In the Forest of Forgetting

In the Forest of Forgetting is an anthology of beautiful, well crafted, and dreamlike short stories. They exist on the edges of dream, fable, and folklore, each one a unique take on the fantastic. With a very few words Theodora Goss takes us into visionary realms. Dreams are central to these tales. Some are explicitly about dreaming, like "Professor Berkowitz Stands on the Threshold", while others draw heavily on dreams, dreamlike states, and visions, such as "Conrad", "Pip and the Fairies", "Phalaenopsis", and "Miss Emily Gray". Others address politics and history, starting with the author's native Hungary in "Letters from Budapest" and "A Statement in the Case". Perhaps my favorite story in the collection. "Rose in Twelve Petals", is (among other things) a delicate alternate history, placing the Rumpelstilskin story in a world where Napoleon conquered Britain and the rest of Europe. But folklore looms largest in Forest. Many of these stories are retellings of fairy tales, or critiques of same, or feature fairy tale literacy as a major plot point. Time and again one layer of civilization peels back to reveal a folkloric basis, as when a successful children's author turns out to be drawing on real fairies (perhaps), or an arson and murder involves magical animals (and people). "My story has the contours of a fairy tale" begins the densely packed "The Belt", which starts with a riff on fairy tales, moves to sexual fetishism of several stripes, then concludes with social revolution. Time and again I was struck by well-wrought passages. Goss' tone veers from wry amusement (see the bear wedding story) to cold insight to lyrical surrealism: One becomes bored, eventually, even of penance. Do not blame Sophia, Mada,. Boredom is a healthy impulse. It is a sign of the will to live. Fear the man who is not bored by suffering.(195) Sorrow: a feeling of grief or melancholy. A mythical city generally located in northern Siberia, said to have been visited by Marco Polo. From Sorry, he took back to Italy the secret of making ice. (44) There is a fascinating and deep focus on gender in these stories, an attraction to, yet desire to escape from girlhood and womanhood. So much of the book focuses on objects and dynamics we normally assign to women's writing and concerns: mother-daughter relations, ballet, fears of being overweight, flowers, marriage, proper ways of being a lady. Sometimes the characters seem immersed in this world with pleasure or at least careful attention, like the heroines in the first half of "Lessons with Miss Gray". Yet Goss is concerned with the ways these situations sour and demand escape, as with "Miss Gray"'s conclusion, or the aching flights of "Wings of Meister Wilhelm." "In The Forest of Forgetting" follows a woman's visionary voyage as she suffers from cancer, each stage of her flight defined by her gendered roles, and often with beauty. "Lily With Clouds" occurs from the point of view of a wealthy society woman, trying to cope with a black sheep sister who spends her life avoiding that privilege. Women take center stage in these perfectly wrought stories. Recommended for anyone interested in the contemporary short story, or fantasy, or gender, or simply fine reading.