Solitary Creatures

The cover of the 2007 issue of American Literary Review shows an attractive, virile man emitting "mouthfuls of Everclear at a tiki torch to provoke the flame." The result is fiery yellow, ethereal green, and blazing white. Unfortunately, much of the poetry and prose within the magazine does not match the power and brilliance of its dynamic cover.

Although the prose and poetry are satisfying for their layers of vibrant images and colorful language, less radiant are the lonely characters and cheerless themes. Even so, a few stories and poems move beyond exposing the flaws and weaknesses that repress the human spirit to show how one faces adversity and learns to soar.

Elizabeth Lantz, an introverted twenty year old student, paints dormitory rooms as a summer job and rarely feels comfortable with people her age. "I know that I am a social misfit like my brother Stephen. ... As I stand and watch the party, I wish wholeheartedly for only one thing. I wish to be invisible."

When Elizabeth becomes "the confidante of grown men," she at last moves beyond her self-consciousness and her self-imposed silence. Ultimately, she gains enough confidence to make a move on Jack Lantz "the most gorgeous man alive" (and whom she eventually marries). The story becomes a canvas that she has painted for herself to remember the time she stopped "Being Invisible" (the title of the nonfiction story) and finally perceive herself in a positive and optimistic light.

Likewise, in Mary Jean Babic's story "Clarification," Adele D'Angelo nearly succumbs to invisibility after her husband Frank annuls their thirty-five year marriage. Through dialogue and flashback, the reader learns how Frank diminishes Adele's self-worth, making her feel insignificant and unworthy. He bullies her into doubting herself and insists she sign annulment papers stating that their marriage had never been valid, "had always in fact been imperiled by ...‘psychological immaturity.'"

Adele's gradual transformation from outcast and doormat to independent extrovert begins when she must step to her own defense, but also when she realizes that she can have a productive life beyond Frank. Soon she is "out of her mind with happiness not to be married anymore." What had been a woman besieged by self-doubt and broken in spirit, becomes a person who believes she can live a successful life on her own terms.

Included in the nonfiction section of the magazine is "Constructing Spotted Dog" byNick Kowalczyk. Here a journalist shadows a re-enactor who portrays a Native American at living history events in the Midwest. The piece is a hodge-podge of paragraphs from a variety of points of view, pieced together like building blocks, each attempting to construct a three-dimensional view. Unltimately, in a piece that seems constructed tongue-in-cheek, attempting to be stylistically clever, Kowalcyzk just comes across as cheeky.

In the opening paragraphs of "The Season of Omagongo" by Alan Barstow, a Namibian child is whipped because he played soccer rather than corral the cows, who destroyed a valuable crop. Barstow watches, powerless. His host father, Tate Randu, represents a society where poverty thrives, and where his perception of the human condition prevails. "You Americans, you aid-workers, believe solutions await each problem like brides. It's not true. Especially not in Africa. Whether nothing changes, or the land is seized, or the government buys the farms, people will still suffer."

Barstow tries to defend America, but he is verbally whipped into acquiescence. "You have come here to teach, Alona, but you cannot teach much here. You are learning more than you are teaching. When you return home, spread your message. Teach your people." The implication is enlightening, and the writing excellent. The story unleashes a longing for home, the fear of unfulfilled dreams, and the possibility of misplaced motives among Americans.

In an essay by Barbara J. Moore, "A Personal Reading of Freud's Mourning and Melancholia," the narrator discusses her husband's death and how mourning him was cathartic. Reading it requires an understanding of narcissism, self-realization, idealization, and other psychoanalytical terms, as well as the ability to sustain one's attention through long, circuitous sentences. Perhaps Moore was released of her despair after writing this treatise, but the reader, even someone sympathetic to her sadness, is subjected to a long, sorrowful and unrelenting journey through this woman's personal bell jar.

Several other stories -- character-driven, complex, and well crafted -- also dwell on solitude and despair.