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Brighten the Corner Where You Are
But I had known since forever that it's colours that keep the world turning, that keep a person going.
One glimpse of the tiny painted house that folk art legend Maud Lewis shared with her husband, Everett, in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, during the mid-twentieth century and the startling contrast between her joyful artwork and her life's deprivations is evident. One glimpse at her photo and you realize, for all her smile's shyness, she must've been one tough cookie. But, beneath her iconic resilience, who was Maud, really? How did she manage, holed up in that one-room house with no running water, married to a miserly man known for his drinking? Was she happy, or was she miserable? Did painting save or make her Everett's meal ticket? And then there are the darker secrets that haunt her story: the loss of her parents, her child, her first love.
Against all odds, Maud Lewis rose above these constraints—and this is where you'll find the Maud of Brighten the Corner Where You Are: speaking her mind from beyond the grave, freed of the stigmas of gender, poverty, and disability that marked her life and shaped her art. Unfettered and feisty as can be, she tells her story her way, illuminating the darkest corners of her life. In possession of a voice all her own, Maud demonstrates the agency that hovers within us all.
One glimpse of the tiny painted house that folk art legend Maud Lewis shared with her husband, Everett, in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, during the mid-twentieth century and the startling contrast between her joyful artwork and her life's deprivations is evident. One glimpse at her photo and you realize, for all her smile's shyness, she must've been one tough cookie. But, beneath her iconic resilience, who was Maud, really? How did she manage, holed up in that one-room house with no running water, married to a miserly man known for his drinking? Was she happy, or was she miserable? Did painting save or make her Everett's meal ticket? And then there are the darker secrets that haunt her story: the loss of her parents, her child, her first love.
Against all odds, Maud Lewis rose above these constraints—and this is where you'll find the Maud of Brighten the Corner Where You Are: speaking her mind from beyond the grave, freed of the stigmas of gender, poverty, and disability that marked her life and shaped her art. Unfettered and feisty as can be, she tells her story her way, illuminating the darkest corners of her life. In possession of a voice all her own, Maud demonstrates the agency that hovers within us all.
345 pages, Paperback
First published March 31, 2021
18 people are currently reading
393 people want to read
About the author
Carol Bruneau
15 books27 followersCarol Bruneau is the author of nine books: three short fiction collections and six novels, including Brighten the Corner Where You Are (Fall 2020) and A Circle on the Surface (2018.) Her first novel, Purple for Sky, won the 2001 Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the Dartmouth Book Award. She lives with her husband in Halifax.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 64 reviews
December 14, 2020
Many thanks to NetGalley and Nimbus Publishing for this profoundly moving, enthralling vision of the challenging life of Maud Lewis. This is a beautifully written, glorious story that is narrated by Maud from beyond the grave. The author, Carol Bruneau, has relied on well-researched facts and insightful speculation. She has told the story with Maritime colloquialisms and expressions that add to its believability. This work of fiction enhances the biographies written about Maud's sad and tragic life and her resilience. Maud painted in a confined space, and the book describes how she found joy with vivid colours viewed through a tiny window and deep within her imagination. The result was glorious folk art produced through her pain and impoverished circumstances.
I have been a longtime fan of her artwork and am lucky to have two of her paintings hanging in my living room. These were purchased cheaply before Maud became famous, but I would never part with them. Two years ago, the movie 'Maudie' gave people a less bleak picture of her life but made her art widely known, much in demand, and expensive.
Suffering from a progressive degenerative condition, she produced colourful paintings despite painful, deformed hands. Due to a very tiny working space in the small shack where she lived, she frequently endured injuries from falling or bumping into things.
When she was younger, she had an illegitimate child, and the father deserted her. To protect Maud and hide their shame, her parents lied to her about the baby's fate. After her parents' death, she lived with a scornful, Bible-quoting aunt. She dreaded a likely need to live in a poorhouse, so married to escape this fate. Her husband was Everett, a mean, miserly, ignorant drunk, and she lived with him in a cold one-room shack without a toilet, running water or electricity. Based on a mutual need, they seemed to have developed a manner of love and caring for one another but also an ongoing resentment. Maud worked long hours on her brightly coloured paintings and decorated every spare space on the shack. Her husband, a miser, took and hid any small proceeds from her paintings, causing them to live in extreme poverty.
