R. A. Lafferty in the New York Times

I didn't expect to see Lafferty mentioned in the New York Times; I was pleasantly surprised. Quoting from Bill Hader's recommendation of the story collection Nine Hundred Grandmothers:

You get the feeling like it’s a guy just writing to amuse himself: “I don’t care if any of this makes sense, but I want to see weird stuff happen.” One of his stories starts off, “He began by breaking things that morning.” There’s a short story called “Ginny Wrapped in the Sun,” and it’s just about this little girl who’s super strong, running around, picking things up. You get such a sense of joy and boundless imagination in every sentence – even if the story doesn’t totally cohere, you feel like it’s about something.

Actually, beneath his crazy brilliant ebullient prose Lafferty is often dead serious. See for example stories like "The World as Will and Wallpaper" or "You can't go back".

By the way, "Ginny Wrapped in the Sun" is an apocalyptic tale full of allusions to the Book of Revelation. The title refers to the "woman clothed in the sun" of Revelation 12:1-10, who was the subject of a famous painting by William Blake. One character is called Krios, which is greek for "lamb". He is killed at the end. Ginny is going to "stay in a cave for twelve hundred and sixty days". That is reminiscent of:

And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.

(The Bible, King James Version. Revelations 12:6)

I suppose there are more biblical references, but I didn't catch them. I'm also puzzled about the overall meaning of the story. Because it seems to have a meaning, only I can't make head nor tail of it.

Anyway, if only this were the beginning of some kind of RAL revival! A chance to get some of his more elusive volumes back in print. Or printed for the first time...