Contributions by Mary Gordon
Mary Gordon is the author of six novels, two memoirs, a short-story collection, and Reading Jesus, a work of nonfiction. She has received many honors, among them a Lila Wallace–Reader’s Digest Writers’ Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, an O. Henry Award, an Academy Award for Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Story Prize. She is the State Writer of New York. Gordon teaches at Barnard College and lives in New York City.
The Mothers of Gustave Flaubert, Marcel Proust, and Jorge Luis Borges Meet in Heaven
Mary Gordon
An angel in a golden robe escorts the last of three ladies of a certain age into a well-appointed sitting room. It is tenderly lit; there are bowls of scentless cream-colored flowers on tables of a heartbreaking polish. Clearly arranged to the greatest possible conversational advantage are three upholstered chairs, covered in a lemon-colored silk. Two of the chairs are already filled; in one, a stoutish woman sits, an iron-colored bun on the top of her head, her hands folded quietly on her lap. Her face is contented; it would be wrong to say that she is smiling. The woman in the chair across from her has her hair done in a knot at the nape of her neck; threads of grey stand out in the chignon, but far fewer than her companions. The third, escorted by … Read More »
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