One must admire Maud and the glowing primitive art she produced during years of hardship. This brilliant speculative fiction adds insight and emotion to the non-fiction books about her life.
I have been a longtime fan of her artwork and am lucky to have two of her paintings hanging in my living room. These were purchased cheaply before Maud became famous, but I would never part with them. Two years ago, the movie 'Maudie' gave people a less bleak picture of her life but made her art widely known, much in demand, and expensive.
Suffering from a progressive degenerative condition, she produced colourful paintings despite painful, deformed hands. Due to a very tiny working space in the small shack where she lived, she frequently endured injuries from falling or bumping into things.
When she was younger, she had an illegitimate child, and the father deserted her. To protect Maud and hide their shame, her parents lied to her about the baby's fate. After her parents' death, she lived with a scornful, Bible-quoting aunt. She dreaded a likely need to live in a poorhouse, so married to escape this fate. Her husband was Everett, a mean, miserly, ignorant drunk, and she lived with him in a cold one-room shack without a toilet, running water or electricity. Based on a mutual need, they seemed to have developed a manner of love and caring for one another but also an ongoing resentment. Maud worked long hours on her brightly coloured paintings and decorated every spare space on the shack. Her husband, a miser, took and hid any small proceeds from her paintings, causing them to live in extreme poverty.
One must admire Maud and the glowing primitive art she produced during years of hardship. This brilliant speculative fiction adds insight and emotion to the non-fiction books about her life.
July 14, 2021
"...I had known since forever that it's colours that keep the world turning, that keep a person going."
The beautiful colourful cover is very appropriate for Brighten the Corner Where You Are: A Novel Inspired by the Life of Maud Lewis. I have been a fan of Maud Lewis and her folk art for years, so enthusiastically read this fictional novel of her life.
This is the first book written by Carol Bruneau that I have read, and I found her style of writing interesting. The story is told using Maud's voice from the afterlife. Although this is a fictional novel, there are historical facts interwoven. Maud was named Maud Kathleen Dowley when she was born.
Here are some of my favourite quotes:
"Marshlands, beaches, islands, and the sea are a rolling rug of greens and blues, every hue you can imagine is hooked into it, it's the prettiest hooking made by the happiest hooker. If there's a God in charge of all this, that's what she is, a hooker of borderless rugs."
"Her eyes gleamed wet and dark as stones and a fast brook... her eyes seem stuck on me, like they might draw me, body and soul, down inside of her. Her voice was sharp, sharp as a pair of scissors."
"I was happy, oh yes. I hung onto that feeling. It was like having a sunflower bloom inside me and it's big nodding head ripen with seeds for the birds. For happiness is like this, you soak it up like summer sun to remember during the cold, dark days of the winter ahead."
"Her voice was warm as honey standing in sunshine."
"She was on a mission to shake me like an apple from the tree."
"...as he bent closer I saw he had a face that would stop a clock." This was referring to her first love, Emery Gordon Allen, the father of her baby.
"Talk talk talk talk talk. At times, I had to admit, the sound of his voice was a bit like the sound of a rusty saw cutting a wet log." This quote was in reference to Maud's husband, Everett Lewis.
Several years ago my daughter and I saw Everett and Maud Lewis's little house in the Nova Scotia Art Gallery in Halifax. Years before that I saw it beside Highway #1 in Marshalltown.
I enjoyed reading this book and agree with the following quote by Lauren B. Davis.
"Dazzling! A poignant imagining of Maud Lewis's life; as colourful and joyous as Lewis's art, as bleak as an abandoned garden in February....It will never leave me."
4 stars
The beautiful colourful cover is very appropriate for Brighten the Corner Where You Are: A Novel Inspired by the Life of Maud Lewis. I have been a fan of Maud Lewis and her folk art for years, so enthusiastically read this fictional novel of her life.
This is the first book written by Carol Bruneau that I have read, and I found her style of writing interesting. The story is told using Maud's voice from the afterlife. Although this is a fictional novel, there are historical facts interwoven. Maud was named Maud Kathleen Dowley when she was born.
Here are some of my favourite quotes:
"Marshlands, beaches, islands, and the sea are a rolling rug of greens and blues, every hue you can imagine is hooked into it, it's the prettiest hooking made by the happiest hooker. If there's a God in charge of all this, that's what she is, a hooker of borderless rugs."
