Receiving a call from the State Department that her daughter Pearl has been protesting global violence by chaining herself to a flagpole at the American embassy in Dublin and refusing to eat, liberal New Yorker and single mother Maria Meyers heads to Ireland to save her daughter, while Pearl's surrogate father, Joseph Kasperman, flies in from Rome to help. Reader's Guide available. Reprint. 35,000 first printing.

In Conversations with Mary Gordon, Mary Gordon reveals her intellectual vigor, her freewheeling humor, and her strongly held opinions on issues ranging from sex to contemporary literature and gender theory. With candor, she details her departure from and eventual return to her Irish-Catholic heritage. Since the resounding success of her first novel, Final Payments (1978), Gordon has been one of America's most popular and controversial writers. She has published five novels, three novellas, two collections of essays, a short story collection, a memoir, a biography of Joan of Arc, and dozens of book reviews. Conversations with Mary Gordon joins the writer in talks with Terry Gross, Charlie Rose, Edmund White, Madison Smartt Bell, Patrick H. Samway, and others. Nine of these interviews have never before been published. Her many interviewers know her as a wonderful, gregarious, passionate, and articulate interviewee. This is surprising, considering that Gordon once insisted during an interview that "interviews are absolutely my idea of hell." The clarity and conviction evident in her writing are matched by the same qualities in her conversation. She explores her favorite novelists--Virginia Woolf, Jane Austen, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Ford Madox Ford--and talks at length about how and why she uses Roman Catholicism as metaphor and symbol in her own writing. Freely discussing the autobiographic influences in her work, she is open about the huge influence of her father. David Gordon, a journalist and scholar, died when Mary was seven. Mary loved him dearly, and she discusses his influence on her life and writing, as well as her profound disillusionment with him when she discovered the self-hatred and ultra-conservatism of his writing. Her utter devotion to him in early interviews gives way to disillusionment, rejection, and, ultimately, acceptance. This collection allows the reader to trace the roots--both literary and autobiographical--of one of America's most fiercely intelligent and thoughtful writers. Alma Bennett is an associate professor of humanities and English at Clemson University.

The author looks at eight locations that have shaped her life and career, including her grandmother's house, her babysitter's house, a neighbor's house, a vacation rental where she often worked, and the public spaces of the church and university. (view table of contents)

Describes the domestic obligations, social limitations, and economic factors which impede literary creativity in women

Product Description: Book by Gordon, Mary

Product Description: In The Shadow Man, the bestselling author of Final Payments and The Company of Women elevates the memoir into an uncompromising and unforgettable art form as she seeks to learn the truth about her lost father. 20 photos.

A passionate artist cannot refuse an offer from a wealthy man to be her muse and provide the time, space, and money for her to paint, but she suddenly becomes a great success and his star fades, which makes the dynamic in their relationship change

A passionate artist cannot refuse an offer from a wealthy man to be her muse and provide the time, space, and money for her to paint, but she suddenly becomes a great success and his star fades, which makes the dynamic in their relationship change.

Product Description: Contributors to this issue include: Alice Adams, E. M. Broner, Bliss Broyard, Susan Daitch, Tim Gautreaux, Patricia Hampl, Ethan Hauser, Lucy Honig, Carole Maso, Joyce Carol Oates, Richard Panek, David Plante, Helen Schulman, Maxine Swann, Eileen Tobin, Nola Tully, Meg Wolitzer

Reissued to coincide with the release of the movie version, a controversial novel, banned in Ireland in 1936 for its frank depiction of lesbianism, follows an Irish woman who becomes involved with a fellow expatriate in Spain. Movie tie-in. (view table of contents)

(view table of contents)

Product Description: Twayne's United States Authors, English Authors, and World Authors Series present concise critical introductions to great writers and their works.Devoted to critical interpretation and discussion of an author's work, each study takes account of major literary trends and important scholarly contributions and provides new critical insights with an original point of view...read more

In 'Immaculate Man', a virgin priest finds love; a journalist alters his lover's life in 'Living at Home'; and in 'The Rest of Life', a teenager is inspired by the Romantic poets to make a suicide pact.

While temporarily separated from her husband, on an academic fellowship in France, Anne Foster must cope with writing a catalogue for an important art exhibition and dealing with the sitter she has hired for her children

Product Description: Essays, Literary Studies, Literary Fiction

A tale spanning two continents brings three generations of the McNamara clan together to help fulfill a sixty-year-old promise to Ellen, the family's dying matriarch

Six writers discuss the novel-like structure of the Catholic mass, the history of religious writing, self-discovery, Biblical language, and the influence of Eastern religions

Product Description: "A superb, stunningly written novel." The Philadelphia InquirerRaised by five intensely religious women and a charismatic, controversial priest, sheltered from the secular world, Felicitas Maria Taylor is intelligent, charming, and desperate for a taste of ordinary happiness...read more

Six writers discuss the novel-like structure of the Catholic mass, the history of religious writing, self-discovery, Biblical language, and the influence of Eastern religions

A collection of twenty-one stories, including a trio of interrelated stories that deal with the Irish immigrant experience in the United States

Product Description: Book by Gordon, Mary