I am so glad Lisa (ANZLitLovers) has given me an excuse, her Christina Stead Week, to finally pick up Ocean of story: The uncollected stories of Christina Stead. I bought this book, in 1991, from a sale table for all of 98 (Australian) cents! What a bargain. I then popped it on my Australian literature TBR shelves, where it has sat, and sat, and sat – until now.
Before I get to it, though, I must confess that this post’s title is a bit of a lie. Christina Stead just called this story “Ocean of story”, but RG Geering, the editor of this “uncollected” collection, made it the Introduction to the book. I decided that I could use this to differentiate in my post title that the post is just about this introductory story. Fair enough?
Now to the overall collection. I am on record as stating that I don’t read introductions to books before I read the book itself. I would in fact prefer these “introductions” to be called “afterwords” and placed at the end. And that’s what Geering has done here except, being perverse, I’d rather that for such a “curated” collection it had been at the beginning! Consequently, I didn’t see it until I’d read the first story and, finding it a little unusual, wondered why there wasn’t some sort of editor’s introduction. So, I went looking. And there, at the end, was his Afterword!
Geering writes that the book
brings together for the first time most of the short prose writings that appeared in various places (journals, magazines and newspapers) outside the thirteen volumes of fiction published during her own life, along with other unpublished pieces found among her personal papers after her death.
And then he says that he has grouped the pieces “according to their settings and contents rather than chronologically”. In this way, they will “follow the contours of [her] somewhat wandering life.” Then, right towards the end of his Afterward, he finally describes the opening piece: it’s
a contribution to ‘The International Symposium on the Short Story’ in Kenyan Review, 1968 … [and] is a highly personal essay, rather than a conventional article.
And that is exactly what it is, a “highly personal essay”, one that, by its end, has given us a “highly personal” understanding of what stories, and particularly short stories, meant to Stead. It starts:
I love Ocean of Story, the name of an Indian treasury of story; that is the way I think of the short story and what is part of it, the sketch, anecdote, jokes cunning, philosophical, and biting, legends and fragments. Where do they come from? Who invents them? Everyone perhaps. Who remembers them so that they pass endlessly across city life? I know some of those marvellous rememberers who pass on their daily earnings in story; and then they are forgotten to become fragments, mysterious indications. Any treasury of story is a residue of the past and a record of the day.
I love the open-endedness of her conception. It’s a free-flowing one that allows stories to take all forms. She goes on to say that “what is unique about the short story is that we all can tell one, live one, even write one down.”
Then she turns autobiographical, starting with her childhood with her father. She was, she says, “born into the ocean of story, or on its shores”, the daughter of a “lively young scientist”. He
told his tales. He meant to talk me asleep. He talked me awake.
Ha, the impact of stories on an imaginative child, which Stead clearly was. He told her stories drawn from his zoological work, and “stories of the outback…and even a few historic events.” But then comes the important thing – the thing that is important to all who read – that is, what stories do for us. She writes that the thousand stories she heard between two and four and a half
formed my views – an interest in men and nature, a feeling that all were equal, the extinct monster, the coral insect, the black man and us; and another curious feeling in me, of terrestrial eternity, a sun that never set.
This feeling came via her father’s nature-related stories which taught her that while death was necessary, there was always “a frail print” left. However, the storytelling – these times that allowed her “to see the unseen” – ended when she was four and a half and her father remarried. The magic was imprinted by then though!
“the million drops of water”
Indeed, she sees stories as “magical”. You only need for someone to say, she says, “Here’s a story; it happened to me” and all will listen. We seek stories – even those “twisted, inferior, cramped, and sterile stories on TV” – because we hope to recognise and “have explained our own existence”. She’s right – on both superficial (what am I doing) and deeper, more psychological (who am I) levels – don’t you think? She continues:
It isn’t necessary that these stories should be artistic or follow formula or be like Chekhov or the last metropolitan fad, or anything. The virtue of the story is its reality and its meaning for any one person: that is its pungency.
She argues that while the “masterpiece” might be appropriate for professionals, “the essential for us is integrity and what is genuine.” She then, interestingly given she wrote this in 1968, harks back to stories of the 1930s:
not all are memorable (some are) but all record the realities of the days when America was suffering and looking for a way out and thinking about its fate; and – look at those same today – they are a vivid and irreplaceable memento. That is what is best about the short story: it is real life for everyone; and everyone can tell one.
In other words, “the story has a magic necessary to our happiness”! We seek “the powerful story rooted in all things which will explain life to us”. I love all this. It is such an argument for the importance and value of the arts.
Stead concludes by telling a story about a group near London that she once joined. All were asked to stand up and tell a story, and
everyone, those stuffy and snug people came to life, became mouths out of which bubbled stories poor and ordinary or before unheard of.
