The Worlds of Carol Shields (Reappraisals: Canadian Writers)

Introduction / David Staines -- To the light house / Margaret Atwood -- Art is making : Carol Shields in conversation and correspondence / Eleanor Wachtel -- The square root of a clock tick : time and timing in Carol Shields's poetry and prose / Anne Giardini and Joseph Giardini -- All that "below-the-surface" stuff : Carol Shields's conversational modes / Coral Ann Howells -- Guilt, guile, and ginger in small ceremonies / Elizabeth Waterston -- Revisiting the sequel : Carol Shields's companion novels / Wendy Roy -- Sarah Binks, Pat Lowther, and the satirical gothic turn in Carol Shields's Swann : a mystery / Cynthia Sugars -- Assembling identity : late-life agency in The stone angel and The stone diaries / Patricia Life -- Male-pattern bewilderment in Larry's party / John Van Rys -- Departures, arrivals : Canada/United States migrations and the trope of travel in the fiction of Carol Shields / Alex Ramon -- "To be faithful to the idea of being good": the expansion to goodness in Carol Shields's Unless / Margaret Steffler -- Narrative pragmatism : goodness in Carol Shields's Unless / Tim Heath -- Shields's guerrilla gardeners : sowing seeds of defiance and care / Shelley Boyd -- Cool empathy in the short fiction of Carol Shields / Marilyn Rose -- The "perfect gift" and the "true gift" : empathetic dialogue in Carol Shields's "A scarf " and Joyce Carol Oates's "The scarf " / Elizabeth Reimer -- Prepositional domesticity / Aritha van Herk -- Grand slam : birthing women and bridging generations n Carol Shields's Play thirteen hands / Nora Foster Stovel -- Archives as traces of life process and engagement : the late years of the Carol Shields fonds / Catherine Hobbs -- The voices of Carol Shields / Joan Clark -- The clarity of her anger / Jane Urquhart -- My seen-sang, Carol Shields : a memoir of a master teacher / Wayson Choy -- Carol Shields / Martin Levin. "Carol was a very fine writer and a remarkable human being, a wonderful person whose work I closely followed for more than 20 years. I interviewed her frequently over those years, with virtually every work she produced --novel, radio drama, play, book of stories. So I had a good sense of the span of her work and also her evolution as a stylist. But the key reason I wanted to make a book focusing on her life and work is that we were friends." --Eleanor Wachtel This book strikes the right balance between intimate accounts and literary analysis. It opens with reminiscences by close friend Eleanor Wachtel, which are followed by a study of Shields' poetry by her daughter and grandson, then by various aspects of her fiction, including a detailed examination of her plays. It closes with reminiscences by four close friends: Jane Urquhart, Joan Clark, Wayson Choy and Martin Levin. The 23 contributors offer new insights, new theories, and new perspectives about Shields' illuminating career. Only one piece--her obituary written by Margaret Atwood--has been previously published. The Worlds Of Carol Shields Is The First Book To Examine Shields’ Extraordinary Career And Life Through The Lens Both Of Close Friends And Of Literary Critics.