‘Lies’ by Ethan Canin

Lies by Ethan Canin, 1980

The magic trick:

A building dread about what our dopey narrator might actually do

“Lies” takes us to working class Boston. Our narrator runs the projector in a local movie theater. He has a girlfriend. He has big dreams.

The world he paints; the action he describes for the reader – it all gives us the idea that perhaps reality isn’t all that he assumes it is or will be. So that’s a nice trick – acing the first-person narrator who isn’t on top of things as much as he thinks he is and letting the reader see the gaps he misses.

But there’s more than that here. There’s something more unique than that difficult but not-altogether-rare magic trick. This narrator embodies a very interesting combination of traits. He’s maybe a leader but he’s also not very bright. He’s very immature and that sometimes makes him sympathetic but maybe even more often makes pathetic. Finally, and I think this is the most important part, there is an air of danger to this story. Is it the narrator’s narcissism? Does it verge on psychotic? I think maybe the reader worries that it might.

The gaps between what he wants and what we sense is likely to be possible grow as the story goes on, as does his confidence that he deserves what he wants. It’s a great way to build dread.

And that’s quite a trick on Canin’s part.

The selection:

I work inside, half the time selling tickets and the other half as a projectionist. It’s not a bad job. I memorize most movies. But one thing about a movie theater is that it’s always dark inside, even in the lobby because of the tinted glass. (You’ve seen that, the way the light explodes in when someone opens the exit door.) But when you work in the ticket booth you’re looking outside to where it’s bright daylight, and you’re looking through the metal bars, and sometimes that makes you think. On a hot afternoon when I see the wives coming indoors for the matinee, I want to push their money back under the slot. I want to ask them what in the world they are doing that for, trading away the light and the space outside for a seat in here.

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