Author Description

In unsentimental prose and with sharp wit, Canadian-born Mavis Gallant portrays the isolation, fear, and detachment that afflict rootless North American and European expatriates. Gallant's challenging stories require her readers' active participation; unless they add their own building blocks, the stories will not stand. Danielle Schaub discusses Gallant's disconcerting use of techniques and their impact on her work's thematics, reconciling the inherent tension governing the lives of Gallant's characters and the way she strains language and exploits narrative devices to translate it. Social, political, and historical issues treated in Gallant's work are discussed in relation to the techniques used, making it easier for readers to understand the largely European context of the stories.