"Her eyes gleamed wet and dark as stones and a fast brook... her eyes seem stuck on me, like they might draw me, body and soul, down inside of her. Her voice was sharp, sharp as a pair of scissors."
"I was happy, oh yes. I hung onto that feeling. It was like having a sunflower bloom inside me and it's big nodding head ripen with seeds for the birds. For happiness is like this, you soak it up like summer sun to remember during the cold, dark days of the winter ahead."
"Her voice was warm as honey standing in sunshine."
"She was on a mission to shake me like an apple from the tree."
"...as he bent closer I saw he had a face that would stop a clock." This was referring to her first love, Emery Gordon Allen, the father of her baby.
"Talk talk talk talk talk. At times, I had to admit, the sound of his voice was a bit like the sound of a rusty saw cutting a wet log." This quote was in reference to Maud's husband, Everett Lewis.
Several years ago my daughter and I saw Everett and Maud Lewis's little house in the Nova Scotia Art Gallery in Halifax. Years before that I saw it beside Highway #1 in Marshalltown.
I enjoyed reading this book and agree with the following quote by Lauren B. Davis.
"Dazzling! A poignant imagining of Maud Lewis's life; as colourful and joyous as Lewis's art, as bleak as an abandoned garden in February....It will never leave me."
4 stars
March 28, 2023
Maud Lewis was a Canadian folk artist who faced adversity and poverty in her life and created a remarkable body of work, which is now very collectible (the book cover art is a cheerful taste of Maud Lewis).
This novel is a look at Maud's life, from the lofty point of view of Maud herself some decades after her death. Such an approach is ambitious but Bruneau makes it look easy, and provides us with Maud in the first person as well as a more omniscient overview—or as much omniscience as one's inclinations permit. Truly a remarkable novel, about the vicissitudes of life, the randomness of events, the persistence of rumour and gossip, and the prismatic lens though which each of us construct our lives according to our own inclinations.
Maud's work is consistently cheerful ("world without shadows" is the phrase often used). Bruneau's novel is thoroughly shaded, intimate yet expansive, and offers much insight into the life of the artist, especially one who is self-taught and working in isolation. Maud was canny and determined, but probably never had much to say about her "artistic practice."
Maud did marry, in fact she married movie star Ethan Hawke! Of course, that's only in the movie version called "Maudie" which has, as movies tend to do, prettified everything. But that was Maud's approach too— working from memory she created idyllic scenes of country life, populated with flowers, birds, cats, and ox teams. Such a landscape may seem "old-timey" but it is also one I remember, having grown up in Nova Scotia, an eastern province of Canada.
I savoured every word of this wonderful novel, and also explored the internets to create a multimedia reading experience into the remarkable life and art of Maud Lewis.
Here are two videos, both very short:
Canadian television segment featuring an adorable Maud Lewis in the 1960s, a few years before her death:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIr8P...
Her incredibly tiny house was restored and relocated to the Art Gallery in Nova Scotia. The Maud Lewis House is now itself an art installation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1Q4N...
This novel is a look at Maud's life, from the lofty point of view of Maud herself some decades after her death. Such an approach is ambitious but Bruneau makes it look easy, and provides us with Maud in the first person as well as a more omniscient overview—or as much omniscience as one's inclinations permit. Truly a remarkable novel, about the vicissitudes of life, the randomness of events, the persistence of rumour and gossip, and the prismatic lens though which each of us construct our lives according to our own inclinations.
Maud's work is consistently cheerful ("world without shadows" is the phrase often used). Bruneau's novel is thoroughly shaded, intimate yet expansive, and offers much insight into the life of the artist, especially one who is self-taught and working in isolation. Maud was canny and determined, but probably never had much to say about her "artistic practice."
Maud did marry, in fact she married movie star Ethan Hawke! Of course, that's only in the movie version called "Maudie" which has, as movies tend to do, prettified everything. But that was Maud's approach too— working from memory she created idyllic scenes of country life, populated with flowers, birds, cats, and ox teams. Such a landscape may seem "old-timey" but it is also one I remember, having grown up in Nova Scotia, an eastern province of Canada.
I savoured every word of this wonderful novel, and also explored the internets to create a multimedia reading experience into the remarkable life and art of Maud Lewis.
Here are two videos, both very short:
Canadian television segment featuring an adorable Maud Lewis in the 1960s, a few years before her death:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIr8P...
