“Caterpillars? Yes, Senator, that’s correct. That was the first sign: caterpillars.”
The person who speaks this line—and indeed every line—in the story is an unidentified individual call to give testimony before Congress about an environmental disaster resulting from a pest control project in Borneo requested by the World Health Organization. The entire narrative—short as it is—takes the form of this individual’s replies to a Senator’s inquiries. The actual questions directed are not supplied, but easily inferred from the witness testimony. This is a good example of just how far-ranging Boyle’s stories are in terms of form, content and style while still maintaining and displaying his sense of irony and satirical humor.
Her hands were cold.
Narrator, “I Dated Jane Austen.” Interestingly, this is both the first and the last sentence of this short, strange and bizarre little sketch in which a man named “Mr. Boyle” goes on a date with Jane Austen that includes a sexy Italian film and a skinhead band performing at a nightclub. Of some interest is that this is not the only story written by Boyle to reference Jane Austen; a teacher’s job in “Hope Rises” that involves a courses studying Jane Austen’s novel is metaphorically described as a prison sentence. So what, exactly, is Boyle’s feeling toward Austen? Who knows, but something, that’s for sure.
He was no Joltin’ Joe, no Sultan of Swat, no Iron Man. For one thing, his feet hurt.
Here, the irony and humor is displayed mock epic style in which the ridiculously named Hector Quesadilla makes Don Quixote look almost positively noble by comparison. It is a baseball story which has been primed for myth practically since being invented. But few of those baseball heroes are at the stage of Hector: an aging, almost decrepit one-time master of the pinch hit. What epically mythic qualities Boyle is able to wring from such an unpromising set-up is one of the reasons for his popularity.
We were all dangerous characters then. We wore torn-up leather jackets, slouched around with toothpicks in our mouths, sniffed glue and ether and what somebody claimed was cocaine.
Arguably, Boyle’s most famous line from inarguably from his most well-known story is packed with contradiction that allows the author to explore with profound irony themes related to innocence, the loss thereof and, on one level, just what the heck did we think we were doing in Vietnam, anyway? These guys are not dangerous at all; they are poseurs trying to look tough. The problem is that when you go around acting tough, you inevitably come across a situation in which you had better back it up. Suffice to say that that incident which takes around the quagmire known as Greasy Lake turns out little better for them than the Vietnam War did for some other poseurs trying to act tough. Except that in this case, these guys actually have to fight their battle themselves.
