When You Are Engulfed in Flames

When You Are Engulfed in Flames is a 2008 compilation of humorous essays by American author David Sedaris. His sixth such collection, it traverses many years of Sedaris’ life, infusing his experiences with his signature eccentricity, irony, and charming absurdity. Key themes in the book include the difficulty of sustaining familial relationships, the complexity of sexuality, international travel, and the unpredictability of the modern world. At the same time, the stories are practically impossible to classify together. For its hyperbolic yet poignant connections to contemporary life, the collection met with both critical and commercial success in North America and Europe.

Many of Sedaris’s stories are taken from childhood; he views the absurdity and frustration he felt then as formative to how he perceives the world. Born in the 1960s into a middle-class family in North Carolina, his voice was overwhelmed by his parents’ marital and substance abuse troubles, and his five other siblings’ equally urgent needs. In “This Old House,” his mother’s neglectful parenting “style” is made clear when she hires an even more neglectful nanny. In the present day, he is happily partnered to his longtime boyfriend, Hugh. In the story “Keeping Up,” in which Hugh and Sedaris travel, Sedaris comically acknowledges his dependence on his partner’s far superior logistical skills. In other stories, Sedaris reflects on his sexuality, with particular emphasis on the complex and never-ending process through which one comes to consciousness of one’s sexuality. The story “Road Trips” chronicles a few hitchhiking experiences in the 1970s and 80s in which his patrons made sexual advances. At the time, Sedaris had hardly figured out his own sexuality, creating the perfect storm for a communication breakdown.

Some stories utilize self-deprecating humor to illustrate Sedaris’ unusual ways of looking at the world and responding to things he finds confusing. One of these things is fashion. The story “Buddy, Can You Spare a Tie?” compiles some of the countless fashion mistakes he confidently made. These range from a urine bag called the “Stadium Pal” meant to extend one’s ability to drink while viewing a sports game, to his participation in the questionable trend of bow ties. His obsessive tendencies are further highlighted in “April in Paris,” in which Sedaris visits his French country house only to become obsessed with a single spider making a home there. He proceeds to research spiders’ behavioral habits and feeding patterns, ignoring the rest of the world around him. In “The Monster Mash,” Sedaris visits a morgue, and for a while, thereafter, can only think of death. “Memento Mori,” another morbid story, recalls the time he bought a real human skeleton for Hugh to use as a subject for his art. “Solution to Saturday’s Puzzle” highlights his social awkwardness through a difficult encounter with a couple on a plane. He connects his obsessive and eccentric traits to those of his parents in “Adult Figures Charging Toward a Concrete Stool,” which details their sudden preoccupation with collecting art for their house (despite having minimal art knowledge).



Other stories turn to observations that don’t directly involve the author. “Town and Country” recalls an encounter with a wealthy, high-brow couple and their striking similarities (mainly in their vulgarity) to a poor taxi driver Sedaris encountered shortly before. “All the Beauty You Will Ever Need” profiles a North Carolina couple closed off from the rest of the world who are fascinated with gay sex. Though When You Are Engulfed in Flames shifts almost frenetically between times, topics, and themes, it colors Sedaris’s life story with vitality and creativity.