The Visitor

The Visitor

by Maeve Brennan (Author)

Synopsis

'The Visitor is the work of a sure hand... and Brennan's prose is terse and exquisitely precise throughout... Only in the work of Emily Dickinson can the same ferocious vision - of love, pain, transgression and death - and economy of expression be found.' Guardian

The Visitor tells the haunting tale of Anastasia King, who, at the age of twenty-two, returns to her grandmother's house in Ireland - the very house where she grew up - after six long years away. An atmospheric story of Dublin, it is also a dissection of the unkind, ungenerous, emotionally unreachable side of the Irish temperament.

Recently rediscovered in a university archive, The Visitor was written in the mid-1940s but has never been published until now. Long championed by authors from Nuala O'Faolain and Clare Messud to John Updike, this miraculous literary discovery confirms Brennan's status as a master of the novella and one of the best storytellers since Joyce.

'An astonishing miniature masterpiece, except there is nothing miniature about the forces at work in a story as violent underneath as it is demure on the surface ... The ferocity of her vision of femininity is hers alone. ' -Nuala O'Faolain

$8.25

Quantity

1 in stock

More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 96
Edition: New edition
Publisher: Atlantic Books
Published: 08 Apr 2002

ISBN 10: 1903809770
ISBN 13: 9781903809778
Book Overview: 'A jewelled miniature, a glittering depiction of regret' Elle

Media Reviews
An extraordinary book; a brittle meditation on grief and exile * Time Out *
To mention her in the company of Chekhov and Flaubert is only proper * Edward Albee *
Author Bio
Maeve Brennan died in obscurity in 1993. She was the author of the acclaimed The Springs of Affection: Stories of Dublin; The Long-winded Lady: Notes from a New Yorker and The Rose Garden: Short Stories.In her review of Springs of Affection, Penelope Fitzgerald described the powerful force of Brennan's stories, carrying 'an electric charge of resentment and quiet satisfaction in revenge that chills you right through'.