The Stone Angel

The Stone Angel (1964) is a novel by Margaret Laurence. The story follows the life of Hagar Shipley and the memories she reflects on as she nears the end of her life. The story alternates between the present day (the early 1960s) and the formative memories of her life as told from her perspective.

The Stone Angel: Genre

The Stone Angel belongs to the genre of historical fiction, set in the fictitious town of Manawaka, Manitoba. While the story focuses on the main characters and their lives, major historical events, such as the 1929 stock market crash and the subsequent Great Depression, play a crucial role in the lives of the characters. Hagar recalls her life, starting at her birth in 1886, until the present day, the early 1960s.

The Stone Angel: Characters

The major characters are Hagar Shipley, her family, and her closest friends.

The Stone Angel: Summary

The Stone Angel is divided into ten chapters and we have provided a summary of each for you!

Chapter One

A stone angel marks the grave of Hagar Shipley’s mother in Manawaka cemetery. She describes it as having blank eyes despite its ever-watchful appearance. In 1886, Hagar’s mother died giving birth to her. Her father Jason Currie imported the costly statue.

Now ninety, Hagar spends her time lost in memories. Her oldest son Marvin and his wife Doris care for her. However, Hagar neglects her infirmity, desiring more privacy and freedom.

Hagar reflects on her life, starting with her childhood. Her father Jason became successful after starting the first general store in Manawaka. He could afford a governess that Hagar, full of energy and cleverness, would cause trouble for. She received whippings with a defiance and fortitude that her father admired. She was more like her father while her two older brothers were like their mother.

Fig 1 - Hagar's father, Jason Currie, opens the first general store in Manawaka.

Her brothers worked in their father’s store but were never paid. Matt tried to save up for college but ultimately gambled it all away. Dan seemed to always be sick and indulge in the attention from caretaking. As a teenager, Dan caught pneumonia after he fell through ice while skating on a lake. As his condition worsened, he called out for their mother. Matt asked Hagar to dress up as their late mother to console him. Hagar refused, and Matt put on her shawl to console his brother for the last few hours of his life.

Chapter Two

When Mr. Troy visits, Hagar falls into another reverie.

After three years, she meets Brampton Shipley. Her friend Lottie warns her of his lower class and unsuitability for her. She accepts Brampton’s marriage proposal against her father's wishes, and has a wedding ceremony completely unattended by her family. Hagar immediately moves out and struggles to adjust to Bram’s dirty home and coarse behavior in public.

Mr. Troy is astonished at her story. He asks if she has any friends, and she says no. Then she realizes this is a setup for putting her in a nursing home. After Mr. Troy leaves, Marvin and Doris confront Hagar about seeking professional senior care.

Hagar feels pain at the thought of leaving her home and things behind, wistfully reviewing them all. She remembers how her brother Matt died during his twenties from influenza, and how her father did not seek a relationship with her. She wishes she had something to give her sons, but her father left her nothing and bequeathed his fortune to the town of Manawaka.

Hagar’s overall health is declining. Doris and Marvin do not feel safe leaving her alone after finding a lit cigarette end on the floor. She begs them not to put her into a nursing home. She retreats into memories of her marriage with Bram. Back in the present, she believes Bram would not have treated her as a burden.

Chapter Three

At the doctor's office, Hagar is reminded of the bare walls of her home with Bram. They take x-rays of Hagar’s internal organs. Later after dinner, they all go for a drive, carefully bundling up Hagar. To her dismay, they pass the nursing home Silverthreads. Hagar panics, but ultimately relents and goes inside for a visit.

Fig 2 - Hagar feels that senior care is a threat to her independence.

Hagar explores the space as the administrator explains the facilities and amenities. She’s resistant to it all and finds herself a seat alone outside while Doris and Marvin speak with the administrator.

Chapter Four

Hagar impatiently waits in the doctor's office for more tests. It’s a metaphorical reminder of her life with Bram: she was always waiting for something to happen, a big break. The incessant cleaning only helped later by sons, bitter arguing, and general poverty gradually depleted her youthful spirit until she could not recognize herself anymore.

In the present, Marvin and Doris refuse to share the doctor’s report. Once, Hagar took John with her to sell eggs, only to feel embarrassment at meeting Lottie Dreiser and her daughter, who married the well-off Telford Simmons.

