Oral tradition and dialogue in “Oddball” and “They Talk

Vasily Shukshin’s “Oddball” and Linor Goralik’s “They Talk” are both short stories in which events are fundamentally dependent on communication. Oral tradition in storytelling is therefore central to both stories. The miscommunication in or fragmentation of dialogue is a leading motif in both stories that obliquely builds character and genre. Reader response is necessary to complete these portraits: idiosyncrasies in speech develop characters in a way only visible to the omniscient reader, idiosyncrasies interact with structure and placement of dialogue within the text to make a critique of genre, and self-reflective endings further develop characters. In “They Talk”, speech is the only determinant in whether a character exists, gesturing to the role of oral tradition in storytelling. The voice of each anecdote is the only provided setting. The readers are responsible for creating any other context, such as links between stories, should they choose to. Nadine Forimer argues that “[in novels] contact is more like the flash of fireflies, in and out, now here, now there, in darkness. Short-story writers see by the light of their flash; theirs is the art of the only thing one can be sure of - the present moment” (264). In “They Talk”, Goralik offers no consistency to the readers. As soon as a story reaches its climax, the scene cuts to another unrelated anecdote and each begins mid-speech and focuses on a single, intense topic, delivering a series of concentrated “flashes”. While the narrator provides a series of Gordimer’s “flashes”, the onus to make sense of the work as a whole is on the reader. However, the stories are explicitly disconnected, making interpretation difficult. There is no identifiable recipient of the dialogue, and the speaker is only identifiable through the fact that they are speaking and their pattern of speech. For instance, the second passage’s speaker uses “like” several times: “like, for example” and “with this, like, mink boa” (21). Then, the third passage begins with “still, like, shaking all over” prior to evolving into an aggressive voice “she fucking throws these kinds of tantrums” and “she’s fucking nuts” (21, 22). There is a fleeting illusion of connection through the “like” of the second passage which dissolves once it becomes clear that it is two different speakers. The limits of interpretation therefore leave the reader with speech patterns that act as new settings following each shift. Thus, the act of storytelling governs the shape, context, and characters of “They Talk”. In “Oddball”, Oddball’s inner monologue is consistent with his speech, but other characters perceive his speech as disconnected and random because they do not have access to his inner world. The reader is omniscient and sees the process of dialogue, thus making empathy necessary on the part of the reader to develop a full picture of Oddball. For instance, on the plane, Oddball thinks “Why aren’t I amazed? After all, there’s almost five kilometers below me”, and continues his train of thought out loud “That’s man for you! The things he thinks up” (275). The other man is hostile towards this random outburst and ignores him (275). However, readers are more understanding because they see his thought process. This call for empathy applies to the scene with Oddball’s joke about the rouble bill (82). In this case, the narrator makes Oddball’s good-hearted intentions clear, “even trembling with joy, his eyes lit up. Quickly, so nobody could forestall him, he tried to come up with the most amusing and witty way to tell the folks in line about the bill” (82), but his joke proceeds to make those around him uncomfortable “at that, everybody got a little nervous” (82). In this case, he puts human connection before material goods, seeing that

