The Abyss (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Marguerite Yourcenar
- First Published: 1968
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Historical realism
- Time of Work: 1510-1569
- Setting: Flanders and Northern Europe
- Principal Characters: Zeno, Henry Maximilian, Hilzonda Ligre, Martha Adriansen, Jean-Louis de Berlaimont
- Genres: Long fiction, Historical fiction, Biographical fiction
- Subjects: Self-discovery, Philosophy or philosophers, Sex or sexuality, Suicide, Europe or Europeans, Capital punishment, Trials, Truth, Cults, Sixteenth century, Catholics or Catholic Church, Alchemy, Inquisition, Catholic, Reformation
- Locales: Europe, Flanders
Form and Content
In The Abyss, Marguerite Yourcenar combines chronological order and flashbacks, both short and long, to juxtapose a single character against a complicated historical background. She introduces the reader to her protagonist, Zeno, in his twentieth year, when he has already embarked on his quest for knowledge of self and the world. In “The Wanderings,” the first of three parts, Yourcenar’s narrative crisscrosses time and space just as Zeno crisscrosses Europe. The novel opens as he meets his younger cousin Henry Maximilian on the roads of France. On...
[The entire page is 2243 words long]
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