May Stevens' paintings weave themes of familial love and loss, societal ills, and the healing power of nature and the human community. This book surveys the full range of her remarkable lifework, from her early social protest paintings to her recent series of luminous, large-format images of lakes, rivers, and other bodies of water. Patricia Hills offers an insightful, in-depth look at Stevens' career, drawing on her own recollections and rounded out by informed commentary. Images and text bring to light Stevens' personal history, her humanitarian concerns, and the social context within which her art evolved.
Three luminous novels from a New York Times–bestselling author and National Book Award finalist whose “prose leaves compelling echoes in one’s mind” (The New York Times Book Review). Throughout her long and acclaimed career, May Sarton refused to be categorized. As a memoirist, poet, and novelist, she broke new ground by openly exploring homosexuality, gender inequality, and other once taboo social issues. Gathered here in one volume are three of her most memorable and moving works of fiction. Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing: Widely regarded as her most important work, Sarton’s 1965 semiautobiographical novel centers upon Hillary Stevens, an author now in her twilight years. As she prepares to publish anew, Stevens sits down to discuss her life, the arc of her creative journey, and her love affairs—with both men and women. “The plot of this short novel is deceptively simple, the mood subtle, the feeling intense” (The New York Times Book Review). A Shower of Summer Days: The Irish estate home Dene Court has been shuttered for years—but this summer Violet Dene Gordon and her husband Charles return from British Burma, electrifying life in the sleepy village that adjoins Violet’s childhood home. As an added complication, Violet’s American niece is being sent to Ireland to separate her from an unsuitable romantic attachment. A National Book Award finalist, “A Shower of Summer Days establishes once and for all [Sarton’s] unmistakable authority” (The New York Times Book Review). The Magnificent Spinster: This “absolutely compelling . . . monument to love . . . [and] friendship” is actually the story of two women: Cam, the novel’s narrator, and the recently deceased Jane Reid. Unmarried and childless, Jane left no family to remember her, so Cam sets out to immortalize the life of her quietly remarkable friend and teacher in fiction (The Cleveland Plain Dealer).
May is a fashionable young lady, who is attentive to her appearance and has numerous friends and acquaintances. Amy is more of a free and independent spirit with several close friends. Both are big fans of professional wresting having attended many live events and know the names and stories behind all the wrestling stars.
This transcript from the film World of Light: A Portrait of May Sarton illuminates the life and writing of the poet while celebrating the joys of creativity, love, and solitude In June of 1979, May Sarton answered the questions of two filmmakers and read to them from her poetry. This four-day “jam session” ultimately became an acclaimed documentary about her life and work. For Sarton, the muse has always been female, and the writer says that her own poems “tell me where to go.” In this rare and inspiring window into a singular woman’s soul, Sarton speaks candidly about everything from how a single image opened the door to writing about her mother to the importance of transparency in art and life. She shares insights into her very personal art, including the unusual people and events that provide inspiration, how creativity can grow out of pain, solitude as a two-edged sword, the difficulties of being a female poet, and the ways love can open “the door into one’s own secret and . . . frightening real self.” Featuring sections entitled “On Inner Space,” “On Nature,” and “On Love,” this revealing volume is also about the need go on, even when up against overwhelming odds. May Sarton: A Self-Portrait pays tribute to an artist’s vision and serves as a revealing window into a fascinating life.
Mary Sarton's ninth novel explores a woman's struggle to reconcile the claims of life and art, to transmute passion ans pain into poetry. As it opens, Hilary Stevens, a renowned poet in her seventies, is talking with Mar, an intense young man who has sought her out and whose passionate despair reminds her of herself when young. Mar has had an unhappy love affair with a man. Bewildered by both his sexuality and his writing talent, he flings his anguish against Hilary's brusque, sympathetic intelligence. The next event in this emotionally charged dayis the arrival of a team of interviewers sent by a leading literary periodical to search out the reasons and mysteries behind the poet's work. In her efforts to answer the questions put to her, Hilary Stevens retraces her past, seeking the link between encounters with the muse, those passionate attachments to women who ignited her imagination, and her own epiphanies. 'We have to dare to be ourselves, ' she says, 'however frightening or strange that self may prove to be.' In taking inventory of her own creative life, Hilary Stevens recalls how the 'mermaids' sang. 'Love opens the doors into everything, as far as I can see, including, and perhaps most of all, the door into one's secret, real self.'"--Jacket.
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