Her incredibly tiny house was restored and relocated to the Art Gallery in Nova Scotia. The Maud Lewis House is now itself an art installation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1Q4N...
October 26, 2020
No doubt the story of Nova Scotia folk artist Maud Lewis is well-known to many, but Carol Bruneau's captivating novel was my first introduction to this extraordinary woman. It's her first-person voice that grabs the reader; witty, colloquial and full of insight. Lewis suffered from a disability and a lost first love; she married a man with a drinking problem and lived all her life in abject poverty. And yet somehow Bruneau manages to convey the unbroken spirit of a woman whose passion was painting, and who lived for the joy of colour and artistic simplicity. Bruneau takes risks in her storytelling, letting the dead Lewis narrate the story from the hearafter, but there isn't a saccharine note to be found. Nor is it in any way depressing. What keeps the pages turning is the sense of mystery. We have no idea what drives Maud Lewis, yet Bruneau has managed to evoke a generous and loving soul, an artist who grows and matures through the simple work of everyday. She leaves us to ponder what we cannot name — the heart of a woman who comes to some profound – and well-earned – conclusions about the wholeness of life. Don't miss this rich and satisfying read.
September 11, 2020
Imbues maud’s story with depth, dimension , and humanity .... highly recommended !!!
April 19, 2021
I enjoyed reading Maude's story told in the (imagined) first person a great deal. While familiar with her as an artist (many Nova Scotians, in particular, will be), I felt I understood her, her troubled marriage, and her compulsion to beautify her surroundings better for having read this. I was challenged to consider how she could so love an abusive person, but this book gave me the space in which to do so. The pacing and prose were fluid, and setting both familiar and new -- it was a pleasure to read about my province through the experiences of one who experienced it so differently. Maude Lewis's life was at the same time very small and quite large, in its embodiment of the universal experiences of so many who are physically, economically or socially constrained within a small space and meagre circumstances.
May 29, 2021
I absolutely loved this book! It is one that is so full of detail that I plan to re-read it again because I feel I missed parts of it the first read through. It is fictional, but an interesting take on what Maud Lewis' life may have been like. It seems Maud Lewis simply started painting whatever surface she could to dull boredom in her life. I think she found a love in it that kept her spirits up and little did she know that years later, her paintings would be selling for large amounts of money. Maud Lewis truly is a woman that should be remembered and celebrated!
November 3, 2020
A superb fictional depiction of the life of one of Nova Scotia's most enduring artists. Carol Bruneau's
portrait of the painter Maud Lewis is richly-drawn, complex, deeply moving and memorable. No one handles the nuances of character more skillfully than Bruneau. This book is a triumph.
portrait of the painter Maud Lewis is richly-drawn, complex, deeply moving and memorable. No one handles the nuances of character more skillfully than Bruneau. This book is a triumph.
Read
November 13, 2020Got to have a lovely chat with Carol about this book: https://atlanticbookstoday.ca/maud-le...
March 2, 2025
Really enjoyed this! I liked how the narrative went back and forth between the present and past. Her life story was sad, but hearing how she was able to stay hopeful and find job even in her difficult relationship with Ev was inspiring, but also still sad. I liked the writing style and the setting in Nova Scotia.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 27, 2020
Oh my heart....I am still hearing Maud's voice days after reading this book. This book of speculative fiction is built on the historical facts and it dispels many myths. The author was respectful to the memory of Maud in this beautiful, heartwrenching book.
(I loved that I have the book The Illuminated Life of Maud Lewis with text by Lance Woolaver and photographs by Bob Brook (1996) to accompany the reading of this book. It is a good book to accompany this beautiful book.)
Brava Carol Bruneau!
(I loved that I have the book The Illuminated Life of Maud Lewis with text by Lance Woolaver and photographs by Bob Brook (1996) to accompany the reading of this book. It is a good book to accompany this beautiful book.)
Brava Carol Bruneau!
March 11, 2021
This is one downer of a book and written in such a byzantine style that it's a bit confusing as well. It is a fictionalized account of the life of renowned Nova Scotia folk artist Maud Lewis. However, I think this interpretation of her difficult life is as extremely dark as the 2016 Hollywood movie "Maudie" was excessively romantic and cheery. The truth probably lies somewhere in between and I think we're better off looking at all the wonderful paintings she left behind rather and examine her painful and complicated background.
