AS WE ARE NOW

by May Sarton ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 24, 1973

The May Sarton novel (or novella -- in many cases -- this time too) is a law unto itself consisting always of sympathy, of old-fashioned poetic responses, of a woman true to her time while acknowledging how it has changed. This time the burden of sentiment is sharpened to a degree by anger -- a more than one-note protest against the indignities of old age, real -- wattles and all, but still more real and terrible -- imposed by the world. Caro, after a heart attack, has been sent to a small private nursing home and this is her journal, ""The Book of the Dead,"" which she keeps in an attempt to retain her failing mind and depressed spirits. As she faces someone else's Kleenex under the bureau, unemptied bedpans, uneasy visitors who stay as short a time as possible -- in her case her brother John married to a much younger woman. Then there's the punitive surveillance of two dreadful women which passes for care while the patients are tranquilized by drugs and hopelessness. All have ""fantasies of escape. Death is the only practical one."" Death, and at the end, retaliation of sorts. A small book as shocking as the reality although there have been recent books of far greater extension -- Ellen Douglas' Apostles of Light and Sharon Curtin's Nobody Ever Died of Old Age. Still May Sarton's name may attract her certain readership among those chronologically closer to a problem they have probably avoided.

Pub Date: Sept. 24, 1973

ISBN: 0393309576

Page Count: -

Publisher: Norton

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1973

Categories: FICTION