The role in socialization of the last thing you should do in polite society: "The Stackpole Legend" by Wendell Berry (2025 O.Henry Anthology)

I've blogged Best American Short Stories nearly every year for the past seven years, but I've only done the Best Short Stories anthology, a.k.a. The O.Henry Awards, twice. Both times I did O.Henry, I did it after BASS. This year, I'm aiming to switch the order and do O.Henry first. I don't know if I can get all the way through O.Henry by the time BASS comes out in a little over a month. I'm hopefully starting a new job soon, and it's going to take up a lot of my better brain cells for a while. But I don't want to not start something just because I might fail to finish it. So here we go.

For a long time, I didn't read much contemporary fiction. I think I felt like there were the classics and there was contemporary fiction, and contemporary fiction had to be all frivolous, or else its products would be classics. Since I wanted to write what would become classical fiction myself, I decided to stay away from anything that wasn't already on college syllabi. I'm not sure how, in my highly circular system of evaluation, anything new could become considered classic, since its failure to already be considered a classic meant it must not be one, but it was my system. It's really only been in the last dozen or so years that I've read books written by people who were alive when I read them. 

I wonder what my brain would have done if, by chance, the first contemporary writer I had chosen to read had been Wendell Berry, because reading Berry is a lot like reading all those authors that a high school student encounters in the first semester of American Lit. The language is a bit more up to date, although still full of some anachronisms, but if one of his stories was slipped into a high school class next to Twain or Washington Irving, a student might very well not notice the difference. 

"The Stackpole Legend," which leads off the 2025 O.Henry anthology, is a good example of a story with a 19th-century feel in a 21st century book. Its entire presentation as one of many local legends collected by an author who is more aw-shucks-I-just-came-across-this than the thundering man of tortured genius the 20th century created reminds me more of "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" than it does any work of the last hundred years.

This throwback feel is Berry's signature style. I try not to write too much commentary on writers themselves on this blog and focus only on the work, but with Berry, it's kind of important to know that you're reading someone whose entire oeuvre as well as personal life is an effort to turn the clock back. Much of his work takes place in the past of his fictional Port William, as does this story. 

Berry thinks modern society is unhealthy for humans, both individually and as a society, but rather than write entirely about what's wrong about us, he writes a lot about humans in a bygone age to show what a different relationship with the world would look like. That isn't to say that every story he writes is a rosy picture of the past, a sort of MAGA literary movement that goes back to 1850 instead of 1950 the way the current political MAGA does. But his stories from the past do present us here today with a different way of viewing human nature, both individually and in a social context.

Socialization

"The Stackpole Legend" is a fable about how socialization happens. We follow the life of Delinthus Stackpole, one of Port William's residents long ago. Delinthus is made fun of for his name, but he neutralizes his would-be tormentors by simply not realizing they were teasing him. Soon after, the boys his age, thinking him slow, try to bully him by pushing him, but they realize that, just as Delinthus will not be teased, he will also not be pushed. This is how he earns the nickname "Stump," presumably because he is as hard to move as the stump of a tree is hard to pull out. 

Since he was raised in a very small society of three on his family's farm, one in which he did very little talking because it simply wasn't needed, he is bewildered by the avalanche of questions to be answered that he faces when he enters school. He is happy to let others do the talking. One could look at this and say that it was the relative isolation Stump grew up with, having only his parents nearby and not speaking much with them, that made socialization difficult when he began school, but it's actually the opposite. It is the solidity and certainty of his value and place in his family that prepares him for life outside the farm. His unique upbringing is what allows him to remain unbothered when introduced to social life at school. He might take longer to become part of the community, but he at least survives childhood unharmed by society--more than most people can say--and when he decides he is ready, he turns out to have all the tools he needs. Stump is able to navigate his way into society precisely because his personality is first made secure and unmovable through isolation. Stump's progression is to first be secure in himself, and then to try to find how to make that self fit into a larger world. 

Stump is impervious to the mean side of social life, which does him a lot of good, but he is also unable to enjoy the positive aspects of living in a community, and therein lies his arc. When both his parents die, he realizes the same thing Adam realized when alone in the Garden of Eden: it is not good for man to be alone. But Stump, who has been content to not speak for most of his life, suddenly finds himself in need of speaking if he is to find a wife to end his loneliness. 