Hagar decides to visit her father’s store, hoping to get a discount, when she sees Bram there too. Embarrassed by his behavior, comparing their marriage and child to the Simmons', she rushes home and sells all her valuables to Lottie to finance an escape. She is brought back to the present by Doris while on a walk. Coming home, she sees Marvin pacing, who announces she will be put in a nursing home in one week.

Chapter Five

Hagar cannot sleep and wonders how she can foil Doris and Marvin’s nursing home scheme. She remembers a blank social security check downstairs so, in the morning while Doris is away, she takes the blank check and cashes it at the bank. Overwhelmed by her surroundings, she makes her way to the downtown bus thanks to the help of locals. She rides to Shadow Point, a place in the country she visited once before.

Fig 3 - Hagar's rapidly declining health makes a trip to downtown Manawaka overwhelming.

Surprised at her sudden energy, she explores the area a bit while also worryingly noting she is ill-prepared without water and just a few snacks. Finding her own room in an abandoned building, she drifts back into the memory of leaving Manawaka with John.

She finds work as a live-in caretaker in Mr. Oatley’s massive home, his wealth earned from smuggling immigrant women. She watches John grow up confidently, but John lies to his friends and Hagar about his true living circumstances.

Chapter 6

Hagar awakes scared and lonely in her abandoned building room. She remembers another time living with Mr. Oakley, her and John saving up to send him to college. She invested savings in the stock market, only to lose them in the crash of 1929. Against the backdrop of the Great Depression, John struggles to find steady work and ultimately moves back to Manawaka with Bram. Two years later, John writes to Hagar that Bram is ill and will die soon. She hurries back to the Shipley farm.

The Shipley farm is in complete disarray, to Hagar’s dismay. John looks ragged and too skinny, while the dying Bram is shrunken and frail Both of them self-medicate with homemade wine. Hagar learns that John has been seeing Arlene Simmons, Lottie and Telford Simmons' daughter. John goes out after dinner every night to return by daybreak. Hagar is embarrassed to share her state of affairs (the Shipley farm and dying Bram) with Lottie.

When Bram passes, John weeps and Hagar does not cry at all.

Chapter 7

Hagar wakes up feeling achy. She sees two children playing on the beach. Her presence scares them away. She becomes increasingly aware of the life and decay in the forest.

Back in memories, she recalls staying longer in Manawaka to help John make a home, while he refuses her help. One night, Arlene brings John home drunk and nearly passed out, but quickly leaves things to Hagar.

Fig 4 - Abandoned buildings pose all sorts of health problems, regardless of age.

The following summer, Hagar returns to Manawaka, to find the Shipley farm clean and well-kept. She realizes the extent of John and Arlene’s relationship, overhearing them talk about hoping to have the Shipley house to themselves someday. Hagar confronts both Arlene and John separately, expressing her disapproval of the relationship. Fearing they are doomed to make the same mistakes that Hagar did with Bram, she conspires with Lottie to separate John and Arlene.

Chapter Eight

Fearing vagrants, Hagar left the abandoned house for a nearby abandoned cannery. After hearing a pack of dogs, Hagar is startled by an old man, Murray, who is out for an evening walk. They begin to share their life stories and connect over the loss of a son. Hagar, gradually feeling safer, launches into another reverie while Murray shares his wine and cigarettes.

Back in Manawaka, John finds Hagar to tell her Arlene will soon leave to go work out East. Hagar feigns ignorance, while John suspects her complicity. One night, Hagar learns John has been in an automobile accident: Arlene immediately died, and he will soon too. Like Bram’s passing, Hagar does not grieve. She avoids the funeral, not wanting to see the stone angel.

Hagar returns to the present, finally crying and mourning John’s death. Murray encourages her to embrace her feelings while they sit closer together and fall asleep.

Chapter Nine

Hagar wakes up to find herself alone shortly before Marvin, Doris, and Murray arrive. She laments being found, but it’s clear she needs immediate medical attention. On the way to the hospital, Marvin shares the results of her tests, telling her she needs more urgent care than a senior home.

Fig 5 - Hagar trades the serene forest for a hospital ward full of suffering patients.

At the public hospital, she is disturbed by her sudden lack of privacy and is difficult to all the nurses while receiving her care. By the time she is moved to a semi-private room by her own request, she begins to miss the other patients who shared their stories.