August 11, 2023
I sommarläsningen brukar det ingå att ta itu med ett antal littslattar. För ett drygt halvår sedan stod jag där, djupt berörd, inne på Art Gallery of Nova Scotia i Halifax, framför huset där Maud och Everett levde. Bortom tiny house- och struggling artist-troperna, på det tragiska sättet, då det inte fanns ett val. Sedermera nedplockat och fraktat nerifrån Marshalltown för att återuppbyggas och varsamt bevaras.
Med den här boken gäller det att acceptera premissen, Sebold-style, men magisk realism är svårt för mig. Dock medger jag att författaren fångat en ton och jag är glad att jag hängde i ända fram till meta-avsnittet precis i slutet. Hela projektet är ambitiöst, bl.a. är kapitelrubrikerna namngiva efter country- och gospelhits som Bruneau tänker att Lewis hörde på sin skruttiga radio medan hon målade. Hank Williams, kanske.
Om jag står ut med att bevittna det miserabla igen ska jag se om 'Maudie'. För som många påpekar finns det även en joie de vivre och den kommer från konsten.
Med den här boken gäller det att acceptera premissen, Sebold-style, men magisk realism är svårt för mig. Dock medger jag att författaren fångat en ton och jag är glad att jag hängde i ända fram till meta-avsnittet precis i slutet. Hela projektet är ambitiöst, bl.a. är kapitelrubrikerna namngiva efter country- och gospelhits som Bruneau tänker att Lewis hörde på sin skruttiga radio medan hon målade. Hank Williams, kanske.
Om jag står ut med att bevittna det miserabla igen ska jag se om 'Maudie'. För som många påpekar finns det även en joie de vivre och den kommer från konsten.
May 20, 2022
The author imagines the life story of Canadian folk artist Maud Lewis and her life living with her mentally abusive husband, Everett, who took her money over the years as both lived in poverty despite Maud's talent and ability to earn money through her paintings. Maud had debilitating arthritis and other challenges and though the author has a clear gift for capturing the story of the hardships of Maud's life, I didn't enjoy the book. It was hard not to feel angry the whole way through about the injustice of Maud's life experience. I don't mind a hard story so long as there's some redemption and recognize this bias as a reader. I wouldn't read it again or recommend it unless someone is in the mood for a good cry or needs another reason to be angry at life.
February 10, 2021
Very well written. It does make you wonder what Maud's life would have been like if she was born 20-30years later. Very thankful that so much of her art and life have been so carefully preserved.
September 16, 2024
Sad and hard to read at times but very relatable as to how messy life can be and the attempt to make the best of what there is to work with.
September 30, 2020
This is a very tender and insightful account of Maud's life. Brilliantly written, dealing with some uncomfortable realities of small town Nova Scotia.
November 30, 2020
The first person narrative of folk artist Maud Lewis from the afterlife allows us to know her earthly existence. Ironically, the real chance for freedom from the "cages" of her health, poverty, and marriage comes only after her death. Bruneau's use of contrast was really interesting and shed light on her complex character. The joy, colour, and movement in her paintings are placed against the stasis of her life marred by rheumatoid arthritis and COPD. A woman with intellect and curiosity is pitted against her husband Everett who cannot read or see beyond insular Marshalltown. Religion and nature are at opposite ends of her continuum. She loves music yet is not allowed a radio or television because of Ev's miserly ways, another deprivation. I could go on and on. Another clever part was the use of the symbols of the gold ring and Matilda the crow who lived in the trees in her yard.
Bruneau's prose is intense and the novel indicates an excellent knowledge of the time and place when Lewis lived and painted. Her research is impeccable. The novel grew on me!
Bruneau's prose is intense and the novel indicates an excellent knowledge of the time and place when Lewis lived and painted. Her research is impeccable. The novel grew on me!
January 4, 2022
Loved it - especially the second half -
June 9, 2025
I had no idea this book was based on Maud Lewis' life! I had seen it in bookstores but had passed over it many times. I nearly missed out on this beautiful story. I strongly recommend you read it.
January 30, 2025
A beautiful re-imagining of the life of Maud Lewis. Heart-breaking yet hopeful, this novel opens the door of the life of woman who wanted to see the best in everything despite poverty, neglect and abuse. I loved it!
