posted on 21 Jan 2019

In Sunlight or in Shadow : Stories inspired by the paintings of Edward Hopper edited by Lawrence Block

Intriguingly enough, right at the start of this anthology, editor Lawrence Block tells us:

“Hopper was neither an illustrator nor a narrative painter. His paintings don’t tell stories. What they do is suggest – powerfully, irresistibly – that there are stories within them, waiting to be told. He shows us a moment in time, arrayed on a canvas: there’s clearly a past and a future, but it’s our task to find it for ourselves.”

This is, I think, an important insight that not only helps to open up the world of Edward Hopper’s paintings but is a necessary key to understanding what this collection of stories is all about.

At first sight this is a pretty awe-inspiring combination – the brilliance and magnetism of Edward Hopper’s paintings acting as inspiration for a positive galaxy of short story writing talent. Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, Michael Connolly, Jeffrey Deaver, Lee Child and Block himself headline but a dozen others have also contributed to the collection.

Inevitably, not everything here is of the same quality and in the hands of some of the lesser lights you can begin to feel that you’re in the middle of a creative writing course exercise. The device of using one of Hopper’s paintings to spin off a short story is magic and powerful when it works but clumsy and a bit clunking when it doesn’t. Fortunately there’s more inspired story telling here than crude mechanics and if you’re happy skipping over the stories that don’t grab you, it’s likely you’ll find more than enough to make it a satisfying read.

There is something about Hopper that suggests a hint of the noir gangster story happening somewhere just off stage or a suggestion of slightly tawdry sensuality bubbling under the surface. The normal is always waiting to be abnormal and that’s ideal territory for the short story writer. Stephen King, of course, makes the most of this idea of the hidden ‘something’ in his tale, The Music Room inspired by Hopper’s seemingly very ordinary Room in New York 1932. Just what is it knocking on the door from inside the store cupboard? And the repressed sexual fury of Joyce Carol Oates’ The Woman in the Window turns Hopper’s ambiguous Eleven A.M. 1926 into a tale of mistresses and murder.

Lee Child’s The Truth About What Happened (based on Hotel Lobby 1943) tells the tale of a private dick, hired to establish whether a candidate for a high-level government job is involved inappropriately in a sexual triangle that might make him susceptible to blackmail. The ordinariness of the answer makes the story extraordinary.

But, in the end, if I had to select the story that has stayed with me most graphically it would be the very first one in the anthology – Girlie Show by Megan Abbott based on the 1941 painting of the same name. It’s a simmering tale of frustration – personal, sexual and professional – abuse, gender roles and unexpected pathways to liberation. I think I loved the story because it felt as if it captured something essential about Hopper but intangible in his painting – a sense of time and place, of people trapped in late 1930s American small town life but looking for so much more.

As I suggested at the beginning of this review, Lawrence Block makes a superb and sensitive editor for this collection. He understands Hopper and he also understands the appeal of Hopper’s work – not only to an audience of art-lovers but to writers, critics and a general public who frequently cite the painter as their favourite US artist of the 20th century.

Books of short stories like this are designed to be picked up and put down, to be read in bursts and not to be taken from cover to cover. That’s definitely the way to approach this one because if you try and read through it without taking breaks I suspect you’ll find yourself getting a sense of artificiality about it.

There are plenty of ways into this book - pick an intriguing story title; pick a favourite author; or, just pick a painting you love and savour the moment….

 

Terry Potter

January 2019