Chapter Ten

Hagar’s new surroundings feel smaller than ever. After a peaceful sleep, she receives a new roommate, a teenager named Sandra Wong. They bond over a moment of rebellious behavior towards the nurses when Hagar, against nurse orders, leaves her bed to get a bedpan for Sandra.

In a final visit with Marvin, Hagar recognizes his struggle to care for her. Marvin, for his part, vocalizes his respect for his mother’s fierce independence.

Fig 6 - Hagar spends the last days of her life receiving heavy doses of painkillers.

Recalling her last visit to Manawaka, she is astonished at how much it’s changed. The Shipley home has been replaced with a new one. At the cemetery, a caretaker explains to Doris, Marvin, and Hagar about the stone angel marking and joining the grave of the Shipley-Currie families.

Hagar’s waking detachment from reality increases in severity as she receives more painkillers. As she debates her ability to sip from a glass herself, the story ends mid-sentence.

The Stone Angel: Analysis

In analyzing The Stone Angel, it's clear the novel purports one must come to terms with one's choices in life as one nears death. The entirety of the story is about Hagar confronting her past and seeing how it still informs her present behavior. Once she comes to accept that her decisions have brought her to where she is, she begins to find peace, make amends with still-living family members, and finally grieve for the ones she never did. The Stone Angel explores the main idea through the themes of the strength of familial bonds, gender roles and expectations, and identity and independence.

The Strength of Familial Bonds

Throughout the story, crises test the endurance of family bonds. When Dan is on his deathbed, Matt asks Hagar to dress as their mother to console him. When she refuses, the resentment that builds within Matt redefines their relationship well into adulthood. This resentment is deepened further when their father chooses Hagar’s education over Matt’s.

It’s nearly impossible for family members, especially siblings, to receive equal treatment. Marvin builds resentment towards Hagar for being her primary caretaker when fate left him as the only surviving child. Circumstances dictate and prioritize the needs of specific family members, and the amount of sacrifice needed can exceed the willingness of the family members to support each other.

Gender Roles and Expectations

The author Margaret Laurence does not glorify Hagar’s need for independence, nor suggest it a better or worse impulse than other choices women make, such as Lottie, who marries for financial security. Rather, Hagar’s circumstances are a result of the choices she made within societal pressures to perform her role as a daughter and eventually mother. She’s fiercely independent but can hardly live on her own. The Stone Angel can be considered a feminist novel in its portrayal of a fiercely independent woman who refuses to play the traditional gender roles expected of her.

When Hagar seeks to earn a living on her education, her father denies her the opportunity and demands she stays home as a domestic caretaker. Essentially, her father grooms her to replace her late mother as the main housekeeper.

The crucial life choice to leave her social class and marry Bram is fueled by rebellion, and her desire to create more autonomy in her life. Even as Hagar denies consolation to her dying brother, Laurence is not giving a moral indictment, but rather that the pressure to be responsible for the management of men’s emotions in the household is a burden that Hagar cannot bear herself, nor is given much leeway to refuse.

Identity and Independence

Related to the previous theme, Hagar grapples with her sense of identity and regret over past choices. She defines herself by the choices she makes in life, choosing independence whenever she can. Unfortunately, these choices also lead her to the circumstances she finds herself in. She desires to retain autonomy in her old age, but she sabotages this possibility when she decides to run away. She ultimately ends up in the more dependent facility of a hospital rather than a nursing home.

The Stone Angel: Symbol

The stone angel acts as a mirror for Hagar’s life. Marking the grave of her deceased mother, it starts fresh and brand new, a costly import made affordable by her father’s recent fortune. This strongly implies the high cost of her mother's life, which doomed Hagar to a life of difficulty and hardship.

Fig 7 - The stone angel becomes worn and defaced as the story progresses.

The stone angel show signs of wear as Hagar ages. When Hagar visits the angel as a middle-aged woman she finds it has toppled to the ground. This symbolises to Hagar that she has given up her youthful vitality and beauty. Further visits find the angel increasingly disfigured. The angel's defacement reflects Hagar's slow realisation that the Shipley home is in complete filth and disarray, and her life is almost unrecognizable to her.

Finally, her last image of the stone angel shows even more wear from severe winters, so much so that she can’t imagine anyone standing it back up when it's next toppled. Ultimately it will be removed, forgotten, and wear away to nothing over time.