The Rest of the Story: Critical Essays on Alice Munro

Since the early 1950s Alice Munro has been writing stories that have absorbed, intrigued, and even troubled her readers. In this critical analysis, leading critics explore the myriad connections informing Munro’s deceptively simple tales. Munro’s 1996 story, “The Love of a Good Woman,” receives particular attention, because in it she looks back on and forward to her unfolding career as a writer. Insights into Munro’s relationship with her agent, Virginia Barber, and with the New Yorker, also reveal a great deal about the development of Munro’s career and her vocation. Together, the essays explore Munro’s art in its full accomplishment, treating broadly both its process and its achievement.