The Loudest Voice by Grace Paley is part of the Collected Stories that have been shortlisted for The Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1995 https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-category/219 10 out of 10

 The Loudest Voice by Grace Paley is part of the Collected Stories that have been shortlisted for The Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1995  https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-category/219

10 out of 10

 

 

The Loudest Voice

 

‘My voice is the loudest’ so says Shirley Abramowitz, a Jewish girl that is invited to take part in a play, mainly on account of her ‘stamina’ and the aforementioned loud voice, but that will upset her mother, Clara Abramowitz, who feels that the participation in the ceremony of the Goyim is wrong, though her husband disagrees…

 

Misha Abramowitz, her father, says you are in America, in Palestine, the Arabs would be eating you alive, in Europe, you had pogroms, and Argentina is full of Indians...here you got Christmas, some joke ha, but he has some sort of point…

America used to be the greatest democracy in the world, but once they have elected Trump in 2016, that status has been clearly lost, and besides, they still have close to one hundred million (if we count other members of families, teenagers that could not vote last year, but may do so alas in 2024) that believe, OMG, that the elections have been stolen, in Qanon, lizard leaders, deny Climate Change and well…

 

Worst of all, in the Orange Very stable Genius

 

The Contest

 

‘My last girl was Jewish, which is a warm kind of girl, concerned about food intake and employability…They don't like you to work too hard, until you're hooked and then, you bastard, sweat’

 

On a personal note, I regret that I had no chance to attach to my own Jewish girl, except for one chance – since I have been working in the hospitality business with many groups from Israel; it looks like such a lost opportunity

Dorothy Wasserman is aggravated by Freddy and the fact that ‘you don't take yourself seriously, you are barbaric’ and she feels he does not do what is required of a real man and we could agree that he is rather indolent

 

At one time, she comes with luggage intent on spending the night, but when she sees that he does not take a job, she is again upset, returns his copy of Nineteen Eighty Four http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/nineteen-eighty-four-by-george-orwell.html and she ends the relationship

Only to return later, brought in by an opportunity to make a lot of money, due to The Contest, a competition organized by a Jewish publication, entitled Jews in the News and which Dot aka Dorothy thinks they can win.

 

That means that on quite a few levels, she has a very good opinion of Freddy – indeed, this is surely the very proof that she is sure he has tremendous potential, talent, intelligence and culture, only he does not have the drive, the gumption to use all this treasure and just wastes himself by not making the effort…

The Contest proposes each day a photograph of a Jewish personality, together with two pieces about him and the competitors have to submit one more fact, before midnight and the winner will get five thousand dollars

 

On top of that prize, there will be a trip to Israel and Freddie works hard to get there, proving the trust placed in him was justified, even when most people would not know the names of those who are Jews in The News

They eventually (spoiler alert) win the top prize, but Dorothy Wasserman does not travel with Freddy to Israel, which seems so wrong and immoral, albeit if we think of his later message, perhaps he had deserved it…

 

Freddy will be very sour, enraged we should say perhaps, and he writes an elaborated letter, in which he includes the message ‘you were a prostitute’, presumably at that time he was not familiar with the term sex worker

In response to this correspondence, Dorothy Wassermann sends a one hundred dollar bill, a projector and slides with images from Europe, North Africa, presumably sharing some of her experiences with her former friend…

 

The Collected Stories start with The Little Disturbances of Man, namely with Good bye and Good Luck http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/09/from-collected-stories-of-grace-paley.html and this reader intends to continue with Enormous Changes at the Last Minute


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