The Bay of Angels | The Bay of Angels

At a glance:

Author: Anita Brookner
First Published: 2001
Type of Work: Novel
Time of Work: 1950-2000
Setting: London, England; Nice, France
Principal Characters: Zoë Cunningham, Anne Cunningham, Simon Gould, Adam Crowhurst, Dr. Antoine Balbi
Genres: Long fiction, Domestic realism
Subjects: 1950’s, Girls, 1960’s, 1970’s, Mothers, Parents and children, France or French people, Love or romance, Sex or sexuality, Twentieth century, 1980’s, England or English people, Death or dying, London, Truthfulness and falsehood, Bereavement or grief, 1990’s
Locales: London, England, Nice, France

Faithful readers know that most of Anita Brookner’s novels center on a female character who passively yearns for love. Some, like Theo May in Visitors (1997), are aged and almost catatonic. Others, like Zoë Cunningham in The Bay of Angels, are younger and more energetic.

The reader first meets Zoë as a young girl in the 1950’s. She lives with her youngish widowed mother in a flat in Edith Grove, a genteel street in the farther reaches of Chelsea in southwest London. (Except for Zoë’s visit to a lawyer, the novel’s London scenes all take place in this part...

The Bay of Angels | The Bay of Angels

At a glance:

Join eNotes