It is a pleasure to bid you welcome to the proposed discussion of Anne Tyler's most recent book. I hope to have your company in this reading adventure.

I would love to join this Discussion. I just finished this book and was thinking "I wish I knew someone who read this because I really want to talk to someone about these people."

Funny thing, I read it on the 12th of January and the inside page says first published in 2004. That's pretty quick to be discounted in a store in Australia!

Jan

I have this book on the request list at the library.....I am 12th in line!!!! Maybe I will get by then.....I have read all her books....

JAN and TIGERLILEY, WELCOME, WELCOME ! It is good to know you plan on being here.

TIGERLILEY, surely your copy will arrive before we begin. By now the waiting list is bound to be much longer!

When it comes to Anne Tyler I admit to a distinct bias; in my eyes she can do no wrong. I remember as if it had been yesterday : About 20 years ago when I was in a van pool commuting to Boston and reading Tyler's Morgan's Passing, one of the co-riders, a man, asked about the book, and I guess I bubbled over. He stunned me into silence when he replied, firmly, that HE would NEVER read a book written by a WOMAN !! Can you imagine ? Of course I didn't argue with him; it would have been no use.

Those of you who already have, or expect to get, the book will notice that the various chapters have intriguing titles that are not revelatory i.e. do not give away things, at first glance. The chapters are "self-contained" gems and advance the narrative in stages with different points of view.

Like you JAN, I have read the book but am now in the process of devising a proposed reading schedule.

I'll ask some general (but related) questions soon. Stay tuned. And Happy Reading!

Dear Reader friends,

Our proposed discussion has been moved to the Upcoming Discussions , where it will attract more readers, I hope.

Within just one month since publication, The Amateur Marriage finds itself catapulted to 4th place on the NYT bestseller list = testimony of how beloved the author is.

In her past books Anne Tyler had placed her characters squarely within a specific period of time, hers and ours; we identified with the respective epoch.

Reviewers have called her characters "quirky", and yes, there are early groupies, star gazers, puppeteers. But there are also non-quirky, ordinary people with whom we could identify, like the underappreciated mother in Ladder of Years who walked away from an afternoon at the beach, clad only in her husband's robe, and started a new life ... Alas, the outcome was not what some fans had hoped for.

In any event, this time Tyler aims higher. She follows one couple through 30 years of a stormy marriage to its dissolution, and beyond. These are not quirky characters, in fact, they could live right next door, and- but for the Grace of God - they could even be us !

In anticipation of March 1st, I now submit for your consideration some general thoughts which have no specific reference to the book.

(*) We know all about incompatible personalities. The question is: Can incompatibility be overcome in a marital relationship ?

(*) What about the old saw " Opposites attract" (Do they really ?)

(*) Is it really possible to overcome fundamental differences between spouses for good, at bottom , or merely by wishful thinking and the resigned submission of one party to the seemingly inevitable status quo ?

(*) Where do children fit into this ?

Would love to hear from you.

WELCOME, MAL, and thank you ! I am glad you will be here with us, as you had said earlier in the WRX folder. The more, the merrier !

Valentine's is almost upon us, and so is Love ! Any thoughts about our book yet in that connection ?

JANE, many thanks. I am grateful for your detailed message and feel guilty having caused you to lose that much time.

I'll be perfectly happy to leave things as they now are in the header.

Thank you again. T

Dear Friends,

I hope that those of you who were waiting for "our" book have it now before them and are reading. Tyler is always "timely" in her novels, and this is particularly true this time as we once again are fighting a war abroad.

The NYT of February 16 carried an interesting interview with the author, interesting because it was conducted via e-mail. The interviewer, Mel Gussow , e-mailed his questions and Tyler replied in kind, discussing her approach to writing, her themes and motifs, and how distant her books are from her life.

Tyler is still an intensely private person, and we know essentally no more about her than what we've read in the back of her previous fifteen novels, except that her husband, a psychiatrist, died in 1997.

And that is just fine with me : We live in such "noisy" times, we are being talked at constantly, endlessly, and the relentless, repetitious self-promotion of some celebrities (and those who aspire to that status) can become tiresome.

When this folder was opened, I asked a few musing questions and will continue to do so as the discussion proceeds. I do not intend to unduly limit your reading by proposing a number of specific chapters within the time we have together, preferring instead to leave you free to read as little or as much as you wish and have time for. We have one month, beginning on March first.

See you then, or sooner - if someone posts before than.

Happy Reading!

This is my first venture into Seniornet, and my first Book Discussion. I am looking forward to seeing what it's all about. I got the book from the library and will have it read by March 1. I look forward to participating in this discussion.

