← Selected Shorts
Selected Shorts
Perfectly Unmatched
00:58:06
Host Meg Wolitzer presents perfect mismatches. In “The Man and the Moose” by Ben Loory, performed by Michael Cerveris, a man’s best bud has antlers. In “Red Dirt Don't Wash” by Roger Mais, performed by Brandon J. Dirden, a young man’s courtship is at risk—she doesn’t like his shoes. And a piano lesson is out of tune in “The Piano Teacher’s Pupil” by William Trevor, performed by Kathryn Erbe.
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- [00:01]
Meg Wolitzer
If you could hear love, what would it sound like?
- [00:11]
Marlon James
Son, can we talk about your drinking? Yeah, Dad, I think we should.
- [00:19]
Meg Wolitzer
Helping those closest to you think about their excessive drinking. Maybe that's what love sounds like. More@rethinkthedrink.com An OHA initiative.
- [00:31]
Marlon James
For years everyone thought Verizon had the best network because they did. But now the best mobile network in the US is T Mobile. T Mobile's network has the most advanced 5G with more towers and their signal reaches further than ever. So you can text an insta talk and say, you won't believe where I am. T Mobile has the best mobile network in the US based on analysis by Ookla of speed test intelligence data 1H2025CT.
- [00:58]
Meg Wolitzer
Mobile.Com network.
- [01:08]
Michael Cerverus
On this week's show, Perfect Mismatches, we'll find out what happens if your best bud has antlers, the love of your life doesn't like your shoes, and a piano lesson is out of tune. Join me, Meg Wolitzer for stories where two halves don't make a whole. You're listening to selected shorts where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction one short story at a time. We revel in stories about perfect matches, Romeo and Juliet, Harry and Meghan, Beavis and Butthead. But tales about the wonderfully mismatched can also be gold. The Odd Couple or Turner and Hooch. Say, perfect mismatches work so well in stories, by which I mean they are fascinating to witness. You never exactly know why two people are together as a couple or as friends, or as whatever they are to each other. Nor do you know what they talk about when no one else is around. It's the mystery of attraction and its exact opposite that powers these fascinating duos. And on this show we we have three very different examples of that attraction. In one story, a man takes an unusual surprise guest to a stag party. You're going to remember this. In the second, a prolonged flirtation leads to a moment of truth and Elizabeth Strout tells us about a favorite William Trevor story. Our first story is by Ben Laurie, a favorite of ours, who writes playful fantasies in such works as Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day. You might have heard his story, the book on a recent show. This time we're happy to share an unlikely friendship. In the man and the Moose. Our reader is a Selected Shorts regular, Michael Cerverus, a two time Tony Award winner whose other recent work includes the Gilded Age and Billions. Here he is as both man and moose.
- [03:27]
Meg Wolitzer
The man and the Moose A moose is standing in the forest when he suddenly hears a noise. He looks up and sees a plane flying overhead. As he watches, a man jumps out. A parachute bursts open, and the man floats safely down. The moose goes over and looks at him. Hello, says the man, gathering in his parachute. Hello? Says the Moose. What are you doing? Oh, nothing, says the man. Nothing much. I just jump out of planes every now and then. The moose looks up at the sky. Is it fun? He asks. Oh, yes, says the man. Have you never done it?
- [04:17]
Marlon James
Me?
- [04:19]
Meg Wolitzer
Says the Moose. Whoa.
- [04:21]
Marlon James
No.
- [04:23]
Meg Wolitzer
Well, come along with me, says the man. We'll go back to the town and get you all suited up, and then off we'll go. What do you say? I don't know, says the moose. Isn't it dangerous? Dangerous? Says the man. No, not at all. Well, a little. But hey, isn't everything, I guess, says the moose, when you put it that way. And after a while he starts to nod. All right, he says. Okay, great, says the man. You're gonna love it. And he claps the moose on the back and the two of them start off. When they get to the edge of the city, the moose suddenly stops. What about the people? He says. What about them? Says the man. Well, says the moose, I'm not saying that I'm afraid of them, understand? But they're always out in the woods looking at me. It makes me nervous. I. I don't know what they want. Hmm, says the man. I doubt they want anything. But okay, here's what we'll do. He takes an extra T shirt and a hat out of his bag. Put these on. Nobody will recognize you, he says. The moose looks at the offered disguise for a moment. All right, he says, and puts it on. The man and the moose wander into town. The moose is very, very nervous. Hey, Tom, someone says, and a group of people come over. How'd your jump go today? And who's that? The man turns and looks at the moose. This is my friend Lawrence, he says. He just came in from the coast. The moose shakes hands all around. Quite a grip you got there, Lawrence, says one of the men. Are you bringing Lawrence to the party? Says another. Oh, shoot, says the man, looking at the moose. I completely forgot about that. You mind coming along to this thing tonight? It's sort of a shindig from my most recent jump. Sure, says the Moose, feeling self conscious. Sure, that'll be fine. That night, the man and the moose go to the party. It is at the Explorer's Club. There are a number of long tables arranged in A square. The man and the moose are in the place of honor. The Moose is having a wonderful time. The food is really very good. Different people make different speeches. And the moose finds the waitress quite fascinating. But then, suddenly, something draws his attention. Heads. Animal heads. They're lining the walls all around the top. Lions, zebras, deer, elk and moose. Fear grips the moose's heart. Killers, he thinks, looking around the room. What is it? Says the man, sensing trouble. The moose turns and looks at him in horror. You're trying to kill me, he says, his voice a whisper. You brought me here to kill me. What? Says the man. Why would I do that? I don't understand. But the moose is too scared to explain. He stumbles backward to his feet. He points a hoof at the abomination on the wall. The man sees it. Then his eyes go wide. My God, he says. I. I just. I didn't think. He reaches out to reassure the moose, but his hand grabs the T shirt and it rips and falls off. And then, to make matters worse, the Moose's hat tumbles to the floor. Everybody turns. A moose. They cry. Get him. Get him. Get the guns. The moose takes off.
