October Light (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: John Gardner
- First Published: 1976
- Type of Work: Novel
- Genres: Long fiction, Domestic realism
- Subjects: 1970’s, Politics, Rural or country life, Brothers and sisters, New England, Farms, farmers, or farming, Conservatism, Liberalism, Guns
- Locales: Bennington, VT, Vermont
Published in 1976, October Light was in one sense Gardner's bicentennial novel, a symbolic retelling of the American Revolution through the lives of two elderly Vermont residents, James Page and his sister, Sally Page Abbott. The struggle between the two recapitulates, in miniature, the conflict between the colonists and Great Britain, while the small New England community where they live comes to represent the United States—its past and its promise.
On another, deeper, level the novel focuses on a theme which Gardner found compelling and which is the basis for his...
[The entire page is 1514 words long]
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