The Stone Angel
The Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence is a heart-warming story of aninety year old woman who is nearing death and who has very little to lookback on with pride. Her life had been ruled by her concern of outwardappearances and manners. Although she often felt love and happiness, sherefused to show it fearing it may be viewed by others as a weakness. Hagarinherited this strong pride from her father, Jason Currie, along with otherpoor qualities. Throughout her life, Hagar is desperately trying to escape.First, she tries to escape from her family, mostly her father, but in sodoing she also cuts herself off from her brother, Matt. She also ends upleaving her husband, Brampton. Secondly, Hagar tries to escape from herown poor qualities to which she is captive; attempting to fill theemptiness within her. Finally and futilely, she tries to escape death. Allof these attempts fail dismally. Throughout the narration of the novel manyimages are put forth repetitiously to aid the development of Hagar'scharacter and the main themes. The Stone Angel is a very effective storydue largely to the biblical, water, and flower imagery. The biblical imagery is very strong and can be found numerous times
The flower imagery aids the story by showing the two opposing ways tolive your life. Hagar's son was bornand they both returned to the place where Sarah and her husband, Abraham(Laurence's husband to Hagar was named Brampton to echo Abraham), lived. In the novel there is imagery of wild flowers and ofcultivated flowers. Withoutthis outstanding application of imagery, the novel The Stone Angel wouldnot be nearly as powerful as portrayed. The water imagery presented many times in the novel helped to developthe theme of death. The Hagar in the Old Testament bore a wild son, Ishmael, but she alsocreated a faithful son, Jacob (descendent of Isaac). Many parallels are made betweenMargaret Laurence's Hagar and the biblical Hagar. As everyone knows, water is viewed as the center oflife since, without it, life would cease to exist. There is other imagery (such as mirror imagery) which also helps todevelop Margaret Laurence's story; however, it wasn't personally seen aspowerful as the ones discussed. (This was foreshadowing Hagar's death). The two Hagars are also very similar in that theyboth go into the wilderness. Much like people, some are wild and others are tame orpredictable.
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Acceptance Essays
