All Things Consoled |
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Author:
| Hay, Elizabeth |
ISBN: | 978-0-85705-912-3 |
Publication Date: | Aug 2019 |
Publisher: | Quercus
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Imprint: | MacLehose Press |
Book Format: | Paperback |
List Price: | AUD $36.99 |
Book Description:
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Winner of the 2018 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Award for Non-fictionA poignant, complex and hugely resonant memoir about the shift from being a daughter to a guardian and caregiver, by a prizewinning author.From Elizabeth Hay, one of Canada's most celebrated novelists, comes a startling and beautiful memoir about the drama of her parents' end, and the longer drama of being their daughter.Jean and Gordon Hay were a formidable pair. She was an artist and superlatively...
More Description Winner of the 2018 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Award for Non-fictionA poignant, complex and hugely resonant memoir about the shift from being a daughter to a guardian and caregiver, by a prizewinning author.From Elizabeth Hay, one of Canada's most celebrated novelists, comes a startling and beautiful memoir about the drama of her parents' end, and the longer drama of being their daughter.Jean and Gordon Hay were a formidable pair. She was an artist and superlatively frugal; he was a proud and principled schoolteacher with an explosive temper. Elizabeth, the so-called difficult child, always suspected she would end up caring for them in their final years, in part to atone for her childhood sins.Philip Roth once said, "Old age is a massacre". ALL THINGS CONSOLED takes you inside the massacre as Hay's ferociously independent parents become increasingly dependent on her.With remarkable wit and honesty, Hay lays bare the agony of a family coping as old age turns into the tragedy of living too long. In the end she arrives at a more nuanced understanding of her mother and father, and of herself as their daughter. They were and remain the two vivid giants in her life.