- [08:15]
Michael Cerverus
He.
- [08:16]
Meg Wolitzer
He galumps out of the ballroom, knocking people over left and right. He barrels through the doors and off down the hall. The members of the Explorers Club are striking the glass on the gun cases. Hurry. They're yelling. It's a big one. The biggest. The moose careens out into the street. He's weaving in and out of cars. They're honking and screaming. The moose has never been so terrified. Wait, Wait. Cries a voice. The moose looks back. It's the man running after him. I'm sorry. Yells the man. I didn't think. I'm so stupid. I'll make it up to you. I'll get you out of this, I swear. Are you kidding? Yells the Moose. Why should I trust you? Just then, gunfire erupts. It's the Explorers Club, hot on their trail. Bullets whiz past. Close. Closer. I can take you to the plane, says the man. It's your only chance. The moose thinks. Another bullet whizzes by. All right. The moose yells. Climb on. The man jumps on and the two of them charge through the streets. Turn left. Yells the man, and the moose turns. Up ahead is the airfield behind the men with guns getting closer with every passing second. There's the plane. The man hollers, and the two dive on board. The man guns it, and the plane taxis toward the Runway. Behind them, the Explorers Club lines up in a Row. Fire, says the leader. Fire more. The plane is hit in 10,000 places, but still it manages to lift off. Behind it trails a cloud of smoke and fire that is terrifying to behold. We're not going to make it, the man yells to the moose. We're going to have to jump. He turns and looks for the parachutes, but there is only one. You take it, says the man, pushing it to the moose. But the moose just stares at it in silence. No you, says the moose. I don't even know how to use it. Besides, I wouldn't have gotten this far without you. The man thinks for a moment. We go together, he finally says. It might work, it might not. Who knows? He straps the parachute around them both and edges the moose toward the door. On the count of three, the man says, and the moose jumps the man and the moose plummet through the air. Is that the forest? The moose calls. Down there? Yes, says the man. Isn't it pretty? It is, says the moose. I can see why you like doing this. At this point the ground is coming up pretty fast. All right, says the man. Moment of truth. The two grip the pull cord tightly together. I hope we can be friends, says the moose.
- [11:16]
Michael Cerverus
Michael Cerverus performed Ben Laurie's the Man and the Moose. Cerverus has read dozens of stories for us over the years, but when we sent him this one for a performance at the Dallas Museum of Art, he said it was his all time favorite. Next up, a painful Kind of Romeo and Juliet story by Roger Mays. The late Jamaican author and activist who died in 1955, published two collections of stories and novels, including Black Lightning. Red Dirt Don't Wash covers some familiar territory rejected love, but listen for its surprising resolution. It was read at an evening presented by Marlon James and Jake Morrissey of the podcast. Marlon and Jake read Dead People, and here's James talking about the story from the stage at Symphony Space.
- [12:03]
Marlon James
Roger Mays is one of the first writers I read. Also, when I read it, I thought the English in this is so old. And in this story you you will hear not only the voice of an activist, but echoes of an upbringing in a coffee farm outside Kingston. It's a Kingston that doesn't exist anymore in a lot of ways, in a world and a language that also doesn't really exist anymore.
- [12:26]
Michael Cerverus
That was Marlon James on stage at Symphony Space. And now we'll hear Roger Mays Red Dirt Don't Wash, performed by the subtle and powerful actor Brandon J. Durden. Durden held down roles in Tony nominated shows, including all the way and and his television work includes Blue Bloods and the Americans.
