P: "Self-criticism..shouldn't work.. but it can"--and be as strange as Love,mebbe

[Mark Kohut]

We know and most do not believe in P's own harsh judgment of The Crying of
Lot 49.

But, rereading Under the Rose and his words about it, leads to other
questions about
his harsh self-judgment.

He sez, in minimizing Under the Rose that readers have become accustomed to
Le Carre
who 'has upped the ante" for the whole genre. Quote from TRP in 1984:
"Today we expect a complexity of plot and depth of character missing from
my effort here".  Well,...

Does that strike any others of you as ...weird? Le Carre writes novels ( i
know of no stories
and if there are, they are seldom read or considered, right?) which give
room for complexity
of plot and depth of character.

All short story writers, all critics of the form that I know, believe
'complexity of plot" ruins stories. All the unspooling and therefore
contrived respooling, so to speak. And, if character is mostly revealed
in fiction by responses within actions and scenes, then of course real
depth of character
is unattainable. To reveal depth like a perfect snapshot is what many of
the best stories
do. As I think someone said (setting up story vs novel as snapshot--unity
of effect--vs a
novel, a movie)

Then he says this story is, "happily, mostly chase scenes" "for which I
remain a dedicated
sucker"....invoking the eternal Road Runner plot.

Really, TRP? Did we reread the same story? Perhaps you are conflating it
with V, which
this plot line of, with Stencil and all, can feel more like a long chase
scene. But here, I remember
most that window spying scene, the conversations and interactions of the
characters, Bongo-Shaftsbury saying: "You screamed at the Chief".."You said
'Go away and die'"
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