This is a brief, and all but "lost" story rediscovered. It's not Absolutely yet proven it's by the Gene Wolfe who was a notable fantasy and sf and historical fiction writer, but it sure reads like his work, and the dealing with Roman Catholic matters in its short focus (unsurprising in a story set, essentially, in the Philippines) doesn't disqualify it from being his in any way.
It's not quite as short as a vignette, as it concerns a Filipina-born widow of a US sailor, returning to her birth-city of Zamboanga after the death of her husband, having lived with him in the States for most of the years since their marriage, apparently just after World War 2's conclusion (he is cited as having commanded the Kusunoki, a Japanese vessel turned over to the Allies after Japan's surrender, and mostly used to repatriate Japanese citizens from the Philippines and probably elsewhere through 1947). She is observing a year of mourning, and took a long sea voyage back to Mindanao on a craft commanded by an old colleague of her husband's, and shortly after landing, she meets an old flame of hers from back in the day, who reminds her of her brothers' threats (presumably for marrying a Yank, in the resumption of US occupation briefly after "liberation" from the Japanese), though the severity of the threat and the reasons for it are not made explicit. A good work to read, if not quite a key work of Wolfe's, and apparently he didn't think of it as such, himself, but it does have me wondering what inspired it.
I'm not sure this is posted anywhere that one can access directly (I haven't searched for it on Archive.org as yet, though there are citations of its Laurel Review issue in other texts collected there); the copy I read was procured via interlibrary transmission from the Michigan State University library.
For more Short Story Wednesday items, please see Patti Abbott's blog.
10 comments:
Neat --I'm always down for literary enigmas. Sounds like the provenance is mostly certain, but it's both fun and maddening to try and find the proof of such things.
Most of the Evidence Against is along the lines that "he never cited it anywhere"...but its a very short story that is from relatively early in his fiction-writing career in a fairly obscure college little magazine (S. I Hayakawa has an essay of some sort in the issue)...Richard Bleiler, who let me see it, wonders if Wolfe perhaps never saw the issue himself, that somehow mail was lost after Wolfe submitted it. I'd say it reads like his prose, in a less strenuous mode than his most famous work is written in...he loved using the underused words in English, perhaps even more than his senior contemporary Jack Vance did...but I imagine that We'll See in terms of final verdicts.
Your current login leads clickers to a 404 error...if you can redirect it to the "open" parts of your subscription blog, bonus!
I'm going to believe it really is an early Gene Wolfe story. But, it's a great literary puzzle!
I'd say it's more a footnote, but a footnote worth reading.
While I am neither a Gene Wolfe completist nor a fanatic, I do recognize him as one of the premier writers of speculative fiction during his long career. I do see that this story is now entered in ISFDB, approved today. That in and of itself does not make it a Wolfe story, but clearly Pete Young thinks so. This is fun, so I'm in favor.
It is more likely than not...though not A Lock, as yet!
Never heard of this author but the story has me intrigued. Here's my FFB for today: Steffan Green by Richmal Crompten: https://ahotcupofpleasureagain.wordpress.com/2023/07/07/fridays-forgotten-book-steffan-green-by-richmal-crompton-1940/
Neeru--you might find Wolfe both interesting and puzzling--and you wouldn't be alone! And thanks for the link.
"Your current login leads clickers to a 404 error...if you can redirect it to the "open" parts of your subscription blog, bonus!"
Darn it, I thought I had the right link. ALL of my content is currently set to be publicly viewed, so I don't know what I did wrong. Thought this would be a simple way to get back to blogging!
Alas all systems! And blogging sites are definitely systematic in their desire to screw with us in various (usually small but annoying) ways.
This newest one works!
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