Stump feels lost, but he does, in fact, know everything he needs to know in order to develop his capacity for speech. "To say something, he had to begin by saying nothing" is now the narrator put his reluctance to speak, but it also sums up Stump's progression. He becomes part of society by first not being part of it, and he learns to speak by first being silent. If the path to socialization of young people today is thrown off by too much togetherness through social media and other forms of technological togetherness at too young an age, Stump, by contrast, is able to follow a much more natural path of silence then speaking, of learning to be comfortable being alone before learning to be comfortable being with others.  

When he finally gets up the nerve to talk to Kizzie, he feels "himself pushed backward" by his question, but "he held his ground." His practice at being "not pushed" that came in his pre-social days has prepared him for his dive into society. 

The fart

I'd bet a lot of us have heard many stories from friends and family that involve passing gas in embarrassing ways. It's a pretty normal topic of conversation for real tales, but not for literary ones. High literature might include frank depictions of sex or the gory details of injury or illness, but I can't think of a single story from one of the "best of" anthologies of the past many years that had a fart in it. Literary fiction is seemingly like the female-dominated planet Gazorpazorp in Rick and Morty, where it is referred to as "the sound we do not name because it does not exist." 

"The Stackpole Legend" not only includes passing gas, but it's the climax of the story. Stump gets up the nerve to take Kizzie out for a buggy ride, but this is no "Surrey with the Fringe on Top" kind of trip. Kizzie is curiously quiet, and for once, Stump can't stop talking, because he is no longer comfortable with silence. He keeps talking and talking, which makes him more and more nervous, until pressure starts to build up inside. He tries to cover over the sound of his fart by firing his revolver into the air, but it misfires, meaning she hears the whole thing. She laughs, and soon he does to, and that's what opens the door to them having a long life together.

Chicks and ducks and geese better scurry away from this fart I just ripped.

In modern couples' therapy wisdom, there is something of a split verdict on the value of couples breaking wind in the presence of one another. Some say it promotes intimacy, because you're being real with one another and doing in each others' presence what you wouldn't do in polite society, which makes you both co-conspirators of a sort. The other school says that it takes the mystery and the romance out of a relationship. Couples should strive to impress one another as much after marriage as they did before, so the thinking goes, and that means still going on dates and thinking of thoughtful gifts and romantic gestures and not farting, burping, or going to the bathroom in the presence of the other. 

Stump's flatulence is involuntary. He didn't mean to do it. It's possible he will go the rest of his life and never fart in front of Kizzie again, because now he won't be as nervous. For them, at least, it's a faux pas that Kizzie generously interprets (as she also interpreted his accidental touch of one of her softer areas). She laughs at it, and this laughter is what allows "Nature" and the preacher to guide them to the altar. Stump has missed out on society at its worst, the mob mentality, but it isn't until he shares a laugh with Kizzie that he gets to enjoy society at its best.

Nature

Nature looms large in "Stackpole." Stump eyes up potential mates with the eye of a "stockman," comparing them to livestock. The "Nature" that lays the way before Stump and Kizzie is capitalized. Nature is best when it's in harmony with society, as in the case of Bill the horse, who is always ready to go when he needs to go, and always ready to stop. And the best way for a person to integrate into society is naturally, as Stump has done. 

Portrait of an artist

You could probably turn about half of all art into self-referential works about art, and this story is no different. When Stump realizes he needs to start talking to people, he begins by talking to himself. When someone catches his talking to himself, he quickly makes up a lie about what he is doing. He finds, to his own surprise, that he is pretty good at making up lies. What is making up lies but writing fiction? He also opens up his imagination to start asking himself what someone else might be thinking, frequently questioning "how do you reckon" someone would react if they saw his home. Trying to imagine what someone else might be feelings is foundational both to writing fiction and to the empathy upon which all life in a society is grounded. 