Welcome Margomay, To Senior Net Books and Literature Amateur Marriage discussion, We the posters are so Happy to see you. You will be recieving a Welcome letter soon Please watch for it "DO NOT DISCARD" as it will be a help to you to get around.
Ginger

MAL, thank you for your posts 12 and 14, dear friend, and thank you, GINGER, our faithful Steward and Books Ambassador.

Welcome, Margomay ! I am so glad you decided to join us in the forthcoming discussion. Let's discover together if there is a message in The Amateur Marriage and, if so, what it might be.

Traude this was e-mailed to me today from the UK Random House people - it is an excerpt on-line of this book - gives folks a chance who are considering to read a bit or if their book has not arrived yet they can get a peek into how the book sounds...

http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/catalog/extract.htm?command=search&db=main.txt&eqisbndata=0701177349

wow they are even suggesting if you have any questions for the author to e-mail them to this e-mail address - hmmm interesting...

https://webmail.pas.earthlink.net/wam/msg.jsp?msgid=14773&folder=INBOX&x=1336761657

Thank you for the links, BARBARA.

Especially the first will be helpful for those who may be undecided about joining the discussion.

I'll keep the second link handy. My modus operandi is to let a discussion develop "organically"- as I like to call it, from within. Precisely for that reason I prefer formulating my own questions as well, rather than repeating those that can often be found in ready-made Readers Guides.

Thank you again.

Hi Everyone, I have just read The Amateur Marriage and enjoyed it very much. I look forward to our discussion and will tune in on March 1st.

MARGOMAY - thank you for dropping in.

Im anxious to have you and everyone else comment to your heart's content about anything and everything in this book. Though it will be a few more days before we begin our discussion, I'd like to ask you to consider the following questions :

Are we 'preordained' or 'predestined' to having an either happy or an unhappy life ?

What makes it so ?

Can an individual assure, or work toward a happy marriage or, respectively, avert an unhappy one instead of blaming everything on 'fate'?

What does that take ?

Are some marriages doomed to failure ?

What exactly is a marriage "made in heaven" ?

See you soon

HORSELOVER, welcome in our group ! It is good to see you here. I appreciate your taking the time to respond to the questions I had posed in preparation for the discussion, which will be free-ranging, so to speak, not strictly limited to specifically assigned chapters.

In parentheses, I found "The # 1 Ladies Detective Agency" charming and captivating. That is true also for the second volume, "Tears of the Giraffe". Both are deeper than meets the eye (or expectations). Volumes three and four have very long waiting lists at the library, and I may end up buying them. But I digress. Back to TAM.

Looking forward to March 1st.

Happy Reading!

Good Morning, and welcome to the opening day of our discussion. Thankyou, MAL, for answering the first more abstract questions that occurred to me when I read the book. Now we can begin to discuss the story itself, the adventures and misadventures of the young couple in their new life together.

Hello MAL,

You are quite right: in times of war, life suddenly becomes more urgent, more precious for the young men who join it as well as for the women they leave behind. Lives are inexorably changed forever.

The scene is vividly set: the narrow-chested, tiny, identical rowhouses in the self-contained forced intimacy of the Polish neighborhood into which Pauline comes as an outsider and is watched with special attention; the church and the dates they celebrate. The reader is given an outline, a first look at characters that have yet to fully emerge. Who do you think is the narrator of this chapter ?

I enjoyed the book very much. I thought the personalities of Michael and Pauline were too different to make a happy marriage, and I think Pauline realised that, when she wanted to change her mind at the very door of the church. While opposites do attract, if people have very different personalities there is bound to be conflict, especially if the conditions of their lives are difficult - the cramped living quarters, the live-in mother-in-law. I found it interesting that the eldest child Lindy seemed to inherit her mother's personality, but to an even greater extreme, resulting in disastrous events. I will be interested to see other people's comments in the days to come.

I was ready for this, and then I woke up feeling dreadful. I'll come back later when I've been up longer and taken more Paracetamol.

Resized

MAL, JAN, MARGOMAY, thank you for posting.

HORSELOVER, thank you also, especially for that map. Indeed, The Day of Infamy reverberated around the world, and it should never be forgotten.

I experienced the war in Europe, in a similar way: the anxiety, the blackout, the rationing, and the bombing, death and destruction. Looking back it seems to me that all of this happened not to me but to a different person whose memory I carry.

Tyler sets the scene perfectly and describes the time and the people as only she can, matter-of-factly and without polemics, in the voice of someone who was there when all of the events in the story happened (reminding me fleetingly of Edward R. Murrow). Though Tyler uses the third person narration in all chapters, she skillfully manages to convey the perspective of different characters.

In chapter 2 it is Michael's perspective. The fractious state of the marriage is in full view. It is said that every marriage requires a period of adjustment, but Pauline and Michael didn't have the time. They became impatient, frustrated, one with the other, hardly a surprise given their temperamental makeup. The image of a dandelion clock is quite fitting.

