Reviews for The Cockatoos: Stories

The average rating for The Cockatoos: Stories based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2013-04-19 00:00:00 Matthew Curley Among the psychological writers Patrick White is one of the best � incredibly deep and analytical. And these six stories are six literary diamonds � many long novels can�t boast such psychological profundity as these short stories manage. Two centrepieces: The Full Belly and The Night the Prowler are two emotional tours de force � I would even say that they are rather psychopathological than just psychological. �She had not been frighten the night the prowler, not really, not from the very beginning. Certainly the unexpectedness of it made her lie rigid; but she wasn�t afraid; she wouldn�t have been afraid if he had stuck the knife, as you read they do; but he didn�t.� I surmise that in any human soul there are enough dark nooks and crannies that are better not to be visited...

Review # 2 was written on 2014-12-09 00:00:00 Cris Russell Considering The Cockatoos, by the Australian Nobel Laureate Patrick White, I find it nearly impossible to arrive at an assessment--here are six long stories, written in a similar style which I can recognize as the work of a master craftsman, yet which also had nearly no affect on me. Each of these stories seem to be trying to illustrate the same bleak worldview by shaving the lives of its protagonists into incredibly fine cross-sections, then illuminating them one facet, one nuance at a time; the effect is dense, finely articulated, and designed for maximum exposure of the interior lives of these people. Yet what the author reveals with these portraits is a world of little joy, of loss and repressed longing, of suppressed rage, and of quiet, confused desperation. It's also true that at times, the stories are so nuanced that I'm not sure if I caught all the details--for sure there is repressed sexuality in some, repressed memories of molestation in others, and few characters who have any idea (as it should be) as to why they do the things that they do. Often they seem compelled by forces within them, forces that were forged in the past and have emerged recently because of some new trauma, or even because of some small trigger that unleashes the pent-up emotions of a lifetime. Whereas Patrick White is more than proficient at bringing these states about in his characters, the bleakness can be a bit unrelenting. These people all live in a state of consciousness that would be unbearable, I'd think, and though I'm sure there are people who manage to do so, the stories in The Cockatoos seem to imply that this is the natural way of things for most people. In this he shares somewhat a similarity with another Nobel Laureate, Alice Munro, whose stories, I think, also seem heavily weighted toward alienation and aloneness. Perhaps it would have made a difference if I'd been able to put more space between reading each story; I pulled The Cockatoos down with eleven other single author collections, and read out of each, round-robin style. It may be that I needed even more time between stories; that may have diminished some of the bleakness I felt overall, and allowed me to appreciate each story without the weight of the preceding one bearing it down. In any case, it does not put me off reading more of Patrick White, as he is a master craftsman, there is no doubt. And it may be that at another time I'd be more receptive to the feelings he tried to evoke in this collection--but I hope not.