Eyes

A Dazzling New CollectionTwo Novellas And Four Short Stories From One Of The Most Revered Writers Of Our Time Author Of Seven Books Of Fiction Among Them The Tunnel (An Extraordinary AchievementMichael Dirda The Washington Post); Middle C (Exhilaratingly IngeniousCynthia Ozick The New York Times Book Review Cover); And Cartesian Sonata (The Finest Prose Stylist In AmericaThe Washington Post).. It Begins With In Camera The First Of The Two Novellas And Tells The Story Which Grows Darker And Dustier By The Speck Of A Mr. Gab (Who DoesnT Have The Gift) And His Photography Shop (In A Part Of Town So Drab Even Robbers WouldnT Visit) A Shop Stuffed With Gray-White Gray-Bleach Photographs Each In Its Own Cellophane Sheet Loosely Side-Filed In Cardboard Boxes Tag Attached . . . An Inner Sanctum Where Little Happens Beyond The Fulsome Deep Reverence For Mr. GabS Images And Vast Collection A Homemade Museum In The Midst Of The Outer Maelstrom . . . Until A Mr. Stu (As In U-Stew-Pid) Enters The Shop Inspecting The Extraordinary Collection And Mr. GabS Treasure-Filled Dust-Laden Meticulously Contained Universe Begins To Implode . . . . In The Story DonT Even Try Sam The Upright Piano From The 1942 Warner Bros. Classic Casablanca Is Interviewed (I Know Why You Want To Talk To Me The Piano Says. ItS Because Everybody Else Is Dead.Stars Go Out.Directors Die. Companies Fold.But Some Of The Props Get Preserved.IVe Seen My Friend The Vichy Water Bottle In The Storeroom As Wrapped Up As The Maltese Falcon.WeD Fetch A Price Now) . . . . In Another Story Charity A Young Lawyer Whose Business It Is To Keep Hospital Equipment Honestly Produced Offers A Simple Gift And Is Brought To The Ambiguous Heart Of Charity Itself. In Soliloquy For A Chair A Folding Chair Does Just ThatTalks In A Barbershop That Is Ultimately Bombed . . . And In The Toy Chest Disneylike Creatures Take On Human Roles And Concerns And Live In An Atmosphere Of A ChildS Imagination.. An Enchanting Gassian Journey; A Glorious Fantasia; A Virtuoso Delight.