A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life

Nonfiction | Essay Collection | Adult | Published in 2021

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue: “We Begin”

“In the Cart’”

“The Singers”

“The Darling”

“Master and Man”

“The Nose”

“Gooseberries”

“Alyosha the Pot”

“We End”

Appendices

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Themes

Writing as a Political Act

In the introductory chapter to this book, Saunders notes that these stories can be seen as a form of “resistance literature” (10). This is despite the fact that none of the stories is overtly about politics. Their resistance is instead oblique and quiet, and “comes from perhaps the most radical idea of all: that every human being is worthy of attention” (11).

Saunders observes that these writers were writing “in a repressive culture, under constant threat of censorship, in a time when a writer’s politics could lead to exile, imprisonment and execution” (10). While 19th century tsarist Russia may seem like a very different political climate than our own, there are repressive forces in our capitalist consumer culture as well. We are constantly distracted by technology and simplistic “information bursts” (12), and are vulnerable to the manipulative agendas of others. In such an environment, writing and reading amount to quiet acts of resistance.

The stories in this book are also political in their anti-dogmatism—their focus on complex realities and nuance. In the Chekhov story “Gooseberries,” for example, the character Ivan makes a passionate speech about the social irresponsibility of happiness. As Saunders notes, it is a stirring speech: “I’m moved and convinced anew by it every time […] I bet Chekhov believed it, too; the speech feels like it could have come right out of his journal” (413). Yet other events in the story—such as the swim in the pond that Ivan and his two friends take, a detail that inspires Saunders’s title—complicate Ivan’s speech. Ivan swims with such self-forgetful joy, even in the rain, that his friend Burkin has to remind him to get out of the water. This episode contradicts Ivan’s stated aversion to happiness, and makes him seem less noble than contrary.

Saunders suggests that Chekhov was examining his own ideas about happiness and social responsibility in the writing of this story. Chekhov comes to no easy conclusions, which is what gives the story its power. Likewise, the Tolstoy story “Alyosha the Pot” raises questions about the Christian values of submission and acceptance. Alyosha is a devout and obedient peasant boy who is exploited by his superiors; when he dies young, it is unclear whether his religious beliefs have been confirmed or shaken. Saunders suggests that this mystery is the result of an instinctual “swerve” on Tolstoy’s part: “That swerve represents a sort of interim decision to not, at that moment, decide—to defer deciding” (476). While Tolstoy was a devout Christian, he avoids making Alyosha a mouthpiece for his beliefs. He instead, in an artistic decision, allows a note of religious doubt to enter into the story.

Advice for Writers

Saunders states that this collection of stories should be regarded as a “workbook” (14). As he writes in his introductory chapter, the book grew out of his teaching these stories to aspiring writers in the Syracuse University MFA program. The book is addressed to both readers and writers, as the latter are the intended audience for the “Afterthought” essays that end each story. There are also three suggested writing exercises, as appendixes at the book’s end.

Little of Saunders’s writing advice is technical. He notes that there are certain important elements in a successful story, such as the need for narrative “causality” (284). A story should “always be escalating,” according to Saunders, and each event in it should have a causal relation to the next (187). Other than that, Saunders offers no formulas for writing a successful short story, and the variety of stories in this book indicates that his idea of a success is broad enough to encompass a meandering, digressive story like “The Singers” and a more straightforward epic like “Master and Man.”

Saunders encourages writers simply to write, and then to revise their writing. He believes that writing gives rise to inspiration, rather than the other way around. He also believes that a writer’s voice is often discovered through the process of revising and editing, rather than through first drafts: “Extreme cutting [...] is a gateway to voice […] There’s something intelligence-increasing about compression” (496). He believes that writers should follow their voices and trust their instincts, but in an alert and disciplined way. He suggests that most writers learn only gradually, and through repeated efforts, what their strengths are.

Saunders shares some anecdotes of attempting to write like Hemingway, an early role model: “I wrote story after story [...] and everything I wrote was minimal and strict and efficient and lifeless and humor-free” (131). Only gradually did Saunders learn to write in his own natural voice, one that was jokey and farcical. Writing is a discipline that involves self-acceptance and humility; it is also like a conversation with a reader—as with a real life conversation, one should not be too over-prepared: “If we set out to do a thing, and then we (merely) do it, everyone is bummed out” (198). Rather, writers should pay attention to their writing from line to line, figuring out their story as they go along, an attentiveness that will manifest to the reader as a form of respect.

Interrogating the Short Story Form

Saunders analyzes the stories in this book, interrogating what makes them successful. As a trained engineer, he brings precision to his literary analysis. For example, he makes a list of all of the events in Turgenev’s “The Singers,” italicizing those that are significant. He writes similar lists for Tolstoy’s “Master and Man” and for Chekhov’s “Gooseberries.” These lists are meant to highlight differences in the skeletons of these stories.

In the case of “Master and Man,” the events that Saunders lists demonstrate the tightness and intentionality of the plot. They show the degree to which “Master and Man” is, like “The Darling,” a pattern story: The characters repeatedly “set out from somewhere and get lost” (262). As Saunders notes, this pattern is also thematic: The main characters Nikita and Vasili have hopes that continually get thwarted. At the story’s end, each character’s spiritual and practical dilemma is solved in a different way: “Vasili ‘comes home’ to moral completion and, we assume, heaven [...] the story ends with a double coming-home for Nikita: home to his village, then home to God” (262).

In the case of “The Singers,” however, the list that Saunders provides of the events in the story shows the apparent digressiveness and randomness of the plot. Saunders argues that the story is successful in spite of its random-seeming plot, and that there is a larger deliberateness at work. The story’s is “front-loaded with static, descriptive passages” (115) that seem awkward to a contemporary reader: “We expect description to be somewhat minimal and serve a thematic purpose, whereas Turgenev seems to be describing things just because they’re there” (115). Yet Saunders points out that the plot is less random than it seems if one looks closely, and that many of the elements in the story thematically echo one another. The boy calling his brother home at the end of the story, for example, can be seen as a ghostly echo of the singing contest: “two males ‘singing’ back and forth. One ‘sings’ first, and the other responds” (123).

The short story is a form that demands a combination of control and looseness. As Saunders notes frequently in this book, a story must “always be escalating” (187), with each line in it building from the previous line and keeping the reader engaged. At the same time, a story should not appear too controlled and efficient, lest it resemble a grid more than a story: “Every part of the story should be able to withstand [...] scrutiny, a scrutiny that, we should note, is to be administered generously, lest our story become too neat and mathematical” (112). Each writer has a different way of engaging the reader; within a story’s strictures, Saunders suggests, there is much room for personality and improvisation. To allow his readers to practice this combination of control and looseness, Saunders includes three timed writing exercises at the end of the book, all of which have strict rules and limitations. In one writing exercise, a writer can only use a certain number of words; in another, a writer must cut a story in half. With these exercises, Saunders means to show how constriction can be freeing for a writer, forcing them to think in new ways and to find radical solutions.