- [12:57]
Marlon James
Red dirt don't wash. He stood awkwardly, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, looking through the open pantry window with dancing eyes of a boy about to receive a treat of good things. But it wasn't the jam tarts that the maid Miranda was taking hot from the oven and putting in a dish that held his gaze wrapped. It was Miranda herself, flicking her fingers smartly and putting them to her mouth as the hot baking tin burnt them. Her trim figure in her blue uniform, Chicago neat fitting, made his eyes swim in his head. It was as though whenever she was in his sight he couldn't take his eyes off her. She ravished his senses. A simple country yokel that he was, he didn't know how to set about making a girl like Miranda, for Miranda was city bred and housebroke and all the things that he wasn't. She had training, she had refinement culture, she knew how to lay a table all by herself, things like that. She knew all the tableware, all the silver by name. She could tell them over to you without even stumbling once. He had often helped her polish them, so he knew she knew which was a cake fork from a fish fork, she knew a cake server from a cheese server, she knew a tea plate from a breakfast plate and which one of the shiny mugs was a coffee percolator and which was for hot water and which was for cream. There wasn't anything she didn't know, and she had let him help her after his work in the garden was over. She had let him stand near as near to her, over the kitchen sink and wash dishes and feel the presence of her, the delicious maddening nearness of her go through him like sharp knives, like red hot needles. He could get the smell of her in his nostrils standing that near to her, like you get the smell of ripe fruit in your nostrils when you bite it. She smelt like a lady, just like any lady. He wondered what it was that gave her that delicious, wonderful, ravishing perfume to her body. And so he had been tempted to stand on tiptoe outside the crack in the window of her room where the gummed paper just didn't cover it quite, and take a good long look at her one day after she had come out from the servant's shower bath. What he had seen had devastated him. He had come away feeling dizzy, faint, as though something was happening inside him, in his stomach. He had seen all of her loveliness in the nude for one devastating instant he had held within his dull, unimaginative eye all her loveliness that was without blemish. And his heart was like a leaping fish held in hand. But he knew now what it was that gave her body that delicious smell that mounted to his nostrils like incense and held his senses with a hazy sort of swoon. And gave him that dry feeling in his throat and that queer feeling in his stomach. It was powder. She took powder from a large red tin and dusted it all over her body. Not just dabbing it on her face alone like other girls did, but all over her body. Such luxury, such expensiveness. It made his head reel, made him aware of his own grossness, his own inferiority, his own lack of polish and refinement, made him aware of his own soiled and patched clothes and his own large bare feet, his own rough red skin which seemed as though the red dirt of his native claret and hills had come there to stay and couldn't ever wash off. When his work was done in the garden, when he had washed down the car and rubbed it down with a chamois cloth until it shone, she would let him carry the pan in which she washed. Napkins and doilies and table runners and handkerchiefs and small things like that. For you must understand that Miranda was no ordinary servant but a lady's maid. She was not a cook, though she made some delicious pastries, not a washerwoman, although she was entrusted with the washing of doilies and the table runners and the cushion covers and the table napkins and the handkerchiefs and the silk stockings and dainty things like that. She would let him carry the pan with its heaping foam of white suds from the sink under the standpipe in the backyard to the deal table on the back veranda. And he would just stand and watch her, her arms up to the elbows in suds. Now and then she would look up from her work and smile at him. And he grinned back at her all the time. He learned a lot from just standing around, talking and joking with her. And helping her through her pantry chores. Sometimes he told her about the place he came from, all about his people up in the mountains and the ways in which their ways were different from the ways of the people who lived in towns. And she laughed a lot. She was a great one for laughing. They are simple, jealous folk, but really the kindest people in the world. We understand each other. We know what makes a man or a woman happy and what makes them mad. And all the people in my district get along together like One big family. And I suppose all the girls and the men work together in the fields. Don't tell me that really. Well, it just come natural for everybody to pitch in and do whatever work there is to be done, whether in the fields or about the yard or in the house, it's all the same. But mostly the men do the heavier work, and women in the family way don't do any but the slightest of things. Oh, you don't say. She squealed with laughter. They say, she remarked, twinkling up at him provocatively, that all the people are red like you. Is that true? He just grinned back for an answer. Even the dirt is red. All red dirt. They say people's skins take its color from the dirt if they live there long enough. All their lives, I suppose. She frowned a little, flicking soap suds from the forearms and hands. They say the red dirt gets on them and even inside them, under their skins, and just stays there and she looked at him quizzically. Well, don't know about that. I specs it so. Never give it no thought before. Oh, it's true. For no matter where you meet a mountain man, you can always know him. I guess it must be true that red dirt don't wash. Once or twice she let him walk with her where she stayed with her cousin, who was another kind of maid, an office maid, because she got along better with gentlemen, they said. But