Word: colleton
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...wound is geography. It is also my anchorage, my port of call," Tom begins as he narrates the tale of his Colleton, South Carolina family. An ill-fitting puzzle of contrasts, the prologue continues with a poignant description of a healthy childhood that Dr. Spock would have praised. "I was born and raised on a Carolina sea island and I carried the sunshine of the low-country, inked in dark gold, on my back and shoulders," says...
...seems well and good--until Tom, in a straightforward, unapologetic manner that characterizes the entire novel, relates the lurid tale of his punishment for the time, as a young child, that he killed the last bald-eagle in Colleton County "for pleasure, for the singularity...
...makes the trip North, where he meets Savannah's psychiatrist Susan Lowenstein, who stands as the antithesis of Colleton County. Throughout the slow and painful process of aiding Lowenstein in helping his sister, Tom reveals the terrible day that he, his mother and Savannah were raped by three escaped convicts. As if the rape of their person were not sufferance enough, the rape of their minds by their mother--who swears them to a pact of secrecy--only added to their torment...
Literally and figuratively, the Wingos of "Colleton, S.C.," are crazy about one another. Father Henry is a shrimper whose feelings for his family are well disguised with verbal and physical abuse. His wife Lila despises his brutality and low status and dreams of moving up in Colleton society. Eldest Son Luke, the Rambo of the salt marshes, returns from Viet Nam to wage a one- man guerrilla war against the construction of plutonium production plants. Brother Tom is an ex-high school football coach struggling with the aftermath of a nervous breakdown and a failing marriage. His twin sister Savannah...
Conroy is also effective when exploring the injuries of class. Small- town South Carolina is a hothouse of humiliations for a family like the Wingos. Lila's bids for membership in the Colleton League are repeatedly turned down; the boys are teased about their unfashionable clothes. All but Henry, jailed for smuggling dope on his boat, have their vindications. Lila divorces Henry and marries the town's richest citizen; Luke and Tom become high school football heroes, and Savannah writes The Shrimper's Daughter, becomes famous and moves north to live in Greenwich Village as a lesbian...