In ‘The Headless Hawk’, Vincent – an art gallery employee – has a painting presented to him by a girl with “trancelike eyes” who he initially dismisses as being “dressed like a freak”. The painting, though lacking “technical merit” nevertheless has “that power often seen in something deeply felt, but primitively conveyed”. Entranced by the painting, which the girl possibly painted while housed in some kind of institution, Vincent buys it for himself. Somehow, the painting conveys all Vincent’s life’s failures, which leads him to a fascination with the painter, as he wonders “who was she that she should know so much?”
He embarks on an affair with the woman, though he is ultimately disgusted by both her and the painting, possibly because he sees himself reflected in both.
This might be a study of psychosis or insanity. If the girl is crazy, does that mean Vincent is too, given that he sees himself in her painting? Is his appearance of sanity simply an act? Though there’s something dark and unpleasant at the heart of this story, it remains elusive. It’s a puzzle that the reader can return to over and over again, trying to figure out its meaning.
First published in The Tree of Night and Other Stories, Random House, 1949, and collected in The Complete Stories, Penguin Modern Classics, 2005
A Personal Anthology 