always she led him through back lanes and down through a dry gully course. And always she parted with him at a certain spot some little way from the house, and he never questioned her. He never thought to question anything she did. He knew this girl was right, just right in everything she did or said. Almost a lady much too good for him, Just a country boy, big and clumsy and awkward and halting in speech and gestures, almost a living caricature of a country boy. He was so bad. But he knew also that he wanted her, even though she was miles too good for him. And at first it didn't trouble him at all, the thought of wanting her so badly. But after a bit it got to haunting him at nights, days and nights, so that he got no rest from the thought of her. That was sweet torture to him. He would lie in his bed and remember every sprightly word and vivid gesture of hers. How she looked at him, looking up sideways like a little bird and laughing in his face. Well, a girl didn't look at a fellow like that unless she. She kind of liked him a bit. He remembered how she put out her hand once and touched his arm and grabbed hard hold of his arm around the bicep muscle and said oh my admiringly, meaning how hard and strong he was. He remembered how she let a clothespin fall down his back once and laughed that squealing laugh of hers, ran her hand down after it and fetched it up slowly from way down at his waist, skylarking while he just sat there and let her do what she would with him. He remembered all that, and it was as though things were going on inside of him all the time, in his blood secretly. Once or twice he saw her walking out with nice looking young men, chauffeurs and such. He envied them not alone because she was walking out with them, but because of something they had that he lacked. A poise, a certain assurance that was almost swagger. Shoes on their feet, the way they wore their clothes. He had never worn shoes in his life. But once, once when he was about 17, his grandpa had bought him a pair of yellow boots to wear Sundays. They were grand boots. They must have cost a pile of money. He wore them once to church and that was enough. His feet inside boots didn't feel like his at all. He lost possession of them and they behaved as though they knew it. He let them go cheap to a boy he knew from a neighboring district about his size. The other fella got a real bargain. They were grand boots. But he didn't care. He bought him a goat with the money. Now there were six goats the last time he heard from home, and more coming along. He didn't care about the boots. Boots wore out and got old, so you had to throw them away. But a goat gave you more goats. He liked goats. Now there was something he knew about. One evening as he walked home with her. They were halfway through the dry gully course when he made bold enough to carry out the desperate scheme. He had been turning over slowly, methodically in his mind all along. He suddenly blurted out, I see you walking out with other fellows. She looked up at him quickly. Her eyes, he noticed, were bright like stars. Her lips slightly parted as though she were panting from walking too fast. But they had been coming along slowly, saying nothing, Mostly their bodies just touching or almost touching in the dark. He said, stopping suddenly and looking down at her face, I would like for you to come out with me once in a while. Eh?
- [25:02]
Brandon J. Durden
How?
- [25:03]
Marlon James
Where? Movies. Oh. It was a big, bold gesture. He had never been to a movie in his life. Now he was asking this girl to go with him just like that. Unconsciously, he was taking on to himself some of the Easy swagger of the young men he'd seen Miranda with. He said, coming closer to her, we'll say we go to a movie Saturday night, you and me, huh? She looked up at his face and away and down at his feet. Suddenly, unexpectedly, she burst out laughing. She just fell on the bank and screamed, squealed with laughter. She was a one for laughing, but it did something to him. For one thing, it made him lose all his recently acquired swagger. For another, it made him all of a sudden fiercely resolved within his mind to make her take it all back, to make her look at him as she looked at her natty young men. Plus the special look she gave him that said as plain as anything that she could like him and more than a bit. All right, he said in a terrible calm voice. I know I'm not good enough for you, but all the same, I love you. See? She stopped laughing immediately. She put the back of her hand to her mouth. Adrian, she said, I'm not laughing at what you think. I'm just laughing like, oh, you don't understand about women, or you would know. He was silent for a while, chewing on this. Of course she was right. He didn't understand about women either. Not her kind. She was miles above him. She would take some understanding. Of a sudden, he felt great humility standing before her. Great humility, and with it a great resolve. The very next day he put the first part of his resolve into effect. He asked for time off in the afternoon and went to town to one of the big stores where they sold shoes things. How much for the yellow ones in the window? He asked after the man at the store had shown him half a dozen pairs from the shelves. Oh, now there's a pair of shoes for you. Genuine Vicky Kid. You can't do better than that at any price anywhere. It's marked 25 shillings. We sold the lot before this at 27 and 6. But I tell you what, now I'm doing the best I can for you. It isn't like I do this for everyone, but I'll put them in you for special for 22 and 11 pence. I'll take them, Adrian said without hesitation. All that money for a pair of shoes. But he didn't mind that a bit. They were genuine Vici Kid goatskin leather. He knew that, too. You could buy two goats, let alone the skins for 22 and 11. But he didn't mind that a bit. She put powder on all over her. He seen it himself, he knew, came Saturday night, and to Adrian it seemed none too soon, either. He put on his best Sunday clothes of blue serge and his yellow shoes. He looked down at his feet and admired the gleaming shine of them. He went