I AM AGATHA

In a novel inspired by the life of the artist Agnes Martin, Foley invents a fictional scenario while capturing Martin’s emotional essence.

The outer contours of Agatha Smithson’s life resemble Martin’s—early artistic success in New York City, a stay at Bellevue Hospital after a psychotic break, a university teaching stint in Albuquerque, a secluded hand-built cabin, complicated friendships with Georgia O’Keeffe and others, a return to painting, an uncloseted lesbian identity. When the novel begins in 1971, 68-year-old Agatha is living, as Martin did, in Mesa Portales, New Mexico, but fiction takes over as Agatha narrates a romantic drama involving her with a variety of local characters, some imagined, others amalgams of real figures in Martin’s life. Agatha’s attention is currently consumed by the intense love affair she has been carrying on with local widow Alice for four years. She indignantly, perhaps defensively, claims that Alice remains “whole in her mind,” despite what others consider Alice’s increasing dementia. Rejecting the decision of Alice’s son to put her in a facility, Agatha acts to relocate Alice from her small house in town to Agatha’s unplumbed, unelectrified cabin. Agatha even digs up the grave of Alice’s daughter, who was tragically murdered at age 21, to keep her body near Alice. But readers will notice early on that whenever anyone comes looking for Alice, Agatha explains that she is “on a walk,” and so conveniently unavailable. That Agatha is not merely an unreliable narrator but an irrational one becomes increasingly clear. Then, midway through the book, Agatha begins to grapple with difficult truths that begin to reveal themselves both to her and the reader. Despite exaggerated, almost silly plotting, a rich portrayal emerges on multiple layers: the self-centered, prickly but gifted artist, the woman fighting the realities both of mental illness and aging, the derider of sentiment who desperately wants, and often makes, deep and lasting connections with others.

A fascinating portrait of a woman torn between her single-minded artistic ambition and her yearning for love.