SOURCE: Gordon, Lois. “Come Back, Dr. Caligari.” In Donald Barthelme, pp. 35-61. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1981.

In the following essay, Gordon surveys the dominant thematic concerns of Barthelme's first short story collection, Come Back, Dr. Caligari.

The first collection introduces many of Barthelme's themes and landscapes, most prominently the spiritually weary, contemporary world, brainwashed by popular culture and the media (“Viennese Opera Ball”), a society of people looking for “the right words” (“Florence Green”) and specific scripts with which to duplicate an identity (“For I'm the Boy,” “Big Broadcast,” “Hiding Man,” “Margins”). The theme of failed marriage recurs (“To London and Rome,” “Broadcast,” “For I'm the Boy,” “Will You Tell Me?” “Piano Player”). Another subject, which Barthelme will pursue, is the problem of using words, because “signs” sometimes “lie” (the remarkable “Me and Miss Mandible”). The artist as subject, in his personal and professional life, is the focus of...