round by the back of the tennis court from the garage, through the little enclosed vegetable garden to the back porch, where he knew he would find her, his shoes creaking faintly across the grass. His feet felt as though they were taking him places. This was different to just walking. Just walking. You set your feet down one before the other without thinking about it. He'd heard about a man walking on a clotheslined wire high above the ground, and he'd often thought about it, wondering how it felt. He didn't anymore after that night. He knew the family had dined and had gone out in the car. He knew just where she would be, what doing, and that she would be alone when she saw him. She just stood looking at him for a time. Then she suddenly burst out laughing as though she couldn't stop. She said, where you all dressed up going to Adrian like that? He said, coming up close to her. We stepping out, my who? And you. You and me. Remember? You said if I got myself some shoes, remember? Well, I got them. They cost a heap of money, too, but I don't give it a thought. He swelled out his chest. He was almost as big as a barrel around. For a moment she looked at him with slightly troubled eyes. His body looked so strong and fine. Bene. All the marks of the country laid on him. The awkwardness you could see at a glance. His flesh was good and strong. Her eyes sort of misted over a bit for a moment, though, and then they dropped to his feet again. What's the matter? Don't they look all right? Oh, sure, they're swell. They must have cost a pile of money, I bet. And she burst out laughing. At first he didn't understand, and he started laughing too, with his country guffaw. And then he saw her face and saw how she looked at his feet and looked up and laughed again. And suddenly the laughter died out of him, leaving him as it were, standing there foolishly with his mouth open, staring at her. She said curiously enough, oh, don't make me laugh about what? Why, what's the matter with them? Oh, nothing, big boy. The shoes are fine. But they're not yours, that's all. They don't fit, you see. Well, they's a bit tight, but my feet will get used to them after a spell. Well, see, that's where you're wrong. They never will. They'll always look just what they are. A pair of shoes carrying your feet around all your life. You never worn shoes, you know that's true. He nodded. You can't educate them feet to shoes, big boy. Not as long as you live. You'll always feel as though you were wearing shoes, and you'll look just the way you feel.
- [31:46]
Meg Wolitzer
Always.
- [31:46]
Marlon James
No, it's no good. You better take them off now. Perhaps if you clean the soles a bit, they might even take them back at the store where you bought them. But I don't want to take them back. They mine. You know why I got them, he said, looking down at them self consciously. It was for all for you. At that. She burst out laughing again. Do you think I'm going out with you and them? She demanded scornfully. It was no use, no use at all thinking about sparing his feelings. He just didn't have sense enough for a child. Nothing short of this could make him understand. It was a pity, but none of her cooking, she was sure. I get you, he said slowly. I'm not good enough for you. I know it. Still, you said if I got myself some shoes like. Oh, don't take it hard, big boy. She laid a hand on his arm, but for a moment only. Then she took it away. I tell you what, she said in a low, husky voice. Perversely, the firm, strong, clean touch of his flesh stung her like nettles. Went driving with sharp pains through her, stirring something in her blood. Tomorrow. Tomorrow night we'll go for a walk. I know a place where we can go where nobody will be around. A pause. That's a promise now. But he remained for a space, looking away, saying nothing. Then he turned slowly, painfully, away with the unaccustomed pain of walking in tight shoes. But he was resolved upon this thing. He was going to walk them in, going to walk those darn feet of his in. He'd do it if it broke his heart, if it killed him. After walking about a mile he came to a lonely spot on the road. He didn't even know where he was, but he didn't care. He sat down on the side of the road and pulled off his shoes. He took each foot between his hands and chafed it gently, wriggling his toes until they felt like his own again. She was leading him on. She was playing him for a sucker all the time, laughing at him, carrying on with other fellows and laughing at him behind his back. He felt in his pocket for his clasp knife and opened it and tested the blade, passing it along the ball of his thumb. There was A cold, still sullen look in his eyes, deadly like anger, burned down the glowing coals of a steel white heat. What she wanted to make of him a blooming Cinderella, for just so she could laugh at him. He lifted his head and stared blankly up at the cold stars. There was nothing there beyond them the somber mountains, they reminded him of his own mountains that seemed so far away, almost unreal, veiled as with a mist. And the mist was in his own eyes, trying to see beyond the St. Andrew Hills, beyond the stars, horizon, space limitless like that. He tested the edge of the blade against the ball of his thumb, and it was right. What she want to make of him, a blooming Cinderella for he took the shoes one at a time and cut them into thin strips, all but the soles, which because of their toughness he just cut anyway. But there he belonged, where there was red dirt everywhere and people didn't go around wearing shoes. Red dirt everywhere on the tilled land as far as the eyes could see, and on the faces and bare arms and legs of men and women. Good, clean red dirt that he loved, that was a symbol of home to him, and more clean, happy faces that he loved that were all frankness and homeliness and that went for cleanness and wholeness. It was clean, the red dirt of his land, the place of his birth. He looked down at the jagged strips of leather in his hand and his face became wonderfully luminous. He even smiled. They were good shoes, genuine Vichy kid. He paid 22 and 11 pence for them at the store.
