Absence Makes the Heart
Year: 2025
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Absence Makes The Heart explores, in six short stories, characters who face ordinary problems, but search for grace through extraordinary means. Inspired by the tragi comic styles of writers such as Lorrie Moore, Lee K. Abbott, Ron Carlson and others, these stories follow regular, if somewhat oddball folks, who - intentionally or by accident - invoke creativity to overcome or circumvent desperate circumstances. Throughout their journeys, these mothers, fathers, fishermen, and saxophone players find support from surprising co-conspirators: other oddballs, equally vulnerable and in need of redemption. Though the characters don't necessarily find the answers or forgiveness they seek, they find pathways and crevices that allow them to advance in their quests for happiness, peace, and stability. In these stories the saviors who ultimately provide a means for healing and shoring up others' spirits emerge, quite often, from the most unlikely places. And in their very oddity, they demonstrate how worthwhile it is to have faith in the inexplicable, to believe in the wily wisdom of maintaining hope when logic suggests all is lost.
DOI: 10.25777/8az2-h072
Author: McMahon, Paula L.
Institution: Old Dominion University
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W6964720957
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