After three series focusing on a central author, Short Stop is taking a bit of a turn for the next run. Sometime last year, I found a copy of “The Vintage Book of Amnesia” that was compiled and edited by Jonathan Lethem. The theme is simple. He looks at authors throughout time and explores how they approach the subject of memory. Whereas previous series focused on exploring a writer finding their voice, I thought that it would be interesting to try and find something more thematic across the centuries. It’s a lengthy ordeal and one that will probably have more highs and lows than ever before. The hope though is finding a few diamonds in the rough that are worth committing to memory.
The start of this anthology was rough. Most of the stories fell back on narrative tropes that may have worked but were so cheap that I don’t think they said anything provocative about their subjects. It got me thinking that maybe Lethem’s eye for short stories wasn’t as sharp as I wanted. Then, with the past few, it has felt like things have shifted and become more intriguing. While Robert Sheckley’s “Warm” may not be on the level of the massive literal head trip of Lawrence Shainberg’s “Memories of Amnesia,” it’s reflective of the direction I hope the remaining stories go in. Even if “Warm” is among the most stationary tales I’ve read so far, it captures a fascinating relationship between man and his body. I’m left with a greater sense of how the brain works and, more importantly, shows that there’s more than one way to notice slight shifts in environment.
On the surface, this should be one of the least appetizing stories that Lethem could’ve chosen. Anders is a man getting dressed up for a date. While he sits on his bed, he is confronted by a voice in his brain trying to understand the significance of the upcoming events. It’s a familiar story centered around anxiety and fears of social interactions. Even if Sheckley descends the story into abstraction, he has a gift for making Anders recognizable. He’s easy to root for even as it feels like his brain seeks to self-sabotage the mundanity of the event. It shouldn’t be that big of a deal but, because of how his brain works, the reader gets the sense that things aren’t going to end well.
In theory, nothing substantial happens over the course of 10 pages. Anders ends the story exactly where he started. Stasis is his biggest enemy. However, what is Sheckley really saying about memory by having this story be essentially a fight between the mind and body? There must be something more than simple fears.
A detail that amuses me is how Sheckley opens the story. Before having any idea of what Anders is about to encounter, the reader is presented with his state of dress. Well, not exactly. He’s “fully dressed,” but there’s more interest in him not wearing shoes and a black bow tie. Somehow that detail manages to convey more than simply saying he was wearing a suit. By emphasizing what was missing, Sheckley gives a literal understanding of how Anders sees himself. Nothing may be wrong, but he’s still obsessed with what is missing. Without shoes, he can’t fathom getting out of his bedroom door. Without the tie, he may appear tacky and vulnerable. Something feels naked without a bowtie, though Sheckley isn’t interested in saying what.
The answer to why he is dressing up happens almost immediately. He is about to propose to Judy. There would be kisses and a “stamp of approval” across his forehead. The latter detail is a comical image that also works to try and soften the difficulty of the situation. Humor is often used to evade pain, and it will become clear by the next paragraph that this is something likely to debilitate him. After all, proposal means that you want to spend the rest of your life with someone. It’s a stressful thought even in the best of situations. Anders isn’t alone in this struggle, and it makes what follows easier to grasp. Had this been something more trivial, it’s likely that the reader couldn’t invest in him overreacting.
Still, everything seems fine until The Voice appears to talk to him. This is figurative, as Anders is quick to point out that The Voice isn’t anywhere in a physical form. The choice to point this out allows for the reader to understand that he knows that The Voice, symbolic of self-doubt, is not real and cannot hurt him. And yet, as anyone who has dealt with negative self-talk will attest, it’s the most unstoppable force on the planet. There’s something about The Voice that is persuasive. It's what gets us up in the morning and tells us to leave the house. It’s the first thing we seek validation from because, more than any physical being, we can’t seem to escape The Voice.
I think another interesting detail that Sheckley inserts is how Anders treats The Voice as a nuisance. It is not part of him, but some magical force wandering around, a layaway that has taken root in his head. The Voice isn’t one with Anders, and yet they become Siamese Twins by the end. One cannot go anywhere without the other. Even if nobody else could see The Voice, its strange force works to ruin Anders’ life. At one point, Anders comments on how The Voice could be seen as a bad therapist wishing to bring up some unresolved trauma. This detail unto itself suggests some unexplored history of Anders that solidifies the sense of insecurity that he must’ve experienced every day of his life.
