Mary Gordon's New Novel, Pearl, Explores Self-Sacrifice, Martyrdom and Purity
Mary Gordon signs a copy of Pearl after her Books Etc. reading at Barnard on February 2. |
Author Mary Gordon, the Millicent C. McIntosh Professor in English and Writing at Barnard, read from her new novel Pearl (Pantheon ) at a recent Books Etc. series event, guiding the audience of 300 people through themes from this, her eighth novel, and other books: mother-daughter conflicts, Catholic school trials, teenage rebellion, Vietnam War-era political activism, spiritual martyrdom, the power of memory and the value of laughter.
Gordon, a Barnard alumna and one of the country's most admired prose writers, read three sections from the novel before answering questions from the audience and signing books.
Pearl is the story of a young woman who has traveled from New York to study in Ireland, receives a political education through the IRA and consequently, chains herself to the flagpole at the U.S. Embassy in Dublin with the hopes of fasting to death as "a witness for peace." The novel begins on Christmas Eve as her mother Maria learns of Pearl's action. She leaves immediately to be at her daughter's side and is joined by their long-time family friend, Joseph. The ensuing tale explores the nuanced issues behind their relationships as well as the role politics and religion play in daily life.
When asked, Gordon said she chose the name Pearl because it was both the name of Hester Prynne's child in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter and a symbol for purity, one of the themes she wanted to explore more deeply.
"Purity is a word and a concept with a lot of resonance, yet it seems as if it's been punishing to women," she told the Barnard audience. "I wondered if there was a new way to think about it, to reclaim it so it is not hijacked by the culture."
Pearl took Gordon almost seven years to write and "nearly killed me in the process!" she said. That was due in part to the fact that though the characters of Maria and Joseph had lived in her head since she first wrote about them in a short story 20 years ago, she was not sure how to join their narratives. She credited her work with students in her teaching at Barnard as well as writing an introduction for Howard's End in helping her find the device that would make their voices less static. She chose a narrator to bring them together, an observer who speaks directly to the reader in the present tense.
Gordon set the story in Ireland because of the "many issues there, the idealism versus real politics, the nationalism versus love of violence for violence's sake. Ireland was accessible to me through people I know there and it has a history of these political and religious issues I wanted to explore."
Mostly, though, Gordon said she wanted to set these themes in the context of the somewhat "vexing relationship between mothers and daughters . . . I wanted to talk about the male appetite for violence and a woman's need for self-sacrifice and how they often come together in tragic ways."
Gordon will be on a nationwide book tour for Pearl.
—Jo Kadlecek
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