The Stone Angel (Masterplots II: American Fiction Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Margaret Laurence
- First Published: 1964
- Type of Plot: Character study
- Time of Work: The 1930’s
- Setting: Manawaka, Manitoba, a fictitious prairie town
- Principal Characters: Hagar Shipley, Bram Shipley, Marvin Shipley, John Shipley
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Bildungsroman, Family literature
- Subjects: Family or family life, Self-discovery, Memory, Mothers, Parents and children, Alienation, Guilt, Class consciousness, Emotions, Mental illness, Death or dying, Canada or Canadians, Small-town life, Old age or elderly people, Pretensions
- Locales: British Columbia, Canada, Vancouver, Canada
The Novel
The Stone Angel offers a portrait of a remarkable character who at age ninety confronts her mortality and is terrified, for all she can see behind her is a wasteland of personal failures. Yet her terror becomes the necessary catalyst for a change of heart and a measure of grace that marks her final days.
Hagar Shipley looms large on nearly every page. The novel works mainly through the flashback memories of a ninety-year-old matron who faces the need for a nursing home. Her case is terminal, but she is not ready to die. Too many ghosts from the past...
[The entire page is 2170 words long]
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