• Southern Spaces
• Jane Rosenberg LaForge (bio)

The grotesque in American literature is a literary act of sublimation; it stands in for the things we can't talk about it, whether that thing is race, religion, or the delusions of a defeated population. Edgar Allan Poe, who popularized the grotesque in his fiction, gives us his paranoiacs, his deformed, disabled, and incestuous characters to comment on racial purity, alcoholism, and other defects in a supposedly great new nation. William Faulkner's taboo subject is the past—the true past, without the illusions that accompany the grand Lost Cause. Flannery O'Connor's is religion, or secularism, depending on your point of view. Whether it's a self-punishing preacher or a hog farmer's wife, her characters suffer from the same estrangement from the one, true faith, for which there is no substitute. The southern gothic, then, is a way of explaining what otherwise cannot, or will not be, explained. The truth is unbelievable; indeed, outlandish in a nation conceived in the philosophy of the Enlightenment. And yet these tales of murder and lust, of obsession and denial, are as persistent as the humidity that is an exhausting feature of a southern summer. They endure because they speak to the paradox inherent in the American project and the contradictions in human nature. Two new novels try to situate themselves into this tradition, though each has its own motivation for referring back to it, for effects both serious and humorous.

In M. David Hornbuckle's The Fireball Brothers, the grotesque appears in every form possible, from human to extraterrestrial, in a comic romp across Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. Charles Dodd White's In the House of Wilderness has his characters trek throughout Appalachia, and he is far more circumspect in what he targets as bizarre and monstrous. But both books can't look at the strange and surrealistic without taking up the subjects of space and time, again in all their permutations. The distances of the American south seem to have their own effect upon time, and time is both an enemy and equalizer in a world crisscrossed by highways but still improbably lonely. These authors are after more than the shock of poverty and its privations: something deeper than language, how and why people communicate their dreams and fears to one another. In both books, circumstances ultimately preclude the most meaningful communication, though characters try, through music, photography, and the simple kindnesses they offer.

Hornbuckle's investigation into the grotesque begins in a rural Alabama lake in summer 1959. It's the year the small world Robert and Wally Mackintosh have always known seems to be coming apart. A meteor hits their swimming hole and the two teenagers are suddenly fused together in a freakish posture: Wally is slung over Robert's back, with his hands fastened atop Robert's heart. Nothing can detach them, though it's possible an unscrupulous and unlicensed doctor can do what the US government and accredited hospitals and physicians cannot. Robert, Wally, and their father take to the road as a musical act to raise money for the operation while their hometown becomes mired in conspiracy theories and recriminations, both global and domestic.

Robert is the ostensible narrator of Hornbuckle's yarn; he begins and ends this story of aliens, a pilfered inheritance, a religious cult, drinking, adultery, carnival barkers, and snake oil salesmen. But the story is told through several viewpoints, and Wally's is never one of them. And yet it is Wally who is most changed by this odyssey. A budding musician who's barely able to contain himself, he is almost prophetic about his plight, if the clues he provides are taken seriously. During their travels, Wally "naturally assumed the authoritative role of bandleader, but it surprised Robert to hear him speak with such confidence."

Wally's relative silence—perhaps ironic, since Wally is the voice of the...

