The Summer of the Great-Grandmother (Crosswicks Journal, Book 2) [Paperback]

Madeleine L'Engle (Author)

Book Description

Series: Crosswicks Journal, Book 2 | Publication Date: January 1, 1984

This journal offers a loving and poignant portrait of L'Engle's mother in old age that is more about living than dying.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This is the summer of the great-grandmother...This is the summer after her ninetieth birthday, the summer of the swift descent." In "Summer's Beginning," during the fourth four-generation summer at Crosswicks, her family's "two-hundred-and-some-year-old farmhouse" in Connecticut, Madeleine L'Engle cares for and contemplates her mother's life. There is her mother now, the great-grandmother with atherosclerosis who is often anxious, can't remember where she is, and needs constantly increasing care. There is "The Mother I Knew," a woman who had miscarriages all over the world before her treasured first child, Madeleine, was born, the mother who never ran out of stories to tell, or classical music to play on her piano. There is "The Mother I Did Not Know," the young woman who was born during the American Civil War to a Southern family fresh with bitter memories of "lost fathers and brothers and homes and money." Throughout this touching journal, memory, pain, respect, fear, and always the daily details of life in Crosswicks Lawns merge into a haunting and lovely chronicle of a lively home filled with pets, small children, visitors, helpers, and newlyweds, the home where Great-Grandmother lives. Until "Summer's End." -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14. -- From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Jesse Larsen

About the Author

Madeline L'Engle, the popular author of many books for children and adults, has interspersed her writing and teaching career with raising three children, maintaining an apartment in New York and a farmhouse of charming confusion which is called "Crosswicks."

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: HarperOne (January 1, 1984)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 006254506X
• ISBN-13: 978-0062545060
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #87,237 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Madeleine L'Engle, the popular author of many books for children and adults, has interspersed her writing and teaching career with raising three children, maintaining an apartment in New York and a farmhouse of charming confusion which is called "Crosswicks."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My Grandmother, too, November 27, 1999

By 

Kristen E. Asmus - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Summer of the Great-Grandmother (Crosswicks Journal, Book 2) (Paperback)

I have lived with my grandmother for two and a half years, watching her slowly slip farther into senility. L'Engle's narrative of her mother's last summer connected with me -- it was helpful to hear another's struggles, and to know I am not the only one who has prayed for the death of a loved one.

My grandmother is gone: she was an artist, a world-traveller, a cook. Now, she does not know me, she doesn't remember her children (except my aunt who has been a constant in her life), she can't "do for herself" anymore. I just want her to have life back. I was touched by the way L'Engle put that --to be born again through death.

I also enjoyed hearing about the life of two fascinating and wonderful women, both L'Engle and her mother. The book is a substantial, warm, human look into L'Engle's thoughts and her family.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essays on Family, aging, and caretaking., October 3, 1999

By 

Nancy K. Oconnor (PAWHUSKA, OK United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Summer of the Great-Grandmother (Crosswicks Journal, Book 2) (Paperback)

Many middle aged women are the sandwich generation, caught in between caring for their children and their elderly mothers. L'Engle has written about being a mother and the meaning of family in her Crosswick Journal series. This one, however, is about the roots of the family, with its memories, and the passing of the generations. It is also about the heartbreaking labor and burden of caring for the elderly. But this memoir, which combines the stories of her ancestors' strengths in struggles, places these stories as a context in which one contemplates the problems of age, the struggles of feeding and caring for one at the end of life. The result is a satisfying string of essays into the eternal meaning of Family.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A story of strength and the importance of family history., April 1, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: The Summer of the Great-Grandmother (Crosswicks Journal, Book 2) (Paperback)

L'Engle confronts issues of death and dying in her experience of the death of her mother. But she also confronts issues of family history and the strength that the women in her family's history have exhibited. With each page I gained a greater respect for the trials that my ancestors have endured, and a greater curiosity to discover who my ancestors really were. The importance of story and passing on wisdom shines through L'Engle's account of her family experience. It explains why we should all feel compelled to pass on our history; to give our children deep roots so that they can understand themselves