The Stupefaction
Subtitle: Stories and a Novella
By: Diane Williams.
Publisher: Knopf
Published: May 21, 1996
Place of publication: New York, USA
Language: eng
Number of pages: 176
ISBN-13: 9780679441861
Other titles: Stories and a novella
Description: In the title novella, Williams offers her version of paradise: A woman runs off with a man on an enchanted journey across an enchanted landscape to an enchanted house, where their time is spent proving all the pleasures - eating, drinking, bathing, slumbering, and coupling - and where fantastic creatures, ravishing objects, and enthralling notions present themselves.

But this sensual, blissful tale also becomes, in the female narrator's artful telling, a vehicle of discovery as she passes from state to state eluding our expectations of her. The novella, Williams's first longer work, is accompanied by forty-nine short pieces, all of them superbly wry and knowing instances of the "sudden fiction" for which she is renowned.
Table of contents: title: An opening chat; title: The key to happiness; title: A shrewd and cunning authority; title: The everlasting sippers; title: The power of performance; title: The blessing; title: Eero; title: The idealist; title: A moment of panic; title: The revenge; title: The capture; title: O rock!; title: The lost sex; title: Monsters; title: Luxuries; title: The guider of the prick; title: Excitability; title: Speech; title: For Diane; title: Plural; title: The transformation; title: Gods of the earth at home; title: Desperately trying to lie down; title: I am a learned person; title: Careful; title: What knowledge is most worth having?; title: Diagnosis; title: A more detailed account of this is out of the question; title: The fuck; title: The grand occasion; title: The goal; title: My reaction to life; title: The dirty necklace; title: The helpmeet; title: The masturbator; title: Boiled and starched; title: Okeydoke; title: The fuss; title: Thank you; title: The purpose; title: The primary intuition; title: Rain; title: The festival; title: The builder; title: The answer to the question; title: Their privileges; title: Escapade; title: The suitor; title: The strong petals of quiet; title: The stupefaction.