From all appearances Michael and his mother were not devout Catholics, but the church dictated certain aspects of their lives nonetheless. Pauline and Michael were both young and inexperienced (as is later confirmed), and it is safe to assume that at that time birth control was not a subject for discussion, let alone practice.

After one of their fights Pauline runs home with baby Lindy whence Michael dutifully retrieves her - apparently a regular occurrence. Like chapter 1, chapter 2 ends on a hopeful note : "He had the feeling that if he held his breath, the two of them could stay suspended forever in this moment of stopped time."

I am following along....I am rather disappointed in this book...somehow it just didn't hold my interest.....

Maybe the point here is the loss of the family closeness. It is indicative of Michael's point that he chooses a woman after his divorce from P whom he comes to realize is desirous of him for "decoration purposes" and maybe that is what he can most allow himself to be. He catches himself trying to begin the type of marriage he had with Pauline. Was it only the familiarity drawing him back or was it his style of interacting? He stopped himself so maybe it was only the familiarity of his marriage style with Pauline. Pauline seems shallow all the way through but the failings don't seem to stem from her family. Their daughter's rebellion may be saying "you are not seeing me so I will make you." The other children were undamaged although I do not understand why this would be so. They maintain a healthy interaction, with even the grandchild being successful and being able to cope without rage with his long-absent mother, meaning that M & P were able to do a good job. Maybe the personality styles were antigonistic. P although flighty cares deeply, too deeply about trivia? and not able to sustain a lasting interest without emotional highs and lows? M wanting a level of eveness P is not able to give? Battling so long that that is all they know, staying amateur instead of passing into professional marriage. Maybe even M decision to divorce is another amature move, tit for tat, stuck in childish ops. Maybe even their daughter's action were "amateur" and she grew up long after her teenage rebellion.

WELCOME KATESICO !

Interesting posts, MAL and KATESICO.

Of course, the Happy End of movie lore is not an end at all but a totally new beginning. More often than not the going is rough because of unforeseen circumstances for which there was no adequate preparation. The transition to married life is rarely smooth, let alone automatic. As I said earlier, a "period of adjustment" is expected.

But when people marry despite being aware of significant differences and oblivious to them, like Pauline and Michael, say, there is no such grace period; reality is immediate. A compromise, even a half-hearted one, is the only alternative. But in Pauline's and Michael's case no earnest effort was attempted. It is difficult to muster sympathy for Pauline and much easier to be irritated by her. But the fact is that the Anton family could even now very well be our neighbor, unremarkable by all accounts, but deeply troubled.

Chapter 3, The Anxiety Committee, shows clearly Pauline's perspective, and quite revealing at that. She does have a sharp tongue; more important, she is not only self-centered, as MAL has said, but hopelessly immature.

This novel is important IMBO because it provides a comprehensive picture of one American family's life from Pearl Harbor Day until sixty years later, how the country changed and how the family adapted.

It may be a "quiet", an introspective story, about nameless people who could have been just "anyone" at the time. Just the same it is an important story about reality, then and now, unheralded and without the fanfare of a Reality Show.

HORSELOVER, the questions in the header are a guideline; none of them anticipate what is going to happen to the characters.

I am averse to proclaim sympathy or antipathy for a character early on, and I have confined myself strictly to commenting on what I perceive from each chapter.

Please feel free to approach the discussion from any angle you find more appropriate; every viewpoint is welcome !

Yes, Pauline was a romantic, hearts and flowers included. But aren't all women when it comes to their birthdays ? Pauline was just a bit more so, and on top of that she was given to temperamental outbursts - which are hard to take by the people around. And men especially are turned off by excessive displays of emotion - especially when the cause of the inital argument is hard to pin down, in retrospect.

But more than the picture of a marriage this story gives us a view of the immedite post-war years and of the first developments in what came to be known as suburbia. One such development in Baltimore County is in Bowie, Maryland, where we had friends. The houses were all identical ranches (aka ramblers), built by the people who founded Leavittown in New York; the streets were treeless then. But that was over thirty years ago.

A dear cyber friend from the old days in AOL's Book Club wrote today to say that he had just finished reading The Amateur Marriage, that "Anne Tyler has done it again" and that "she is a phenomenal writer". That made me feel good. As an inveterate fan, I emphatically agree.

Michael reluctantly gives in and moves the family including his mother and three children from the grimy, gray city out to Baltimore County and a different life. Small wonder that Mother Anton feels displaced and lost. It is not altogether surprising that Pauline should phantasize about a man like Alex Barrow, or any man, because she is vivacious, flirtatious and even a bit "flaky"- in modern parlance. The question is, would she have been capable of carrying on an affair ? Tantalizing though it may be, the question is not answered by Tyler.

There is an interesting insight on page 68 where Pauline thinks that "They (the two women friends at poolside) would be aghast if she told them she wasn't so very sure that chldren really did improve a marriage." As it is, two of her children are "minders", George and Karen. It is the eldest, Lindy, who needs to be watched.

