Polite Conversation by Jean Stafford 10 out of 10
Polite Conversation by Jean Stafford
10 out of 10
Notes and thoughts on other books are available at:
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEVa4_CsRStSBBDo4uJWT8BSWtTTn0N1E and http://realini.blogspot.ro/
Polite Conversation is the third narrative in the series The Bostonians and Other Manifestations of the American Scene.
These are part of:
- The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford
The previous, first short story in the Bostonians is reviewed here: http://realini.blogspot.ro/2017/08/the-hope-chest-by-jean-stafford-9-out.html
Polite Conversation is a very funny study on opposing points of view, people with different levels of education and their opinions.
It also touches on religion and how it could be used to escape an engagement, the limits of politeness.
It could also be seen as a meditation on truthfulness and the restrictions imposed on it by the rigors of society.
On one side we have a woman who is the mother of Eleven (11!!) children and on the other a childless neighbor.
I would be speculating and suggesting that the mother of so many kids would be a Republican and her guest a Democrat.
After all, Mrs. Wainright-Lowe and her eleven children praise education to the point of always participating in courses, even when pregnant.
Mrs. Heath and her husband avoid as much as they can to attend to the afternoon tea or other events organized by their neighbors.
The Heath couple appears as introverted and all the children and their mother seem to be extroverts to an extreme point.
One of the children stayed and waited in the bushes one day until he heard the noise of the typewriter:
- I know you’re at home, I heard the noise…
The right to privacy may be more important than the need to socialize, even if the latter is vital for happiness.
In fact, Positive Psychology research proves that isolation is twice as dangerous as smoking and twice as deadly…
“Day after day and night after night, the buildings bulged and burst with nonalcoholic jollifications, with laughing, singing…shooting of bottles…”
On the other hand, The Heaths were writers and “did not look on summertime as all beer and skittles”.
“They accepted all the invitations but did not appear” which is neither polite, nor fair or civilized, but given that they probably had to cope with a lot of noise and various interferences from their neighbors and their numerous guests, I vote for the Heaths.
And it was not just the Wainright-Lowe family, but “the gentry did not know whether they (the Heaths) were abnormal or stuck-up”.
Through this Polite Conversation, one could change sides…I was thinking that another way to look at this exchange is by appreciating the friendliness, hospitality, openness, social skills-well, up to the point where they are exaggerated and overbearing-of the numerous and boisterous family and be unimpressed by the reclusion, perhaps selfishness of the two writers that, instead of getting inspiration from people, they stay clear of them.
Sister Evelyn joins the tea party and this is an occasion for some amusing pronouncements on religion and various churches.
Mrs. Wainright-Lowe talks about the new activity that they will start and with which the Heaths have to help.
Margaret Heath sees a way out of getting trapped in that task and asks if these activities “are under the auspices of the church…”
And since they are, well…they can’t do it because the priest that they have asked about it replied that:
- “We could not possibly have anything to do with a movement outside our church…
- We are all Catholics, whether we are Romans or Anglicans…”
And we can see this splendid, hilarious answer from the host as indication of her ignorance, the wondrous humor of the story, just a wonderful ecumenical view of the differences or all these combined…
You can read the tale here:
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