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Article: 'Circling My Mother' subtly fills in the blanks
- Article from:
- Deseret News (Salt Lake City)
- Article date:
- December 9, 2007
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2007 Deseret News (Salt Lake City). Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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CIRCLING MY MOTHER, by Mary Gordon, Pantheon Books, 254 pages,
$24
A decade ago, Mary Gordon wrote a memoir about her father. It was
called "Shadow Man." Her father had died when she was 7, and part of
her task in writing about him was to play detective. She needed to
know if her memories were accurate.
Gordon's mother, on the other hand, lived for a long time. Gordon
knew her mother as well as one adult can know another.
The title of Gordon's latest memoir, "Circling My Mother," refers
to the fact that -- even as well as she knew her mother, and even as
well as she writes -- Gordon didn't trust herself to write too
directly about the woman who gave her life.
Her mother married late and was ...