Bewilderment
Описание книги
An inspiring story set in the time of the Great Depression, Bewilderment: A Novel of the Great Depression follows the story of a coal delivery man, Gabriel «Gabe» Goodfellow, who wants to lighten the hearts of the people in homes he visits. Poverty is felt everywhere and people are hopeless. So, he thinks that there can be some joy and inspiration by arranging for the carnival to visit the town. His intentions are pure and altruistic, but then he has to deal with family problems. Things get complicated when manipulative and greedy local politicians get involved. Will Gabe achieve his goal and put smiles on the faces of his townsfolk or will his project be arrested before it even becomes a reality? The prose is sprinkled with succinct and vivid descriptions of the city and some of the elements that readers can easily visualize. While the story is set in the 1930s, it is filled with realism and humanity and today's readers can easily relate to its message and the characters. Bewilderment is hugely inspiring and entertaining. Gobi Jane for Readers' Favorite Don Gutteridge was born in Sarnia and raised in the nearby village of Point Edward. He taught High School English for seven years, later becoming a Professor in the Faculty of Education at Western University, where he is now Professor Emeritus. He is the author of seventy-one books: poetry, fiction and scholarly works in educational theory and practice. He has published twenty-two novels, including the twelve-volume Marc Edwards mystery series, and thirty-nine books of poetry, one of which, Coppermine, was short-listed for the 1973 Governor-General's Award. In 1970 he won the UWO President's Medal for the best periodical poem of that year, «Death at Quebec.» To listen to interviews with the author, go to: http://thereandthen.podbean.com. Don lives in London, Ontario.
Отрывок из книги
Gabe Goodfellow was precisely one block from his mother’s house (well, one block and a bit if you counted the tumbledown dwellings of Granny Crack and Sideways Slim that lay adrift in the wizened grass above the Marsh – and, strictly speaking, it was his house now, their house, the very house his mother had borne and raised him up in, and then left so abruptly, not even saying goodbye) when a voice something like his own whispered or perhaps – as if it were a long ways off and accustomed to being ignored – shouted its simple two-syllable query: Why not? Why not what? he wanted to ask the moment he stopped being startled. But, of course, he didn’t. Questions that had no predicate never lingered overly long in Gabe’s uncomplicated mind. What was the point?
What surprised him, though, and – if Blossom or anybody happening to pass nearby (no-one did) had thought to ask – quite annoyed him, was the fact that this voice in impudent imitation of his own should put its even more impudent query to him in the midst of his walking home from work. For this was the time of day, particularly since the funeral last summer, he most looked forward to as he made his noisy, dusty rounds of the village and its environs, and most looked backed upon while Rennie and Rosie bickered on both sides of him and Blossom clucked and fumed at them and held him at bay and then, much later when quiet reclaimed the house, drew back in her need to extort or relinquish blame and wordlessly punished them both with bewilderment. But here in this hiatus between the teeming docks behind him and the expectant house ahead of him where all the memories of all his life (so far) echoed out of the walls and wainscot unbidden – here he could walk at his own pace, every crack in the path or sidewalk so familiar it didn’t need noting, every porch and window-cranny so thoroughly known he was never certain whether he was seeing them as they swam benignly by or merely remembering them. Not that it mattered. One way or another they were part and parcel of the hum of his body as it carried him along the ancient river flats and the verges of the swamp towards the intimations of habitation. And every day, just as he and the hum touched the westernmost reach of Alexander Ave., he began to whistle. Not the friendly tootle he fetched up to greet his favourite customers or cheer them however briefly out of one sadness or another. No, the whistle here seemed without thought or intent, bright but tuneless, soaring without effort but happy not to be going anywhere, not to be needed or found wanting. And his lunch bucket swung to the selfsame beat.
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“My daughter reads palms,” Papa Malkovic said, “and faces.”
Sophia looked down at her father still squatted close to the stew. “He is a friend of Blackleg’s,” she announced with casual conviction. Then she turned her attention to the stew, giving it a lusty paddling with a wooden spoon. Several rings on several fingers winked even in the misty gloom of a March evening along the route that lay, however roundabout, between day-labour and home. Her hips asserted themselves against the woolly integument containing them.
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