《我与曼蒂博小姐》作为唐纳德.巴塞尔姆发表的第一篇短篇小说,为他其后的短篇小说创作在主题上提供了一种范式。该短篇虽有卡夫卡式的荒诞情节,但作者的创作意图和后现代主义倾向决定了该小说的主题并非表现卡夫卡式的荒诞。作者把荒诞的世界当成一个理所当然的事实和背景,在这一框架内探讨铺天盖地的文化、政治符号是如何以极为“自然化“的面貌为人们所接受和认同的,同时揭示在这些符号的背后力求掌控人们思想、行为和价值观念的权力运作。该小说是巴塞尔姆对六十年代美国社会政治和文化现象的一个反应,体现了他针砭时弊的一贯文风。"Me and Miss Mandible",the first short story by Donald Barthelme,initiates the subject recurring in his later literary career.Despite its absurd plot,its subject is by no means Kafkanian due to the author's writing intent and postmodernist inclination.Rather,Barthelme regards the absurdity of world as a taken-for-granted background,against which he explores the overwhelming cultural and political signs that are integrated into people's lives in a much naturalized way,and the power structure beneath that tries to take the collective ways of thinking,behaviors and values in control."Me and Miss Mandible" was written as a literary response to the diverse social,cultural and political conditions in the 1960s America
