Maud Martha (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Gwendolyn Brooks
- First Published: 1953
- Type of Work: Novel
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Bildungsroman, Domestic realism
- Subjects: African Americans, Values, Family or family life, Racism, Love or romance, Gender roles, Social issues, Marriage, 1940’s, Prejudices or antipathies, 1930’s, Chicago, Beauty, Emotions, Women’s issues, Sisters, Childbirth, Holidays, Idealism, Infants, Lifestyles
- Locales: Chicago, IL
In the first of the novel's thirty-four brief chapters, the seven-year-old Maud Martha Brown yearns to be “cherished” in the way that she perceives her sister Helen, two years older, to be. The same motif of sibling envy pops up late in the novel when Maud Martha's mother, Belva, reveals that Helen wants to marry the family doctor, a man much older. This revelation (the girls’ father is thinking of changing doctors) leads to Maud Martha's musing that “It's funny how some people are just charming, just pretty, and others, born of the same parents, are just not.” The best...
[The entire page is 1400 words long]
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