The Stories of J.F. Powers

by Powers, J.F.; Donoghue, Denis

• ISBN13: 9780940322226
• ISBN10: 0940322226
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-03-31
• Publisher: NYRB Classics

Summary

Hailed by Frank O'Connor as one of "the greatest living storytellers," J. F. Powers, who died in 1999, stands with Eudora Welty, Flannery O'Connor, and Raymond Carver among the authors who have given the short story an unmistakably American cast. In three slim collections of perfectly crafted stories, published over a period of some thirty years and brought together here in a single volume for the first time, Powers wrote about many things: baseball and jazz, race riots and lynchings, the Great Depression, and the flight to the suburbs. His greatest subject, howeverand one that was uniquely hiswas the life of priests in Chicago and the Midwest. Powers's thoroughly human priests, who include do-gooders, gladhanders, wheeler-dealers, petty tyrants, and even the odd saint, struggle to keep up with the Joneses in a country unabashedly devoted to consumption. These beautifully written, deeply sympathetic, and very funny stories are an unforgettable record of the precarious balancing act that is American life. Table of Contents The Lord's Day The Trouble Lions, Harts, Leaping Does Jamesie He Don't Plant Cotton The Forks Renner The Valiant Woman The Eye The Old Bird, A Love Story Prince of Darkness Dawn Death of a Favorite The Poor Thing The Devil Was the Joke A Losing Game Defection of a Favorite Zeal Blue Island The Presence of Grace Look How the Fish Live Bill Folks Keystone One of Them Moonshot Priestly Fellowship Farewell Pharisees Tinkers

Author Biography

J. F. Powers (1917-1999) was born in Jacksonville, Illinois, and studied at Northwestern University while holding a variety of jobs in Chicago and working on his writing. He published his first stories in The Catholic Worker and, as a pacifist, spent thirteen months in prison during World War II. Powers was the author of three collections of short stories and two novels—Morte D’Urban, which won the National Book Award, andWheat That Springeth Green—all of which have been reissued by New York Review Books. He lived in Ireland and the United States and taught for many years at St John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota.

Denis Donoghue is University Professor at NYU, where he holds the Henry James Chair of English and American Letters. He is the author of The Practice of Reading, Words Alone: The Poet T.S. Eliot, and, most recently, The American Classics. (October 2006)

Table of Contents

Introduction	vii
The Lord's Day	3	(10)
The Trouble	13	(16)
Lions, Harts, Leaping Does	29	(28)
Jamesie	57	(22)
He Don't Plant Cotton	79	(14)
The Forks	93	(18)
Renner	111	(14)
The Valiant Woman	125	(12)
The Eye	137	(16)
The Old Bird, A Love Story	153	(14)
Prince of Darkness	167	(48)
Dawn	215	(12)
Death of a Favorite	227	(22)
The Poor Thing	249	(14)
The Devil Was the Joker	263	(34)
A Losing Game	297	(12)
Defection of a Favorite	309	(22)
Zeal	331	(18)
Blue Island	349	(16)
The Presence of Grace	365	(28)
Look How the Fish Live	393	(18)
Bill	411	(18)
Folks	429	(4)
Keystone	433	(32)
One of Them	465	(28)
Moonshot	493	(8)
Priestly Fellowship	501	(28)
Farewell	529	(20)
Pharisees	549	(4)
Tinkers	553