Given the paucity of literature on becoming and being a widower in later life, By Himself is indeed a very timely and welcome addition to the field. Deborah van den Hoonaard has produced an engaging text that, via her analysis of the lived experience of a sample of 26 older, widowed men from both rural Atlantic Canada and a retirement community in Florida, USA, takes the reader on the complex and sometimes unexpected journey of what might be usefully termed ‘later life widowerhood’. van den Hoonaard manages, on the whole, to interweave successfully the voices of the 26 older men with previous scholarship and her own analysis and in doing so develops some interesting, often novel, insights into the experience of becoming and being an older widower.
The book comprises four sections. In Part 1, we are introduced to the origins, theoretical underpinnings, and cultural and social context of the study, as well as being provided with a useful summary of the research process involved. The difficulties, recognised by previous scholars of the topic, of accessing older widowers are noted and an account is provided of how access was tackled in this study. van den Hoonaard locates the study, including her analysis of the men's voices, firmly within concepts of masculinity. She indicates that, somewhat surprisingly and with the exception of Kate Bennett (Reference Bennett2007), little has been written on the topic of widowerhood and masculinity. Part 2 explores the men's experiences of first becoming an older widower. This includes accounts of wives’ illnesses and deaths, and recounts vividly how the men managed those early days when they were engaged in planning funerals and dealing with paperwork. Part 3 explores the way in which, in this as yet unknown territory, the men negotiated old and new relationships in their current social world: that is, a social world without a wife. Adding to the findings of Alinde Moore and Dorothy Stratton (Reference Moore and Stratton2002) and Kate Davidson (Reference Davidson, Davidson and Fennell2004), there are some useful insights in this section into the men's attitudes towards potential partners and, often negative, views on the ‘single’, older women whom they perceive as incessantly pursuing them. I found it interesting, but perhaps not surprising, to observe that the views expressed by these men are in direct contrast with those of some older women in my own study of widows (Chambers Reference Chambers2005), who expressed no desire whatsoever to find a new partner. Finally, Part 4 examines the way in which the men experience their ‘everyday’ lives, how they spent their time and the challenges of undertaking what they had always understood to be ‘women's work’, cooking and housekeeping. An extremely useful conclusion is provided which juxtaposes the key findings of the study with what is already known about older men's lives.
By using concepts of masculinity to both analyse the data and develop the discussion, Deborah van den Hoonaard, has provided the reader with a much deeper understanding of older widowers’ lives as they see them. This may of course not be the same as how their lives are perceived by others, nor indeed by other researchers who may draw on very different theoretical frameworks, but it permits a novel, and indeed invaluable, insight into the world of older men and the way in which they make sense of both their new identity as a widower and the roles they now undertake. She also demonstrates very well, largely as a result of the sample of widowers drawn from the two diverse settings, rural Atlantic Canada and the retirement community in Florida, USA, the way in which external factors such as culture, social context, geographical location and family relationships may all, collectively and individually, impact on the lives of older widowers and both enhance and constrain the opportunities available to them.
Deborah van den Hoonaard has produced a rich contribution to the existing literature base on later-life widowerhood as well as providing readers with a useful example of a rigorous, qualitative study of old age. The book should appeal to a diverse audience, including not only those with a specific interest in later-life widowerhood but also those interested, for example, in the following: masculinities across the lifecourse, transitions in later life; and social relationships in old age. Established and new researchers will find something of interest in this text.
