Education of Harriet Hatfield - Softcover

Sarton, May

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0393306658 ISBN 13: 9780393306651

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated, 1990

Synopsis

"Harriet Hatfield begins a new life at the age of 60 after her lover of 30 years has died and left her comfortably well off. But when Harriet opens a bookstore for women in blue-collar neighborhood of Boston, she is viciously attacked for her lesbianism. Ms. Sarton's powerful portrayal of the shy, reserved woman's battle becomes a moving statement about the place of the outsider in our world -- and the necessity of following the human hear." Dallas Morning News.

About this title

About the Author:

May Sarton (1912-1995) was an acclaimed poet, novelist, and memoirist.

From Publishers Weekly:

Sarton's 19th novel echoes many earlier themes: the comfort of friendship; relationships between women; the precarious balance between union and solitude, the bond between people and their pets, and what it means to live an elegant life and achieve an elegant death. After the death of her companion of 30 years, 60-year-old Harriet Hatfield opens a bookstore for women in a changing, predominantly blue-collar neighborhood near Boston. Following a newspaper article in which she is labeled a lesbian, a word that very ladylike Harriet has never thought to use, she becomes the target of threats and abuse from an unknown assailant. As Harriet moves from the well-ordered life of a sheltered companion into the rougher, wider world, she begins to redefine herself. Sarton uses the bookstore as a backdrop against which to paint a series of predictable thumbnail sketches of women, but these portraits are pale and thin. Although there is a clarity to her unadorned prose, the richness of varied voices does not come through and emotions are many times too carefully circumscribed. Sarton's mainstream, "proper" heroine counterbalances gay stereotypes, but the focus on issue rather than character diminishes the novel's impact.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated
• Publication date: 1990
• ISBN 10: 0393306658
• ISBN 13: 9780393306651
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 5
• Number of pages: 320