The Country A Novel

First published in 1981 to wide acclaim, a haunting family novel by "a daringly skillful writer." (Philip Roth) Foreword by Mary Gordon Praise for The Country: "Mr. Plante"s understanding of the complicated, often perverse configurations that familial relationships can form remains unerring. By mapping out the ways in which beliefs, resentments and hopes are handed down, generation to generation, the ways in which love can mutate into hatred, neediness into rebellion, he creates a portrait of a family that is as uncompromising as it is moving." --Michiko Kakutani, New York Times Book Review "Plante has created one of the most harrowing of contemporary novels." --Philip Roth "[A] haunting lament, a controlled cry of loss and knowledge won through language, sorrow, memory, impossible and comprehending love, love learned through childhood in the body of the family, the country." --Mary Gordon, New York Times Book Review "[A] book that belies its slenderness. A great reckoningin a little room." --Sunday Times (London)

David Plante teaches writing at Columbia University.