There it was, she says, “the ocean of story”. And this happens everywhere, anytime. So,
The short story can’t wither and, living, can’t be tied to a plan. It is only when the short story is written to a rigid plan, or done as an imitation, that it dies. It dies when it is pinned down, but not elsewhere. It is the million drops of water that are the looking-glasses of all our lives.
I classed this post as “(Review, possibly)” because I haven’t really written a review. Rather, I’ve described/shared Stead’s attitude to stories – and to story-making and storytellers. I love her egalitarianism, even when describing stories that are “poor and ordinary”; I love her flexible idea of what makes a story; I love her chatty, idiosyncratic style; and most of all I love her passion for the importance of stories (particularly short stories) to our lives. I look forward to reading at least some of those in this book.
Christina Stead
“Introduction: Ocean of story”
in Ocean of story: The uncollected stories of Christina Stead
Ringwood: Penguin Books, 1986
552pp.
ISBN: 9780140100211
Whispering Gums 
I just bought this one.
Oh good Guy. How much did it cost you? More than 98 cents?
78 cents
Lisa and I probably beat you then, Guy, if you consider the exchange rate! I’m glad she’s not still alive and depending on these royalties.
Definitely one of those books that leave you asking how did I leave it on the shelf for so many years! To me it demonstrates what a shame it was that we ‘left’ Stead overseas for so long when, say from the mid 1950s, she could have been a fabulous mentor here for up and coming writers (and not had to live in poverty).
Absolutely Bill. She’s been so overlooked here.
I love the description of all of the stories. There really is an Ocean of Stories in the world. When sitting at traffic lights (which I seem to do a lot of) I often think of quick stories for the people walking past me as they go across the street. The cruise passengers in town often get me thinking of a lot of them. haha This sounds a remarkable book and I am surprised you have had it on your shelf since 1991! Last century. Lovely review.
Thanks Pam… Too many books on the shelves is the problem!
You sit at a lot of traffic lights in Hobart?! But I love your point. I tend to do that too… Particularly when sitting in cafes, waiting for others I mean, not when they’re worth me!
You would be surprised how many traffic lights Hobart has, haha
What! You now have 5! 😁 just joking.
Dear WG, I always love your refreshing approach to writing about books, and this piece on Christina Stead is no exception. Thank you for your reading, writing, generosity – and for the inspiration you offer.
Oh you, Carmel, you’ll turn my head one day! But thanks so much for reading and commenting. I’m glad I can contribute something.
LOL Sue, I bought my copy for $1.00. The Penguin RRP on the back says it cost $11.95 new, so yes, it was indeed a bargain. I wonder how many of them Penguin sold, given that Stead was as good as unknown here in Australia when it was published in 1986.
Your review is compulsive reading. With Christina Stead Week and reviews like this, (and Text Classics making four of her books available for a so-cheap! $12.95) I do hope we are going to resurrect Stead’s reputation as a grand storyteller! (I am savouring The Beauties and Furies, I wanted to have a review ready for today, but I am enjoying it so much, I have to read and re-read it slowly.)
Thanks Lisa! My copy is the same as yours with $11.95, but then it has price stickers for $7.95, then $3.95 and then .98! I always leave price stickers on my books when I buy them (and you must too!) Librarian/archivists to the end, eh?
I’m impressed that you are reading your book slowly. I thought you were constitutionally incapable of slow reading!! LOL.
I wasn’t familiar with this title, so thanks very much for bringing it to my attention.Like you, i cherish a good short story.
Oh good, Dorothy. It seems like it really hasn’t ever received the promotion it should have. I suppose being one of those books put together after her death it’s not been taken as seriously? I’m sure you’ll be able to find it in second hand shops.
I remember reading Christina Stead’s brilliant novel The Man Who Loved Children. I was not aware that she had written so many short stories – she seems an exciting advocate for the form and its wonderful flexibility.
She sure does I agree, Ian, more than I had realised in fact. I’ll be interested to see how I enjoy her stories, but I expect I’ll like them based on what I’ve read of her to date.
I love what she says about the ocean of stories & why we love stories so much. Your post will help inform my reading of her first book of so called short stories – The Salzburg Tales.
I say so called because it’s not really a short story collection, as you may already know. But it’s certainly a book that celebrates the art & nature of storytelling – a la Chaucer.
I will hopefully have more to say by the end of Christina Stead week, but for now, my beginning is here – http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/2016/11/bronas-salon.html?m=1
Glad you enjoyed that too Brona. And no I don’t know much about Salzburg tales so will be interesting to see what you have to say.
Since 1991? I don’t feel so very bad about the length of time some of my books have been on my shelf then! 😀 What a great introduction. I love stories about stores and essays about stories and all that, so fascinating I think.
Oh no, I’ve showed my shameful hand now, haven’t I! And yes, me too – i.e. love stories about stories, I mean.
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