he could have pocketed the bill (and, ironically, it is his right to do so). Geoffrey Hosking’s model for Shukshin’s characters in which they yearn for volya, but find the reality of rural life restrictive (565) applies to the oddball. Oddball’s choice to venture (“The Urals! The Urals! Need a change of scenery” (81)) exemplifies his feeling of restriction, and his delight in trying to connect with people through jokes represents the harmonious oral tradition that is idealized in rural narratives. His character represents this paradox as he desires communication but dialogue alienates the character within the story while developing the character in the eyes of the reader. The juxtaposition of the urgent and the mundane in “They Talk” reveals the importance of storytelling as the mundane can appear just as noteworthy as the urgent. A sense of urgency is apparent in many passages such as “... still, like, shaking all over” (22), “to talk with some, I’m human, after all, I can’t go on like this!” (23), and so forth. As intrigue and emotion run high, Gordimer’s “flash” is evident. These are then juxtaposed with the mundane: “...haven’t been to the supermarket in a long time. Would really like to go there sometime” (31) or “...So I bought season tickets to the opera. I’m going to start building the normal life of a single person” (31). While there is no language of emotion or urgency, these are still stories in motion in that they begin mid-speech just like the others. Although the intensity of the content palls next to stories of domestic abuse and insanity, readers are left to ask why the speaker hasn’t been to the supermarket, or how buying opera tickets is a habit of single people. More importantly, the juxtaposition forces the reader to accept that these mundane stories belong side by side with more vivid tales because they have been curated by Goralik in this way. Thus, the act of storytelling trumps the stories themselves. In the final passage of “Oddball”, the narrator provides a summary of Oddball that interacts with genre and reader response in order to build character. Kathleen Parthé intentionally excludes Shukshin from Village Prose because of the ironic undertones in his portrayal of the village and its inhabitants (xi). Moreover, in her model of Village Prose, she presents the “goal-directed plot” as alien and favors “cyclical life, small contained ‘episodes’” (18). Trains and planes are a central motif in “Oddball”, thus depicting a character in motion. However, Oddball’s aforementioned inner volya touches on a leisurely ideal of the harmonious Village Prose. His drawing on the carriage further illustrates rural idealism (88). He is not necessarily goal-oriented, but he is in motion. He is the vessel for a chronotype that travels and interacts on a hero quest with the outside world. The final passage, “He worked as a movie projectionist in the village. He adored detectives and dogs. When he was little, he’d dreamed of being a spy” commemorates a way of life that, based on other characters’ hostility, is not bound to survive. When Oddball returns, he “took off his shoes, and set off running along the warm, damp earth” (89), representing a connection to the land. Despite excluding Oddball from her model, this ironically aligns with Parthé’s narrative patterns of return and deracination in Village Prose: “but the acute sense of the end of a way of life, the deracination not just of the hero, but of the Russian people as a whole” (19). The narrator speaks with the reader outside of Oddball’s quest and makes a metaliterary critique on the poetics of the village, gesturing to the narrator’s role as a storyteller and the importance of this storytelling for the sake of remembering ways of life. The final entry in “They Talk” combines the mundane and the urgent in conversation to prove that stories must be told. The speaker states that they are writing a “script” (32). As scripts are structured entirely by means of dialogue, this statement calls attention to the act of writing a story with this type of structure. Critiquing the script as a “cheap melodrama” because “this doesn’t happen in real life- I mean such sheer intensity of tragedy” is

ironic as the stories that preceded did indeed carry a sheer intensity of tragedy (32). The speaker concludes that art is the “ability to discern big issues in small things. The drama, that is, in the simple things of life”, seeming to address how the mundane can be elevated to the height of art through melodrama. However, he receives three dramatic messages, “I’m in a psych ward, held here forcibly for now; Anya died yesterday. Not flying in; Dad keeps crying asking I bring him home.” These text messages can be matched to the twentieth (29), the second (2), sixth (23) anecdotes, respectively because of the theme of insanity and the mention of “Dad” and “Anya”. Despite the three text messages linking their respective stories within this setting, the preceding anecdotes that make up the entire work still remain independent. Only linked in retrospect because this “obviously” confirms the reader’s hypothesis of attributing the three texts to the corresponding anecdotes, this still does not solve, or even make an attempt to solve, the story. All of the other anecdotes remain unmentioned. The imagery of many unlinked stories is reflected in the absurdity in the final line: “I’ve been staring at my phone for fifteen minutes already, walking in circles around the station pillar”. The speaker, like the reader, is left confused. This interaction with reader response develops the story further, but does not allow for reader interpretation. What remains is the act of storytelling and the absurdity felt by the readers and final speaker, emphasizing the power in telling stories. The act of telling stories is a force in “They Talk” and “Oddball” that can either connect stories or alienate characters from one another. In either case, oral tradition pieces together a story. The reader is a necessary component to both stories because they can observe the cases of fragmentation and harmony. While the idiosyncrasies these stories’ characters present prevent a consistent harmony in the story, the motif of dialogue creates a consistent lens through which readers can configure a story. In both stories, human fault and customs in communication are central to the theme of oral tradition.