Dybek Receives MacArthur Grant

Short story author Stuart Dybek is among this year’s recipients of MacArthur Foundation grants.

It’s weird. I love short stories. However, I haven’t read much of Dybek’s work. I remember his collection The Coast of Chicago but that’s about it. And of ocurse there’s his great story Death of the Right Fielder. I do recall with great fondness his story, We Didn’t. Off the top of my head, I can’t remember the year. But the story was included in an edition of Best American Short Stories. It was one of the first stories that really started to click for me. I suppose this was in the early to mid nineties and I had gotten over the period of having nightmares about Barry Hannah the night before going into his workshop. Contemporary fiction had started to mean something to me. I started to really be affected by it and to understand why this story was successful and that story wasn’t, at least in one person’s opinion. And I picked up that year’s BASS and there was We Didn’t.

It was one of the first stories that really started to click for me. I suppose this was in the early to mid nineties and I had gotten over the period of having nightmares about Barry Hannah the night before going into his workshop. Contemporary fiction had started to mean something to me. I started to really be affected by it and to understand why this story was successful and that story wasn’t, at least in one person’s opinion. And I picked up that year’s and there was .So congratulations to Stuart Dybek. I’m going to pull that copy of BASS off the shelf and re-read that story tonight.

[From Ed]