Kate, 1959– Dismembering the American dream : the life and fiction of Richard Yates / Kate Charlton-­ Jones ; foreword by DeWitt Henry ; afterword by Monica Yates.   pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8173-1825-3 (hardback) — ISBN 978-0-8173-8748-8 (ebook) 1. Yates, Richard, 1926–1992—Criticism and interpretation. I. Title. PS3575.A83Z65 2014 813ʹ.54—dc23 2014002564 For John “The Ameri­ cans are funny. You have a funny sense of time— or perhaps you have no sense of time at all, I can’t tell. Time always sounds like a parade chez vous—a triumphant parade, like armies with banners entering a town. As though, with enough time. . . . and all that fearful energy and virtue you people have, everything will be settled, solved, put in its place. And when I say everything,” he added, grimly, “I mean all the serious, dreadful things, like pain and death and love, in which you Ameri­ cans do not believe.” James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room But once that was done she began to find bad places back in the main part of the story: scenes that went on too long and others that didn’t go on long enough, paragraphs that weren’t pulling their narrative weight . . . and far too many easy, poorly chosen words. The only truly professional approach now, it seemed, would be to write the whole damned thing over again. Richard Yates, Young Hearts Crying ...