- [36:48]
Michael Cerverus
Brandon J. Durden performed Red Dirt Don't Wash. There is an elemental satisfaction about this ending. Cruel, dismissive girls will come and go, but this character now knows his own worth from head to toe. I was there in the audience that night and oh, how relaxing it is to just sit and listen. And listening to it again, I paid attention all over to the turn in the story. I think all stories have one the moment, in this case, when the love object is revealed more fully, which leads to a kind of surprise and so surprising liberation. When we return, a music lesson from William Trevor with novelist Elizabeth Strout. I'm Meg Walitzer. You're listening to Selected Shorts recorded live in performance at Symphony Space in New York City and at other venues nationwide. Welcome back. This is Selected Shorts where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction one short story at a time. I'm Meg Wolitzer. On this show, we're looking at odd pairings between different species, different sexes and different ages. Fortunately, we're confident that we're the right match for you? Well, maybe not if you're a moose. Check out our website selectedshorts.org for our latest shows, link to our podcast and find information about our anthology Small Odysseys. In any one of these, you might find yourself paired up with something unexpected. On this show, we're talking about mismatches, fantastical, as in our first story about a man moose road trip, or ruefully traditional, as in our second. Our last story is a subtler take on this theme by a very subtle Irish writer, the late William Trevor, whose many published works include his novel Love and Summer and Collected Stories. At first glance, the Piano Teacher's Pupil seems to be about a perfect match, a dedicated teacher and a gifted pupil. But things are seldom what they seem in a Trevor Story. We presented this story at a live Selected Shorts evening that I had the pleasure of hosting, and one of the pleasures was getting my dear friend, the novelist Elizabeth Strout, to introduce Trevor's work. Here she is from the stage at Symphony Space.
- [39:18]
Elizabeth Strout
Listen carefully now. It will be a delight. But Trevor is a quiet writer. What I mean by this is that he writes quietly about ordinary people who we come to understand as we read along are actually extraordinary people. As the writer Hilma Wolitzer once said, we all are. But William Trevor is also, though maybe it's not fashionable to say this, I think, a kind writer. Of all the hundreds of Trevor characters I have read, no matter what they do, no matter how badly behaved they may be, I have never felt anything but a quiet sort of love for for them. And he does take on evil, he takes on snobbery, he's brave in all his subjects. And yet, always for me, at least, there is that quiet acceptance of life as we know it. During his lifetime of 88 years, he'd wrote 20 story collections and 20 novels. A number of these novels or stories take place in Ireland, where Trevor was born to a Protestant family, and while he moved to England later, he claimed he was Irish in every vein in his work. There are many old farmhouses in Ireland, a variety of men who have stayed on to take care of their widowed mother. There is violence in some of these stories as there is violence in the world. Trevor reports it all with quiet gracefulness and tremendous economy. Trevor will use many details to set a scene. Boots in a corner, the kind of wallpaper on a wall, the cobwebs above the fireplace. But he never uses one detail that does not feel absolutely necessary. Whether we're in an old farmhouse in Ireland or in a pub in London. We feel exactly where we are, we see what we need to see, and then he very quietly tells us a story, flipping a gentle sentence over so suddenly and quietly that we see its underbelly. Trevor is, I think, a traditional writer in the sense that something always changes from the beginning of the story to the end, and yet we almost never see what is coming.
- [41:21]
Michael Cerverus
That was Elizabeth Strout speaking from the stage at Symphony Space, reading William Trevor's the Piano Teacher's Pupil is Kathryn Irby, whom we call on for stories with classic appeal and emotional nuance. She's a member of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company. On television, she could be seen in shows including Law and Order, Criminal Intent and the Good Fight.
