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The Gap of Time by Jeanette Winterson: book review



The Gap of Time: The Winter’s Tale Retold (2016) is a modern cover version of William Shakespeare’s play The Winter’s Tale, the story of Perdita, an abandonned child.

Hogarth Press is commissioning well-known contemporary writers to re-tell the stories of Shakespeare. This is the first publication in the series.

The retold story begins in New Bohemia, America, with 20-year-old Clo and his father Shep, an African-American man, finding a white baby left in a hospital’s BabyHatch for unwanted newborns. The baby, a girl, is left with cash, diamonds, and sheet-music of the song Perdita.

Leo Kaiser is married to MiMi, pregnant with a child that he believes is not his. Leo thinks 18-year-old handsome video gamer, Xeno, his best friend, is the father. So Leo abandons the child. Perdita is this child, and it is Leo’s child.

Raised by Shep and Clo for 16 years, the family relationships are strong and sincere, with Shep counting Perdita as a blessing in their lives after grieving the loss of his wife. Finding their ‘treasure’ and raising her as their own is well told in the modern version. Shep is a wonderful character – the opposite of Leo’s vile temperament.

The past and present collide in the relationship between Perdita and Zel. Zel is Leo’s son.

The gap of time refers to Xeno’s video game called The Gap of Time, but it also refers to memories, the time Perdita spends with Clo and Shep, the gap between past and present, the gap that loss and grief has on one’s life, the gap between traditional and modern values, the gap between fury and forgiveness, and the gap between regret and acceptance.

Winterson’s tale has some excellent comical passages, such as Shep’s 70th birthday celebration, but it is also bawdier and cruder and, I found, more confusing than the original Shakespeare version. All the themes of the original story are intact: rage, jealousy, revenge, abandonment, loneliness, regret for past mistakes, fate, family relationships, and redemption.

The first 75% of the novel is great as readers who know the original can pinpoint the exact Shakespearean scenes and analyse the comparisons. After that, I was longing for the original. I thought some characters were a bit stretched although Leo’s partner Pauline is nicely crafted. I also liked the literary references to Greek mythology, other Shakespearean dramas, other authors, and a touch of the author’s own experiences.

Overall though, the ending was disappointing for me.





MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).


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