May 2, 2021
A novel, just published, based on the life of Maud Lewis. As my sister especially loves Maud Lewis, I had to pre-read this book before giving it to her today. I hope it brightens the corner where she is! A well-researched and well-written book.
January 1, 2021
I was so irritated by the voice, her voice, supposedly, in this story. Another tale of a marginalized women who couldn't fight back against the abusive assholes in her life, including her family. And now we celebrate her art? Where was everyone at the time?? Chalk another one up for the patriarchy.
April 29, 2021
A great read based on the life on Maud Lewis. A sad life, but Bruneau does a great job of getting you inside Maud's head and how life might have been for her, how her decisions were made.
Very thoughtful writing.
Very thoughtful writing.
February 9, 2021
Completely wrapped up in Brighten the Corner Where You Are: A Novel Inspired by the Life of Maud Lewis. Thanks for shining this light in dusty & dark corners. Such a tender, illuminating book!
February 27, 2021
“Beyond the grave” voice did not appeal to me
January 29, 2023
"Strip away a fib and what you are left with is motherless sorrow, the need for more love than you could ever give or receive. Some get the world they guess up in their dreams and some don't. You make do. It helps to fall in love with the sun as it sinks, the blossom as it falls, the rustle of feathers even as one bird raids another's nest. To stay in love and make do, oh yes, it helps to make fibbing -- call it what you want -- an art. For the boundless nothing that is behind, before, below, and beside me covers all things. I figure you had best call it love."
The above quote, for me, sums up Maud’s story. It oh-so-beautifully ends the novel. Maud’s life is HARD and throughout my reading, I wholeheartedly put myself in Maud’s shoes to try to understand her choices. Would I have made the same choices? I don’t think so. But, she made the choices she did so she could paint. And, if she didn’t live through what she lived through, we wouldn’t be able to enjoy her amazing gift. Alternatively, I am also left with the feeling that she made the choices she made because, deep down, she felt it was all she deserved. She was undeserving because she was a bad person. She allowed her baby to be taken away and raised by others. (This is never baldly stated – just my feeling reading between Carol Bruneau’s lines.)
Maud, like all of us, wanted to love and be loved. The people she loved the most also betrayed her the most. Her brother and her Aunt basically rejected her once she became an adult. Her husband, Ev, was abusive, selfish, and neglectful. The world also used her. They took what they wanted from her (her art) and paid her practically nothing. Maud lived in abject poverty. Both she and Ev, were uneducated (she could read but he was illiterate.) Maud seems obtuse and naïve but both her and Ev are clever – in very different ways. They are survivors. Which is a very good thing because there were no safety nets in Nova Scotia back then – no food banks or welfare. Carol Bruneau distressingly presents Maud’s life in the early 1900s in rural Nova Scotia: the tiny (basically) one-room (shack) home with no indoor plumbing, the cold, the hunger, the suffering. This is not a feel-good novel. Ev is not a nice guy. He is what you would (politely) call: extremely distasteful.
Bruneau makes the choice of writing Maud’s life in the first-person AFTER she dies. I found this choice an odd one. Not so much because Maud is dead but because Bruneau chooses to have Maud grow as the story unfolds; as we learn more about Maud. My brain could not come to terms with this. Totally my bias: I just have this idea that when we die we become all seeing and all knowing. But, who can truly know what happens after you die? (only one way to find out.) I couldn’t just lean in to my reading. In the back of my mind, I kept thinking: why doesn’t Maud know about this, that, and the other thing? Isn’t she dead?? Why doesn’t she just know? Also, because Maud’s story does not unfold chronologically AND sometimes she is speaking from (Heaven???) the afterlife, I sometimes had to say to myself – where are we? When are we?? Am I missing something here??
Sadly, I did not know a lot about Maud Lewis’s life before reading this book. Of course, being from Nova Scotia, I see her art. I know about her tiny home, that she lived with an abusive, neglectful, alcoholic husband, and that she lived in abject poverty. I did not know how advanced her rheumatoid arthritis was and thus how deformed she was and how much pain she must have suffered with her disability – both physically and mentally. I now have a better understanding of why her artwork looks like it does. Going forward, when I see her paintings, I will forever see this tiny, but strong, woman. This woman who painted from her soul, who painted scenes that she (mostly) remembered, who painted nature because she loved birds and flowers and the rich colours of our world. Thank you to Carol Bruneau for depicting Maud for me. Thank you to my Ma for loaning the book to me only if I promised to pass it along to my Aunty Bev (who is Maud’s biggest fan.) Last, but not least, thank you to Maude for her beautiful Nova Scotian scenes.