• 南方空间
• 简·罗森伯格·拉福格（生物）

美国文学中的怪诞是一种文学升华。它代表着我们无法谈论的事情，无论是种族，宗教信仰还是被打败的人群的妄想。埃德加·爱伦·坡（Edgar Allan Poe）在他的小说中大张旗鼓地宣传了他的偏执狂，畸形，残疾和乱伦的性格，以评论一个原本伟大的新民族的种族纯洁，酗酒和其他缺陷。威廉·福克纳（William Faulkner）的忌讳话题是过去-真实的过去，没有幻灭伴随着伟大的失落事业。弗兰纳里·奥康纳（Flannery O'Connor）是宗教或世俗主义，这取决于您的观点。无论是自我惩罚的传教士，还是养猪场的妻子，她的角色都遭受着与真实信仰相同的疏远，这是无可替代的。那么，南部的哥特式 是解释无法或将无法解释的内容的一种方式。真相令人难以置信。的确，在一个由启蒙哲学构想的国家中，这很古怪。然而，这些关于谋杀和性欲，痴迷和否认的故事与潮湿一样持久，而潮湿是南方夏天令人疲惫的特征。他们之所以忍受，是因为他们谈到了美国项目固有的悖论和人性上的矛盾。两种新小说都试图将自己置于这种传统中，尽管每种小说都有自己的动机去提及它，以达到严肃而幽默的效果。和潮湿一样持久，而潮湿是南方夏天的疲惫特征。他们之所以忍受，是因为他们谈到了美国项目固有的悖论以及人性上的矛盾。两种新小说都试图将自己置于这种传统中，尽管每种小说都有自己的动机去提及它，以达到严肃而幽默的效果。和潮湿一样持久，而潮湿是南方夏天的疲惫特征。他们之所以忍受，是因为他们谈到了美国项目固有的悖论以及人性上的矛盾。两种新小说都试图将自己置于这种传统中，尽管每种小说都有自己的动机去提及它，以达到严肃而幽默的效果。

在大卫·霍恩巴克勒（M. David Hornbuckle）的《火球兄弟》（The Fireball Brothers）中，怪诞现象以各种可能的形式出现，从人类到外星人，遍布阿拉巴马州，肯塔基州，路易斯安那州，密西西比州和田纳西州的漫画横行。查尔斯·多德·怀特（Charles Dodd White）的《荒野之屋》整个阿巴拉契亚地区都有他的角色跋涉，他的目标是怪异而可怕，因此他要谨慎得多。但是这两本书都不能不考虑空间和时间的主题，而又要考虑所有的排列方式，就无法看待陌生和超现实的事物。美国南部的距离似乎对时间有影响，在一个纵横交错的高速公路上，但仍然是不可能的孤独，时间既是敌人又是均衡器。这些作者所追求的不仅仅是贫困及其匮乏的震惊：比语言更深刻的东西，还有人们如何以及为什么彼此交流梦想和恐惧。在这两本书中，环境最终都排除了最有意义的交流，尽管角色通过音乐，摄影和他们所提供的简单友善来尝试。

Hornbuckle于1959年夏天在阿拉巴马州的一个乡村湖泊中开始对怪诞的事物进行调查。这一年，Robert和Wally Mackintosh一直都知道小世界似乎正在​​瓦解。一颗流星撞到他们的游泳洞，两个少年突然以一种怪异的姿势融合在一起：沃利被甩在罗伯特的背上，双手紧紧抓住罗伯特的心脏。没有任何东西可以使他们脱颖而出，尽管有可能是一个无良和无执照的医生可以做美国政府以及经认可的医院和医生做不到的事情。罗伯特（Robert），沃利（Wally）和他们的父亲以音乐表演的形式走上街头，为该手术筹集资金，而他们的家乡则陷入了全球和国内的阴谋理论和谴责中。

罗伯特（Robert）是霍恩巴克（Hornbuckle）纱线的表面叙述者。他开始并结束了有关外星人，偷窃的遗产，宗教崇拜，饮酒，通奸，狂欢节剥皮者和蛇油推销员的故事。但是这个故事是通过几种观点讲述的，而沃利的观点从来都不是其中之一。然而，这次冒险之旅最大的改变却是沃利。他是位刚起步的音乐家，几乎无法控制自己，如果认真对待他提供的线索，他几乎会预言自己的困境。沃利在旅行中“自然地担当了乐队领袖的权威角色，但让罗伯特听到他如此自信地讲话感到惊讶。”

沃利的相对沉默-也许具有讽刺意味，因为沃利是...的声音