The story works as a dark comedy using the odd couple formula to explore something more psychological. It’s a story drenched in pain, and yet the decision to pit Anders and The Voice against each other trivializes any mental illness into a more palatable deconstruction. Anders is not his negative self-talk. He’s defined not by what he thinks, but the actions he performs. The Voice doesn’t care because it has no use for a body. At the end of the day, Anders will come home and escape the world, but he cannot escape The Voice. Maybe this will be the night that The Voice won’t allow him to sleep. It’s painful, but it’s also the absurdity of life that can be seen as comic. To Sheckley’s credit, he manages to make this exploration of mental illness humorous – or at least more than the other stories so far.
The title “Warm” is a reference to this confusing relationship. Because The Voice transcends the mortal plane, Anders’ quest to find The Voice will be a more confusing game of Marco Polo. As Anders rattles off facts, The Voice will say things like “You’re warmer” to signify that Anders is getting closer to the truth. As Anders unravels thoughts and begins to have some drinks, there is a sense that he’s getting closer to the truth. His loosening up is allowing him to access thoughts that would be closed off by a less inebriated mind. The punchline of the piece is that right when Anders has “hot,” The Voice waits until he trails off to another thought before suggesting a greater intention. It’s also the most realistic area of the text, if just because everyday epiphanies exist before everyone but aren’t recognized because of how poorly they were processed. They don’t have time to be concrete memories because we’ve moved onto something else.
There is a certain part of the text that I found particularly endearing. As The Voice decides to discuss the value of Judy, it can’t help but detail her not as a person. It would be farcical to suggest that The Voice even sees her as an object. This isn’t some piece of misogyny along the lines of “Take my wife, please.” In the world that The Voice paints, Judy isn’t more than colors on a canvas. The closer that Anders will look, the more that he’ll see Judy not for the physiological traits that would make someone attractive, but as one of billions of forces on Earth that are mere shapes and colors designed to wander aimlessly. The question becomes why Anders is even pursuing Judy because from this microscopic examination, she is nothing meaningful at all.
I think it embodies the struggles of anxiety very well. Anyone who has found themselves in a spiral of doubt will recognize the rise of excuses to not pursuing things that would logically make us happy. Also, it’s a perfect fit for the text as Anders is trying to understand the purpose of even having a body. It’s actively rejecting him from this proposal. What could Judy’s be doing at this moment? There’s traces of imposter syndrome scattered throughout and soon the only way to seem greater is to reject. Judy can’t be worth it because she’s nothing more than shapes and colors. Forget any sense of touch or emotion. Logically, she is meaningless.
What makes this story brilliant is that this is all happening from a bed. Anders hasn’t gotten up and it’s not entirely clear what would motivate him to. He’ll take a drink if necessary, but otherwise he’s stuck in a state of excuses. Nothing matters. In fact, he becomes so consumed by a nihilistic worldview that the world around him disappears. Suddenly everything around him is shapes and colors. He’s suddenly nowhere. The Voice is winning. The negative self-talk is winning. His body is joining The Voice’s side and paralyzing him to a life of misery. There is no sense of self because Anders has been consumed whole.
With all of this said, the story ends not in tragedy but hope. The final page finds him at his most helpless. He has no idea where he is. And yet, The Voice suddenly calls out “save me.” It’s a small moment of respite that reflects the greater intention of what Sheckley has just written. The Voice wasn’t self-talk alone. Either that, or possibly there’s multiple ones fighting for his attention. This one shows that Anders is capable of overcoming negative self-talk. He can propose to Judy and experience happiness. All in all, the final message is tear-jerking and beautiful.
Without ever meeting Judy there is a strong sense of her appeal in Anders’ life. There is hope and maybe he’ll leave the house and discover what happiness means. Sheckley has done this so swiftly that despite never getting a strong sense of Anders’ world, the reader can assume a lot about the framework. His anxiety is real and defines him again only as a thought and not actual achievements. The story about overcoming the self is powerful and I think speaks to another way that memory can be either our best friend or our worst enemy. When The Voice chimes up, there’s a good chance that we’ll remember things poorly.
Not everything regarding memory is amnesia related. In fact, I’m intrigued by what Lethem could explore once he moves away from more sensationalist memory loss stories. Here, he’s managed to convey complicated emotions so perfectly that it becomes more profound the longer that one sits with it. Rarely has a story so perfectly captured the feeling of going through anxiety and negative self-talk. It’s not always convenient or will drop us into depression. Sometimes it’ll be a minor inconvenience and give us the odd couple that we can’t help but want to murder. The trick is figuring out how to become “Warm” enough to move on. If we can do that, then maybe we can be considered worthy of validation stamped across our foreheads.
Coming Up Next: Brian Fawcett’s “Soul Walker”
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