The Underpainter (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Jane Urquhart
- First Published: 1997
- Type of Work: Novel
- Time of Work: The 1890’s to the 1970’s
- Setting: Upstate New York; Ontario, Canada; France; and New York City
- Principal Characters: Austin Fraser, Sara Pengelly, George Kearns, Vivian Lacey (Vi Desjardins), Augusta Moffat, Maggie Pierce
- Genres: Long fiction, Philosophical realism
- Subjects: Love or romance, Alienation, Guilt, Emotions, Reality, Painting or painters, Old age or elderly people
- Locales: New York, NY, France, New York, Ontario, Canada
In her three earlier novels, as well as in her poetry and her short fiction, Jane Urquhart has considered such matters as reality and illusion, the everyday world and the realm of the imagination, and the temptation to escape from life, which, she suggests, is probably experienced, to some degree, by every human being capable of reflective thought. In The Whirlpool (1986), characters are mesmerized by Niagara Falls and the flight into death that it offers them; in Changing Heaven (1990), art is presented as a man’s refuge from the demands of love; and, in Away...
[The entire page is 2027 words long]
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