Style

As I said up above, the narrative style is a throwback. The narrator slips himself into the story, but as a cataloguer of the legends of Port William, not as a character within the story itself. He uses folksy devices, such as turning God's declaration in Genesis of "It is not good for the man to be alone" into "the world's first piece of good advice." The are numerous euphemisms and some hilarious use of litotes, both of which are characteristic of how an old person might tell a real, spoken story, but neither of which is used in the same rhetorical fashion in much literary fiction nowadays. Literary fiction and a good yarn have little to do with one another. Except in Wendell Berry. 

I've mused before on why the best literary writers don't seem to tell stories the way our best story-telling friends do. It's nice once in a while to enjoy a pace and tone that's a little more like the everyday tales our co-workers might tell, the ones we stop our work for a minute to hear. 

Future

Kizzie and Stump have four boys and a girl. They children all go off to school, and eventually they move off to the city, into the "world of the future." Their background of hard work and love on a farm ensures they succeed when they go off into the world, but it also means they never come back home, and eventually, the Stackpole name disappears from Port William. Here, the story lays out an irony of the idyllic life in which Stump was raised. Its success leads to its own demise. Stump was raised with the right mix of solitude and society, and so were his kids, but they eventually move off to cities, where they--and most of America--will now have too little solitude, too much community. The America that balances the individual and society, leading to healthier versions of both, will disappear. To a nation that now cannot even conceive of things being different, the narrator presents a version of life from the past, one in which a different balance of individual and society existed, to suggest what ails us.

Does God still love you if your football team sucks?

"If there's a god, he's laughing at us 

and our football team." 

-from "Effington" by Ben Folds

When I was young, I used to get angry when a team in any sport I was rooting for lost. Like, really angry. I'd throw things and storm out of the house. I remember once I was so angry that as I was running out of the house, I needed something to throw, and the only thing I could think of was the watch I was wearing. I really loved that watch, which I'm sure was just a cheap digital one you could get anywhere, but back then, it was one of the things I had that I cared most about. I couldn't even wait to unstrap that watch to throw it, so I ripped it off my wrist, essentially destroying the band so I couldn't wear it anymore. 

Thinking back, even I have a hard time understanding what upset me so much, but I think part of it was the way I felt like my team losing was rejection of me, personally. By God, or the universe, or whatever was in charge. Fans irrationally take part in feelings of celebration when their team wins, so I guess it's natural that I irrationally felt a vicarious participation in the losses of the teams I was rooting for. 

It's easy to believe sometimes that some people get more of a share of success than one person needs.

Because I grew up in Northeast Ohio, it was easy to think that I grew up among a cursed people. Even as I got older and less superstitious about such things, it was hard to shake at least some gut feeling that really good things only happened to other people. People who lived in some place you'd never heard of and would never be fortunate enough to go, places where people who had it all figured out lived. 

To some extent, America encourages linking the success of your sports team with the favor of God. We are admonished that true fans always believe, even when things seem bad. This is exactly the kind of faith we are told to have in God. The gospel of true fandom in America tells us that we should always be true to our team, that rooting for another team is like cheating on your spouse, or worshipping a false idol. When I lived in the DC region for two decades, which was full of at least as many people from other places as from around the area, you were as likely to see football jerseys from all over the country as you were to see a Ravens or a Commanders one. It was like wearing a wedding ring, showing the world that your football love was not subject to change, no matter where the universe had placed you for work.

When I first moved near Baltimore, I was determined I would never, ever root for the Ravens. They weren't just a different team from the Cleveland Browns, they literally used to be the Browns. When owner Art Model took the team (remembered in my part of Ohio the way some people remember Benedict Arnold selling out his country), he moved it to Baltimore. Then, the team had the audacity to be good, winning two Super Bowls, while Cleveland has still never been to one. 

After a while, though, I couldn't help but at least admire the Ravens. In the NFL, which actively tries to create parity and avoid dynasties, the Ravens seem to be good almost every year. Clearly, they do something with their franchise that teams like the Browns only wish they could do. Over time, that admiration turned to liking them and actively wanting them to win games. If the Browns aren't doing especially well, then in a Browns-Ravens game, I am definitely hoping the Ravens win. 

