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The Stonemason: A Play in Five Acts
The Stonemason is a profoundly moving drama set in Louisville, Kentucky in the 1970s, concerning several generations of a black family. McCarthy's narrator, Ben, reveals a painful episode in his family's history, grounding us at the same time in the beautiful dynamic between him and his grandfather, Papaw. Ben, Ben's father, and Papaw are all stonemasons, but in descriptions of "the trade" we learn as much about this family's capacity for love as we do about constructing sound foundations for houses, barns and bridges. Papaw's knowledge about stonemasonry is analogous to his deep spiritual wisdom, and Ben recognizes both as he looks back on his apprenticeship in the "trade at which I thought myself a master and of which I stood in darkest ignorance. And as I came to know him...As I came to know him...Oh I could hardly believe my good fortune. I swore then I'd cleave to that old man like a bride. I swore he'd take nothing to his grave." Papaw's son Big Ben and great-grandson Soldier do not respond as whole-heartedly to the old man's wealth of knowledge and patient guidance and the tragedy of the story is largely rooted in this fact. Both of these characters have lost connection with the work of their hands and by association with the earth, their family, and themselves. They are profoundly dissatisfied. Of his father, Ben later wonders, "Why could he not see the worth of that which he had laid aside and the poverty of all he hungered for? Why could he not see that he too was blest?" The Stonemason reveals afresh the mastery of character, plot, pathos, and the poetic facility for language that distinguishes Cormac McCarthy's fiction, and which recently earned him the National Book Awardfor his bestselling novel, All The Pretty Horses.
Book Details
- Publisher: Vintage
- Publish Date: Aug 1st, 1995
- Pages: 144
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 8.03in - 5.29in - 0.38in - 0.32lb
- EAN: 9780679762805
- Categories: • American - General
About the Author
The novels of the American writer, Cormac McCarthy, have received a number of literary awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award. His works adapted to film include All the Pretty Horses, The Road, and No Country for Old Men--the latter film receiving four Academy Awards, including the award for Best Picture. He died in 2023.
More books by Cormac McCarthy
What people are saying
Will Manidis
@WillManidis
2 years
ceo @ScienceDotIO
@LandsharkRides read cormac mccarthy's the stonemason
Anis Mojgani
@mojgani
3 years
10th Poet Laureate of Oregon. Black Iranian Southern boy. NOLA bred, rest in Portland. Poet & picture maker. Nearly medium sized man. Trying days, trying heart.
@AdeenaR I love Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks, and Cormac McCarthy’s The Stonemason.
Bernard T. Joy
@bernardtjoy
2 years
PhD from @UofGlasgow. Literature, US culture/Southern US culture, William Faulkner, modernist studies, philosophy, visual art, genre fiction.
Where are the others? Where are the others. Oh I've had time in great abundance to reflect upon that terrible question. Because we cannot save ourselves unless we save all ourselves. —Cormac McCarthy, The Stonemason
Praise for this book
"McCarthy has achieved something only a few artists even attempt: He has created his own world...and made it his own--beautiful, nightmarish, isolated." --Wall Street Journal