The above quote, for me, sums up Maud’s story. It oh-so-beautifully ends the novel. Maud’s life is HARD and throughout my reading, I wholeheartedly put myself in Maud’s shoes to try to understand her choices. Would I have made the same choices? I don’t think so. But, she made the choices she did so she could paint. And, if she didn’t live through what she lived through, we wouldn’t be able to enjoy her amazing gift. Alternatively, I am also left with the feeling that she made the choices she made because, deep down, she felt it was all she deserved. She was undeserving because she was a bad person. She allowed her baby to be taken away and raised by others. (This is never baldly stated – just my feeling reading between Carol Bruneau’s lines.)
Maud, like all of us, wanted to love and be loved. The people she loved the most also betrayed her the most. Her brother and her Aunt basically rejected her once she became an adult. Her husband, Ev, was abusive, selfish, and neglectful. The world also used her. They took what they wanted from her (her art) and paid her practically nothing. Maud lived in abject poverty. Both she and Ev, were uneducated (she could read but he was illiterate.) Maud seems obtuse and naïve but both her and Ev are clever – in very different ways. They are survivors. Which is a very good thing because there were no safety nets in Nova Scotia back then – no food banks or welfare. Carol Bruneau distressingly presents Maud’s life in the early 1900s in rural Nova Scotia: the tiny (basically) one-room (shack) home with no indoor plumbing, the cold, the hunger, the suffering. This is not a feel-good novel. Ev is not a nice guy. He is what you would (politely) call: extremely distasteful.
Bruneau makes the choice of writing Maud’s life in the first-person AFTER she dies. I found this choice an odd one. Not so much because Maud is dead but because Bruneau chooses to have Maud grow as the story unfolds; as we learn more about Maud. My brain could not come to terms with this. Totally my bias: I just have this idea that when we die we become all seeing and all knowing. But, who can truly know what happens after you die? (only one way to find out.) I couldn’t just lean in to my reading. In the back of my mind, I kept thinking: why doesn’t Maud know about this, that, and the other thing? Isn’t she dead?? Why doesn’t she just know? Also, because Maud’s story does not unfold chronologically AND sometimes she is speaking from (Heaven???) the afterlife, I sometimes had to say to myself – where are we? When are we?? Am I missing something here??
Sadly, I did not know a lot about Maud Lewis’s life before reading this book. Of course, being from Nova Scotia, I see her art. I know about her tiny home, that she lived with an abusive, neglectful, alcoholic husband, and that she lived in abject poverty. I did not know how advanced her rheumatoid arthritis was and thus how deformed she was and how much pain she must have suffered with her disability – both physically and mentally. I now have a better understanding of why her artwork looks like it does. Going forward, when I see her paintings, I will forever see this tiny, but strong, woman. This woman who painted from her soul, who painted scenes that she (mostly) remembered, who painted nature because she loved birds and flowers and the rich colours of our world. Thank you to Carol Bruneau for depicting Maud for me. Thank you to my Ma for loaning the book to me only if I promised to pass it along to my Aunty Bev (who is Maud’s biggest fan.) Last, but not least, thank you to Maude for her beautiful Nova Scotian scenes.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 3, 2022
A story about Maud Lewis told by her after her death in some sort of after life. She says that she likes that she can swear. It is a musing about her life and her inner thoughts. Of course this is all fiction but the facts are about her real life. An interesting read although sometimes a bit slow paced.
“But I had known since forever that it’s colours that keep the world turning,
that keep a person going.
One glimpse of the tiny painted house that folk art legend Maud Lewis shared with her husband, Everett, in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, during the mid-twentieth century and the startling contrast between her joyful artwork and her life’s deprivations is evident. One glimpse at her photo and you realize, for all her smile’s shyness, she must’ve been one tough cookie. But, beneath her iconic resilience, who was Maud, really? How did she manage, holed up in that one-room house with no running water, married to a miserly man known for his drinking? Was she happy, or was she miserable? Did painting save or make her Everett’s meal ticket? And then there are the darker secrets that haunt her story: the loss of her parents, her child, her first love.