- [41:56]
Brandon J. Durden
The piano Teacher's pupil the Brahms, she said, shall we struggle through the Brahms? The boy whose first lesson with Ms. Nightingale this was said nothing, but gazing at the silent metronome, he smiled a little, as if the silence pleased him. Then his fingers touched the piano keys, and when the first notes sounded, Ms. Nightingale knew that she was in the presence of genius. Now in her early 50s, slender, softly spoken, with a quiet beauty continuing to distinguish her features, Ms. Elizabeth Nightingale considered that she was fortunate in her life. She had inherited a house on the death of her father and managed without skimping on what she earned. As a piano teacher, she had known the passion of love she might have married, but circumstances had not permitted that for 16 years she had been visited instead by a man she believed would one day free himself from a wife he was indifferent to. That hadn't happened, and when the love affair fell apart, there had been painful regret on Ms. Nightingale's side. But since then she had borne her lover no ill will. For after all, there was the memory of a happiness. Miss Nightingale's father, a chocolatier being widowed at the time of her birth, had brought his daughter up on his own. They became companions and remained so until his death, although he'd never been aware of the love affair that had been conducted for so long during his daily absen from the house. That love and her father's devotion were recollections that cheered Ms. Nightingale's present solitude and somehow gave a shape to her life. But the excitement she experienced when her new pupil played for her belonged to the present, was fresh and new and intense. Not ever before had she sensed genius in a child. Just a little fast, she made her comment. When the piece she had suggested came to an end. And remember the pianissimo, she touched the music with the point of her pencil, indicating where she meant. The boy did not respond but smiled as he had before. His dark hair, not cut too short, was in a fringe. The skin of his face was delicate, unblemished, as pale as paper. There was a badge on the breast pocket of his blazer, a long beaked bird feeding its young. The blazer was navy blue, the badge red, all of it rather ugly, in Miss Nightingale's opinion. You'll practice it just a little slower, won't you? She said. She watched the boy reaching for the sheet on the music stand, standing up to do so. He dropped it into his music case. Friday again, she said, standing up herself, same time, with eagerness that might have been purely polite, but which she sensed was not. He nodded. His shyness was a pleasure quite unlike the endless rattling on of her more tiresome pupils. He'd had several music teachers before, his mother had said, rattling on herself so fast it was hard to understand why he'd been moved from one to another in a professional way. Miss Nightingale had inquired about that, but nothing had been forthcoming. She led the way from the room and handed the boy his cap from the hallstand ledge, the same emblem of a bird on it. She stood for a moment by the open door, watching him close the gate behind him. His short trousers made her wonder if he was cold, his knees seeming vulnerable and fragile above gray woolen socks, the blue and red of his blazer and his cap repeated on the border. He waved and she waved back. No other child was due that evening, and Miss Nightingale was glad. She tidied her sitting room, reclaiming it after the week's visitors, her own again until ten o' clock on Monday morning, when dull Francine Morphew came. Piano and sofa and armchairs crowded what space the room offered. Staffordshire figures of soldiers paraded on either side of a carriage, clock on the mantelpiece. Pot lids and framed trays of chocolate molds her father had collected decorated the walls among watercolors and photographs. Daffodils in vases were on the sofa table and on the corner shelf near the door. When she had tidied, Miss Nightingale poured herself a glass of sherry. She would say nothing to the mother if the mother telephoned to ask how the boy was getting on. It was a secret to share with no one except the boy himself, to be taken for granted between them, not gone on about. The mother was a foolish kind of woman. When Miss Nightingale had sat a little longer, she turned on the electric fire, for the April evening was chilly now, warmly, happily, it seemed that years of encouragement and instruction, offered for the most part to children without talent or interest, had at last been rewarded. Within this small boy, so modest in his manner, there were symphonies, unwritten sweets and concertos and oratorios. She could tell she didn't even have to think while darkness gathered. And when her second glass of sherry had been sipped away to almost nothing, Miss Nightingale sat for a few minutes longer. All her life, she often thought, was in this room, where her father had cosseted her in infancy, where he had seen her through the storms of adolescence, to which every evening he had brought back from his kitchens another chocolate he had invented for her. It was here that her lover had pressed himself upon her and whispered that she was beautiful, swearing he could not live without her. And now, in this same room, a marvel had occurred. She felt her way through the gloom to the light switch by the door, enriched by echoes and with memories. The room would surely also be affected by this afternoon. How could it be the same? But when Miss Nightingale turned on the light, nothing had altered. It was only when she was drawing the curtains that she noticed there was a difference. The little snuff box with someone else's coat of arms on it was missing from the windowsill table. The next Friday a porcelain swan went, and then the pot lid with a scene from Great Expectations on it. And then an earring she'd taken out because the clasp was faulty. A scarf too flimsy to be of use to a boy was no longer on its hallstand peg. When she looked for it one Saturday morning, two of the Staffordshire soldiers went. She didn't know how he did it. She watched and saw nothing. She said nothing either. And so unaffected was the boy himself by what was happening, so unperturbed by his own behavior that she began to wonder if she could be mistaken, if it could be one of her less attractive pupils who was light fingered, or even if she had only just noticed what might