Officially, I've evolved as a fan to where I try very hard not to root for teams. I realize every team has plenty of players and coaches and fans with stories that, if you just knew about them, would make you want all their dreams to come true. I try to appreciate the game now and notice the best players doing their thing without pulling internally for one outcome or other. One way I try to help myself to watch in a detached way is to bet for the team I suspect I might find myself rooting against. If the Chiefs are playing the Eagles, and I want the Chiefs to lose, I'll bet for them to win. That way, there is at least something telling me it's okay if they win, some impulse to counteract the one in me that irrationally thinks it unfair if they keep winning. Even with this system in place, though, it's hard for me often to maintain my pledged neutrality. There's something in us that makes us pick sides. 

Years ago, when Tim Tebow had his short run in the NFL, he had a streak where his team won a bunch of games in a row. Although Tebow didn't play that well, his team had a good defense that would keep them in games, and then Tebow would pull off some scramble for a long gain near the end of the game that would win it for them. An evangelical friend of mine was sure God's hand was in those wins. I challenged him on it. Surely, Tebow wasn't the only evangelical on the field. At the ends of NFL games, players from both teams often come together for prayer. It's a violent game where any play can bring about the end of a career. It's understandable if players lean on divine help to cope with the stress. My friend thought, though, that because of Tebow's public persona as a Christian, that God was using him to spread the gospel, and Tebow's miraculous victories were part of that. I wonder how the lopsided loss of Tebow and his Broncos to Tom Brady's Patriots that eventually ended their season fit into God's plan.

I actually like Tebow as a person, by the way.

Ultimately, I doubt any divine force is guiding the outcome of football games. If there is any kind of supernatural power with the ability to intervene in history, I'm not sure we can even get its attention enough to avert genocides or famines, let alone get the Browns back to the playoffs. In the epigraph, Ben Folds imagines a God laughing at our football team, which is reminiscent of the old adage that if you want to make God laugh, you should tell him your plans. If there's some kind of power that created us and watches us, it has its own ideas about the way things should work out. 

But that doesn't keep us from agonizing as our teams are in close games, from praying if we're the praying sort or simply trying to project our will if we're not, so that our teams might prevail. We don't think about the fans of the other team doing the same thing. Or if we do, we imagine that they're bad people who deserve the agony of defeat. There are definitely people out there who have strong opinions on how Eagles fans or Cowboys fans are all terrible, and who take special joy in the losses of those teams because of the imagined gnashing of teeth in those cities. Sports may have some good effects on us as a society. They might have encouraged our sense of the importance of law and fair play. But they also almost certainly encourage a provincial mindset, one in which solidarity is difficult to achieve. People in a bar in Akron can't even watch a game without demonizing the fans 100 miles to the east in Pittsburgh. 

I don't believe God, or whatever hypothetical being who runs things, cares about the outcome of football games. The universe runs on its own laws, and when people with extraordinary talent vie with one another to achieve something under those laws, amazing results happen on their own. That doesn't mean that luck doesn't play a role, and often, luck can feel like divine intervention. 

Football is a microcosm every weekend of the whole human drama. Massive populations--the fans--have their hopes tied up in the decisions of small organizations, and ultimately in the performance of a very select group of athletes whom history has favored to be on the field at that moment. When our teams win, it is tempting to think God favored us, much as when our country wins a war, it is tempting to think the same. That is, to think that God wanted to enemy to lie shattered and broken and weeping for its dead. When our teams lose, especially in heart-breaking fashion, it is tempting to ask why, or to seek for the head of someone responsible. Generally, though, when we have lost, it's because the other team had better coaching and/or players. There's nothing more to it than that. Or, if we were evenly matched and the game was very close, there was some luck involved. If the teams had played a hundred times, our team might have won 55 of them, but they just didn't win that one game. 

God doesn't love you if your team sucks. But then, he doesn't love you if your team wins, either. Football is like life in that most of the time, it's going to end in sadness and defeat, either this week or next. You might get a few moments of real triumph in your life, if you're lucky. To me, football is an invitation not to the tribalism of banding together with others rooting for the same team, but a call to sympathize with everyone, everywhere who shares with me in miserable, mostly futile hopes.

Unless the Browns win a Super Bowl, in which case, y'all's teams suck.