THE WATCH THAT ENDS THE NIGHT

by Hugh MacLennan ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 13, 1958

Hugh MacLennan, in two earlier novels, established himself as a Canadian novelist worth watching. The Precipice (1948) and Each Man's Son (1951) showed marked distinction. This new novel- under a different imprint- has a maturity of technique that seizes upon a difficult handling of a difficult subject, and gives it assurance. If at times his story and characters are momentarily submerged by his philosophical approach to the problem of living with death, in the main it is the characters that develop the theme, and the plot is kept in balance. It is a contemporary tale of a strange triangle, which barks back to the period of crisis in Montreal, unemployment, despair; to the climate of opinion during the Spanish Civil War- and the surface quiescence of the phony war that followed; to World War II -- and to the effect of background (it is a warm, nostalgic picture of Montreal) -- and opinion on each of the central characters. Catherine Carey, set apart by a lifelong imprisonment of body due to a damaged heart; George Stewart, who loved her- but was afraid- and lost her to Jerome Mertell, surgeon, a tempestuous and haunted youth,- these are the three. And through their stories, successively told, then brought up to the moment of eruption, when Jerome, presumed dead, returns, one is caught up in the passion of development on different emotional levels, on the incidents which contribute their aspects of Canada's growing pains, and of the final outcome, an each, in turn, learns to live with the fact of death. A substantial cut above average, this- while at times too discursive is always worth reading.

Pub Date: Feb. 13, 1958

ISBN: 0773524967

Page Count: -

Publisher: Scribner

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1958

Categories: FICTION