You May Not Be Interested in Absurdity, But Absurdity Is Interested in You

Donald Barthelme? Fannie Hurst? Gore Vidal?

Dear Quote Investigator: A wide variety of sayings have employed the following template:

You may not be interested in X, but X is interested in you.

Different terms have been substituted for X including: war, politics, dialectic, and strategy. In addition, variant templates have occurred:

We may not be interested in X, but X is interested in us.

I am interested in a version used by the postmodern storyteller Donald Barthelme with the word “absurdity”. Would you please help me to find a citation?

Quote Investigator: In 1963 Donald Barthelme published the short story “A Shower of Gold” in “The New Yorker”. The character Mr. Peterson applied to appear on a television show called “Who Am I?”, and he was interviewed by Miss Arbor. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:^[1] 1963 November 12, The New Yorker, A Shower of Gold by Donald Barthelme, Start Page 33, Quote Page 33, Column 2, The New Yorker Magazine Inc., New York. (Scans at newyorker.com; accessed July 28, 2021)

“What I want to know now, Mr. Peterson, is this: are you interested in absurdity?”

“Miss Arbor,” he said, “to tell you the truth, I don’t know. I’m not sure I believe in it.”

“Oh, Mr. Peterson!” Miss Arbor said, shocked. “Don’t say that! You’ll be …”

“Punished?” Peterson suggested.

“You may not be interested in absurdity,” she said firmly, “but absurdity is interested in you.”

As the story progressed Peterson changed his viewpoint:^[2]1963 November 12, The New Yorker, A Shower of Gold by Donald Barthelme, Start Page 33, Quote Page 37, Column 1, The New Yorker Magazine Inc., New York. (Online New Yorker archive at newyorker.com; … Continue reading

I was wrong, Peterson thought, the world is absurd. The absurdity is punishing me for not believing in it. I affirm the absurdity. On the other hand, absurdity is itself absurd.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

In 1941 the popular author Fannie Hurst addressed a “Freedom Day” rally in Cleveland, Ohio, and she used an expression with the word “war” that matched the template:^[3]1941 November 17, Cleveland Plain Dealer, 6,000 Here Assail Hostage Slayings (Continuation title: 6,000 Hit Strikes In Freedom Rally) by George Z. Griswold, Start Page 1, Quote Page 4, Column 5, … Continue reading

“We may not be interested in this war, but it is interested in us. I’m not trying to sell it to you, but no one can evade the fact that we are in the path of the storm. We dare not be disunited when liberty, the most precious jewel in our national strongbox, is at stake.

A separate QI article about the expression using “war” is available here.

In 1963 Donald Barthelme’s tale containing the quotation appeared in “The New Yorker”.

In 1964 the tale “A Shower of Gold” was reprinted in the collection “Come Back, Dr. Caligari” by Barthelme. Thus, the quotation achieved further distribution.^[4]1965 (1964 Copyright) Come Back, Dr. Caligari by Donald Barthelme, Short Story: A Shower of Gold, Start Page 129, Quote Page 130 and 137, Anchor Books: Doubleday & Company, Garden City, New York. … Continue reading

In 1974 novelist and commentator Gore Vidal published the essay “American Plastic: The Matter of Fiction”. He examined the works of Barthelme and others. Vidal struggled to appreciate the quip:^[5]1977, Matters of Fact and of Fiction: Essays 1973-1976 by Gore Vidal, Essay: American Plastic: The Matter of Fiction, (Reprinted from “The New York Review of Books” on July 15, 1974), … Continue reading

One can read any number of Barthelme’s lines with a certain low-keyed pleasure. But then silliness stops the eye cold. “‘You’re supposed to be curing a ham.’ ‘The ham died,’ she said.” The Marx Brothers could get a big laugh on this exchange because they would already have given us a dozen other gags in as many minutes. Unhappily one small gag on its own shrivels and dies. “‘You may not be interested in absurdity,’ she said firmly, ‘but absurdity is interested in you.’”

In 1982 the story “A Shower of Gold” appeared in the collection “Sixty Stories” by Barthelme. Thus, the quotation continued to circulate.^[6] 1982, Sixty Stories by Donald Barthelme, Short Story: A Shower of Gold, Start Page 14, Quote Page 15 and 22, E. P. Dutton, New York (Verified with scans)

In conclusion, Donald Barthelme should receive credit for employing this quotation.

Image Notes: Public domain image of a painting of Sisyphus by Titian circa 1548-49. Image has been cropped and resized.

(Great thanks to quotation expert Fred Shapiro who in 2018 asked the members of a mailing list to suggest memorable quotations from short stories. QI submitted this line from Barthelme’s story.)