SOURCE: Labrie, Ross. “The Fiction.” In Howard Nemerov, pp. 29-65. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.

In the following essay, Labrie provides a rare, extensive treatment of Nemerov's fiction.

Nemerov has published two volumes of short stories, A Commodity of Dreams (1959) and Stories, Fables & Other Diversions (1971). A Commodity of Dreams takes its theme from its title story. Exhibiting Nemerov's penchant for fable, the story is set in an English forest where a man has constructed a museum in which his dreams are carefully cataloged and in which objects that have appeared in his dreams are displayed. The museum is a way of preserving Captain Lastwyn's psychic past as well as tangible articles from his undistinguished life: “‘The little boys and girls, my home, the way we used to live, the little things which happened that one doesn't remember. I've had them all back, I have them all back’. ‘Here?’ I asked...