The Best American Short Stories 2006 Edited by Ann Patchett

As I perused this collection, persistent questions tapped on my shoulder: Why do I read? Why do authors write? Why did they write these stories? Why were these stories included in this book? Unfortunately, "Why?" may be the only question in the world that can never be definitively, indisputably answered. We make partial attempts at settling the issue, but unresolved elements always remain. Nonetheless, Ann Patchett ventures her opinion of the matter of the short story and its purpose in her introduction. "I haven't been able to shake the notion that short story writers are famous people and that short stories are life-altering things. I believe it is human nature to try and persuade others that our most passionately held beliefs are true so that they too can know the joy of our deepest convictions."

Evaluating the book in that light, I think the purpose of this collection centers around inspiring compassion for others. While this is sometimes manifested in benign portraits of lonely senior citizens, bemused immigrants, and tragic marriages, at other times it seems merely a vehicle for gaining widespread acceptance of the practices of the most outlandish members of society. Homosexuality and all manner of promiscuity are boldly, kindly, even pedestrianly presented, as if such liasons were not only permissable but laudable, just another facet of a diverse civilization.

The unifying theme that these stories evoke is a continuation of the American motif of isolation. The individual is triumphed at the expense of the community. The gay military man unable to reach out to the needy family of a deployed solider nor commit to his "partner;" the sex-surfeited girl stringing along her smitten boyfriend; the aloof lesbian whose only human connections are fleeting, physical, and base - the individuals are worlds unto themselves, deceiving even their closest companions as to the true nature of their relationships, unable to foster meaningful interactions, nor engage in fully honest discourse. Here we have only ourselves; father, mother, sister, brother, husband, wife, friend - all are peripheral appendages with whom complete sincerity and verity, with whom selfless love, is tragically impossible. The stories form a paean to self.

So what are Ann Patchett's "deepest convictions" - that the individual is to be prized above all else? That the individual should pursue whatever feels right inside him, regardless of extraneous considerations? How should we apply these "life-altering" stories - Become more self-absorbed and self-obsessed than we already are? Accept whatever society foists on us as social norms?

Literature, like life, is vacuous, redundant, without a clear and defined purpose. Saying these short stories are worth reading is like saying one's aim in life is to just "be." The pursuit of truth and beauty is admirable only if it ends fruitfully. To get meat, hunt a deer. To find truth and beauty, seek the One who holds them, whose very being is composed of them.