Stone Mattress

In Stone Mattress, many characters are growing old. The passage of time is a theme found in all of the stories.

In “Alphinland,” Constance escapes to her fantasy world, where time is stopped. Constance does not want to think about dying, possibly hoping to simply disappear in Alphinland instead.

In “Torching the Dusties” aging and the aged become the enemy. The story takes place in a nursing home in a time and place where a movement begins because younger generations protest older generations. The movement’s mission is to get rid of the elderly. Atwood writes that the idea of ridding the world of old people is not a new one: “The elderly used to bow out gracefully to make room for young mouths by walking into the snow or being carried up mountain sides and left there” (275).

Atwood has named the nursing home where the story takes place “Ambrosia Manor.” Ambrosia is a type of beetle that feeds on a cultivated fungus, much like the protestors feel the elderly are doing to society. Further, ambrosia salad is a type of food most often associated with generations gone by.

Meanwhile, Wilma, inside the home under attack by the youth, remembers exchanging secrets with her girlfriends in ladies’ powder rooms, “back when they were called ‘powder rooms’” (243).