The Stonemason

From the acclaimed author of All the Pretty Horses and The Crossing comes a profoundly moving drama set in Louisville, Kentucky in the 1970s, among four generations of a family of stonemasons. Ben Telfair admires and respects his grandfather Papaw for following their trade with a religious simplicity. However, Ben’s father has abandoned hand-hewn stonemasonry for building contract work, and his nephew Soldier is likewise immune to the old man’s guidance and wisdom. The stonemason’s trade is dying out, and the family’s unwillingness to preserve its truths has tragic consequences. The Stonemason reveals afresh the lyrical prose and mastery of character that distinguish Cormac McCarthy’s fiction.

‘Expertly constructed and limpidly written, the play triumphs in its presentation of Papaw, whose earthy wisdom McCarthy makes altogether credible’ Chicago Tribune

‘Mr McCarthy has the best kind of Southern style, one that fuses risky eloquence, intricate rhythms and dead-to-rights accuracy’ New York Times

‘McCarthy is a born storyteller, a writer of natural, impeccable dialogue, a literary child of Faulkner’ New Republic