I
first read this book in my final year of high school when one girl
complained to the teacher because she didn't think it was right for us
to have to read a boring old story about some old lady dying. My
seventeen-year-old self scorned her. I remember being in complete awe of
the skill of Margaret Laurence, and if truth be told, in awe of any
author who had achieved the definition of success: the published novel.
I was willing to accept the value of a book merely because someone had
deemed it worthy enough to print. Although my definiton for literary
success has become somewhat stricter,
The Stone Angel has never wavered from it's position amongst my favourites.
The
value I saw in fiction was, and is, empathic travel inside the world of
another. It is easy to dismiss others as losers and idiots from our
comfortable positions in front of the television screen or behind the
wheel of the car, but when we sit beside, or attempt to get inside the
mind of another, we see the fine line between Me and You, Us and Other.
We have the potential to see and understand that action is not always
just a random and meaningless act, that people all around us have a full
and complete history we may know nothing about; it is that personal
history that informs their behaviour, their preferences, their actions.
Hagar
Shipley is different on the inside and the outside. The two parts of
herself are separate and although we can see the Why in some of her
actions, she is not able to make those connections herself. We hear
Hagar's internal dialogue; we hear her say exactly the opposite at times
of what she is thinking. She prides herself on being the one in her
marriage with manners, and despises Bram Shipley's tendency to say what
he thinks without regard for proper decorum. By the end of her life,
Hagar has become exactly that which she despises. She alienates her son
and daughter-in-law who take care of her. She continually speaks
before thinking, or even realizing she has spoke aloud.
This
is a story about the pendulum of life finding an equilibrium. From one
extreme to the other, Nature is the great equalizer. By the end of his
life, Bram Shipley, the n'er-do-well of the town has a farm that looks
just like all the others. The drought had effected all. The final
great leveller is Death. In death, Bram Shipley is on the same level as
his father-in-law, pioneer farmers with headstones in the town
cemetary.
Hagar has lived long enough to see the great
fall and the lowly rise. But as the cemetary caretaker explains to them
the history of the stones, Hagar offers no information of her own; she
turns away and sits in the car. She is the Stone Angel, enduring, blind
and misunderstood. She was the child of status who fell and was
righted by her own efforts to respectability. Actually, righted by her
son. But she sat precariously, the topple inevitable. Hagar was so
shut within herself that she was divorced from her own emotions. She
was incapable of connecting intimately with her husband, and observed or
overheard the tender interactions between other couples without any
understanding of herself. She did not understand what she was
overhearing when John and Arlene thought they were alone together.
You
feel sorry that Hagar was never able to open herself to real
communication in her life, and never had the kind of conversation the
Jardines in the hospital were able to have after years of shared life.
She tries to warn the little girl on the beach not to be so bossy, but
does she see herself in the little girl's cruelty? Instead of being
able to pass on the wisdom of her years to the children, she once again
miscommunicates and scares them off. There is no sense for me that
Hagar is able to achieve full reconciliation of her own responsibilty
for her life before she dies. I sense that she is taking small steps in
that direction, when she makes an effort to retrieve the bed pan for
Sandra Wong in the hospital. Is this the first truly altruistic effort
she has made?
 |
| The book cover I owned in secondary school. |
Even her attempts to save money for John to attend
university is not truly for his benefit. Hagar wanted to retrieve her
elevated status through her son. She discards Marvin as a less-worthy
son when she thinks she sees that he takes after her husband. He leaves
home never having received the words of praise he so desperately wants
and cannot ask for. He has worked hard for her recognition and when it
comes at the end - the last thing she says to him - it is as a
comparison with John, her favourite son. Hollow words for Marvin to
hear, and offensive. Marvin leaves, calling her "a terror" which is
justifiable.
Poor Hagar. She lived the proverb, "Marry
in haste, repent at leisure." She even acknowledges this to her rival,
Lottie, when John and Arlene are dating. The ingredient missing from
Hagar's life is respect, for herself and others. She cannot respect her
own family, her father, husband or sons, nor even herself. She gives
no heed to the emotional needs of others nor of herself. When Mr. Lees
talks with her through the night she finds herself at times drawn in to
his story, alternatively disinterested and bored. She sees his pain
only as it is relevant to her pain. When he seeks help for her, she is
angry, rude, and dismissive of him. A glimmer of recognition appears
just as they are parting and she is able to acknowledge his pain in the
loss of his son... not as it relates to her own loss, but seeing his
loss, his emotions as real and valid and worthy.
I
take away from this novel the importance of respect, and how hurtful
the thoughtless selfishness can be. Hagar never considers the feelings
of others. She hardly ever tempers her snarkiness, although because she
does, we know she can. She speaks with civility to the ladies in the
seniors home and to Sandra Wong but not to her own family. She never
sees that she has never left Bram but taken over his harshness without
knowing.