Against all odds, Maud Lewis rose above these constraints—and this is where you’ll find the Maud of Brighten the Corner Where You Are: speaking her mind from beyond the grave, freed of the stigmas of gender, poverty, and disability that marked her life and shaped her art. Unfettered and feisty as can be, she tells her story her way, illuminating the darkest corners of her life. In possession of a voice all her own, Maud demonstrates the agency that hovers within us all.”
“But I had known since forever that it’s colours that keep the world turning,
that keep a person going.
One glimpse of the tiny painted house that folk art legend Maud Lewis shared with her husband, Everett, in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, during the mid-twentieth century and the startling contrast between her joyful artwork and her life’s deprivations is evident. One glimpse at her photo and you realize, for all her smile’s shyness, she must’ve been one tough cookie. But, beneath her iconic resilience, who was Maud, really? How did she manage, holed up in that one-room house with no running water, married to a miserly man known for his drinking? Was she happy, or was she miserable? Did painting save or make her Everett’s meal ticket? And then there are the darker secrets that haunt her story: the loss of her parents, her child, her first love.
Against all odds, Maud Lewis rose above these constraints—and this is where you’ll find the Maud of Brighten the Corner Where You Are: speaking her mind from beyond the grave, freed of the stigmas of gender, poverty, and disability that marked her life and shaped her art. Unfettered and feisty as can be, she tells her story her way, illuminating the darkest corners of her life. In possession of a voice all her own, Maud demonstrates the agency that hovers within us all.”
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 22, 2022
Carol Bruneau, a Nova Scotia writer, has given me a fabulous insight into the life of a real person but in an unexpected form which was perfect for the job. 'Brighten the Corner Where You Are' is a beautifully written account of the life of well-known Nova Scotia folk-artist Maud Lewis. Maud's rather quaint, colourful, and child-like art is widely known, although it didn't become so until after her death. It is now widely sought and commands huge pricetags, unlike the $2 - $5 Maud suggested at the time.
Other books have been written, research done, and a movie made about this quirky, intelligent, humourous, talented, and impoverished woman but nothing quite like Bruneau's approach. You see, she wrote it from Lewis' POV, after she would have died, and is making observations on various people & events that happened before. It's as if she is watching from "above" as she looks and waits for those who have gone before her. A unique approach but very effective.
It is obvious that Bruneau did her own extensive research, as the book reads like a story & biography and I believe is true to facts; however, the dialogue has to have been manufactured/manipulated somewhat, as have various characteristics and events to at least fill in some of the unknowns.
Much has been written about Maud and her husband, Ev. She lived a difficult life with a debilitating and degenerative disease, was a chain-smoker, and had to rely on others (only a handful) for almost everything. Ev was often described by his critics as abusive, cruel, mean, misogynistic - you name it. She/they lived an impoverished life, but she never complained. The reader is left at the end with the choice of believing or not; I choose to believe that theirs was truly a love story unlike that of most.
The book is at times dark, then joyful; full of both despair and hope; painful yet uplifting. It is another bit of history that is worth learning about and is also a great, great read.
Thank you, Carol Bruneau.
Other books have been written, research done, and a movie made about this quirky, intelligent, humourous, talented, and impoverished woman but nothing quite like Bruneau's approach. You see, she wrote it from Lewis' POV, after she would have died, and is making observations on various people & events that happened before. It's as if she is watching from "above" as she looks and waits for those who have gone before her. A unique approach but very effective.
It is obvious that Bruneau did her own extensive research, as the book reads like a story & biography and I believe is true to facts; however, the dialogue has to have been manufactured/manipulated somewhat, as have various characteristics and events to at least fill in some of the unknowns.
Much has been written about Maud and her husband, Ev. She lived a difficult life with a debilitating and degenerative disease, was a chain-smoker, and had to rely on others (only a handful) for almost everything. Ev was often described by his critics as abusive, cruel, mean, misogynistic - you name it. She/they lived an impoverished life, but she never complained. The reader is left at the end with the choice of believing or not; I choose to believe that theirs was truly a love story unlike that of most.
The book is at times dark, then joyful; full of both despair and hope; painful yet uplifting. It is another bit of history that is worth learning about and is also a great, great read.
Thank you, Carol Bruneau.
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