have been taken from her over a period of time. But none of this made sense, and her flimsy excuses all fell apart. The rose petal paperweight was there when he began to play his Chopin Preludes. It was gone when she returned from seeing him out. She wasn't a teacher when she was with him because there was so little for her to teach. And yet she knew he valued her presence, that her being an audience of one meant more to him than the comments she contributed. Could it be she even wondered that he helped himself to what he thought of as a fee for his performance? Such childish Fantasies were not unusual. She had herself been given to make believe, and pretending, but that too she dismissed, sensing it not to be true. At night she lay awake, her distress and her bewilderment afterwards, mercilessly feeding vivid dreams in them. The boy was unhappy, and she wanted to comfort him, to make him talk to her. When he had finished playing his pieces in endless repetition. She tried to say that once she had taken a chocolate from her father's special box, but she couldn't. And when awake again she lay there in the dark, she found herself a prey to thoughts she'd never had before. She wondered if her father had been all he had seemed, if the man she had admired and loved for so long had made use of her affections. Had her father's chocolates been an inducement to remain with him in his house, a selfishness dressed up? Had the man who deceived his wife deceived his mistress too, since deception was a part of him, lies scattered through the passion that there was in the dark? She pushed all that away, not knowing where it came from or why it seemed to belong with what, what was happening now. But always it came back, as if a truth she did not understand were casting its light over shadows that had beguiled her once. Was theft, nothing much, the objects taken so small and plenty left behind. If she spoke, her pupil would not come again, even if she said at once that she forgave so slight, a misdemeanor, knowing so little. At least she was certain of that, and often did not look to see what was no longer there. The spring of that year gave way to summer, a heat wave of parched days that went on until the rains of October. All that time on Friday afternoons, the doorbell rang and he was there, the same silent boy who left his cap on the hallstand ledge, who sat down at her piano and took with him into paradise. Miss Nightingale's other pupils came and went also, but among them only the boy never requested. A different day, a different time. No note was ever brought by him, no excuse ever trotted out, no nuisance unrecognized for what it was. Graham talked about his pets, to delay his unpracticed peace. Diana wept, Corrin's fingers hurt, Angela gave up. Then, smoothly in the run of time, another Friday came to take its place as the halcyon afternoon at the center of Miss Nightingale's life. Yet each time after the boy left, there was mockery in the music that faintly lingered. The seasons changed again and then again, until one day the boy did not return. He had outgrown these music lessons and his school and now was somewhere else. For Ms. Nightingale, his absence brought calm and time passing further quietened her unease. If a lonely father had been a calculating man, he it mattered less now than it had when the thought was raw. If a beloved lover had belittled love, it mattered less. In that same soothing retrospect, she had been a victim, too, of the boy who had shown off to her his other skill. She had been the victim of herself, of her careless credulity, her wanting to believe what seemed to be all that she sensed was true. Yet something still nagged. It seemed right almost, that she should understand a little more. Long afterwards, the boy came back coarser, taller, rougher, in ungainly adolescence. He did not come to return her property, but walked straight in and sat down and played for her. The mystery there was in the music was in his smile when he finished, while he waited for her approval and looking at him, Ms. Nightingale realized what she had not before. That mystery was a marvel in itself. She had no rights in this. She had sought too much in trying to understand how human frailty connected with love or with the beauty that the gifted brought. There was a balance struck. It was enough.
- [56:10]
Michael Cerverus
Kathryn Irby performed the Piano Teacher's Pupil By William Trevor I'm Meg Wolitzer. It's typical of Trevor to create an idyllic world and then undo it without any clear explanation. He isn't an intrusive author. He never has a heavy hand. We caught up with Irby before her reading, and she shared her thoughts about the quality of Trevor's language.
- [56:31]
Brandon J. Durden
It reminds me of music. It really feels like music. It's taken me a while to find my way in, but I love this character of Ms. Nightingale. She is so compelling, and the story has so many surprises in it that it's a joy to read honestly, the words are not easy for me. They don't. They need to come tripping out of my mouth, and I'm afraid I'm going to trip on them. But it really does remind me of music, and so my hope is that I just get into her head.
- [57:16]
Michael Cerverus
That was Kathryn Irby backstage at Symphony Space. So when listening to the Piano Teacher's Pupil, we are left creating our own emotional landscape and expression, explanation not only for the student's inexplicable behavior, but for the later reconciliation. We've heard three works in which our ideas of friendship, love, and trust in our instincts are tested. It feels to me as if the authors have shied away from trite solutions to mismatches and are perhaps suggesting that we do the same. I'm Meg Wolitzer. Thanks for joining me for Selected Shorts. Selected Shorts is produced by Jennifer Brennan and Sarah Montague. Our team includes Matthew Love, Drew Richardson, Mary Shimkin, Vivienne Woodward, and Magdalene Robleski. The readings are recorded by Myles B. Smith. Our programs, presented at the Getty center in Los Angeles, are recorded by Phil Richards. Our mix engineer for this episode was Jennifer Nolson. Our theme music is David Peterson's that's the Deal, performed by the Dierdorf Peterson Group. Selected Shorts is supported by the Dungannon Foundation. This program is also made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature. Selected Shorts is produced and distributed by Symphony Space.
- [58:43]
Marlon James
Sam.