I'm sorry I haven't been back before this--a close encounter with a virus.

Mal you just made me think of a song, Denim and Lace, wasn't it? I just can't think who sings it, the singer with a patch over his eye? It's on the tip of my tongue, so annoying.

This odd couple remind me of Diana and Charles, so different in personality and upbringing, and so confident all those years ago that their relationship would work. At first I thought it was all Pauline's doing rushing headlong into a relationship and marriage, but then looking back over the pages I think Michael too was ripe for a change in his life. I think he was looking for a reason to break free from his mother. "It seemed she'd marched off to war with Michael Anton, somebody said. They did all notice-- those in the crowd who knew Michael. It was enough of a surprise so they noticed, and remarked to each other, and remembered it for some time afterward." He didn't need his arm twisted.

I did feel like giving Michael a good shaking, he knew Pauline's character, just a smidgeon of spontaneity would have gone a long way with her, I feel. There doesn't seem to be any malice in Pauline, she's ready to reach out and take what comes if he could just empathize a bit!

In fact Michael seems pretty jealous of her, I remember somewhere he felt a pang of "brotherly jealousy" because his mother and Pauline were happy and laughing together. We have someone in our extended family who's taken feeling hard done by to an art form, he wallows in it! I can see Michael heading the same way.

I think opposites do attract, and can be happy but it takes an awful lot of tolerance and acceptance. I cringe when people talk about soul mates, that's far too much of a burden to put on one poor soul.

Jan

JAN, I am glad you feel better and are able to post.

Michael's first twinge of jealousy is understandable : he is in military training and writes Pauline every day. She works in the Red Cross canteen and enjoys talking and going to dances with the men coming through the city. Her letters to Michael become shorter and arrive less frequently.

In "Dandelion Clock", Michael reveals confusion over Pauline's moodiness; but to some extent that can be blamed on her pregnancy and their living conditions "cheek to jowl" with his mother. Pauline is irritated not only with his parsimony (she calls him "stingy") but evidently dissatisfied also with his performance as a husband.

He is baffled (and inexperienced) and shows concern about the regularity of the quarrels : "But the worst quarrels, he reflected ..., were the ones where he couldn't pinpoint the cause. The ones that simply materialized, developing less from something they said than from who they were, by nature. " (pg. 45, emphasis mine)

His efforts to calm Pauline once something has set her off are useless. "He has no means of controlling her." His appeals for her to be "reasonable" are futile, they actually enrage her further. After the fight described in chapter 2, it is PAULINE who runs home to mother, clutching baby Lindy in her arms, after telling Michael to "Go away! Just go! Just take your stuffy pompous boring self-righteous self away and leave us in peace!" The Barclays do not seem surprised when Michael later arrives at their home to take Pauline and Lindy back home nor, one presumes, when the daughter appears on the doorstep.

But can hurtful words hurled at a loved one in such anger -again and again over a period of years- be erased for good each time? There is bound to be bitterness, and there will be scars.

Back later

HORSELOVER, I agree with your # 47. In the case of Pauline and Michael there is no "meeting of the minds", their traits are not complementary; the invisible gap between them widens.

Tyler accomplishes an extraordinary literary feat IMHO by laying bare the views and reactions of different characters in successive chapters, though none is a first-person narration.

Chapter three, "The Anxiety Committee", shows Pauline's perspective. The chapter title is her mocking moniker for her family. In pp. 74-75 she wonders what made her go through with the marriage despite serious doubts and half a dozen attempts to break off the relationship, including the last possible minute before the wedding. But there she is, all these years later, deeply dissatisfied with Michael's stodginess and his other failings, with three children in the house she carefully and lovingly decorated. She is vulnerable.

It is Lindy's disappearance that creates a true crisis and strikes at the heart of the fragile family unit. But did it come out of the blue ? Or were there warning signs ? Karen and George saw a "progression" in Lindy's rebellious, defiant behavior and had become increasingly vigilant (pg 99). Would it have helped if they had spoken up? Would they have been believed ?

MAL, it causes all sorts of complications when one partner in a marriage is gregarious and the other a loner. The former suffers more than the latter, I believe, and that is Pauline in our book. She needs people, attention, companionship, constant phone contact and visits with her family and friends; she wants to be liked. But Michael is unable to reciprocate. They are poles apart, which Pauline realizes clearly when she says, "The real problem was that they were mismatched. They simply never should have married."

They might have had a chance if they had not been centered exclusively on themselves but paused instead to consider the effects of this constant marital battle on the children, as you have indicated, MAL. Still, to walk away from a marriage was uncommon in that era, in my experience, or at least not the first thought/option of an unhappy spouse.

In chapter 4, it is Karen's voice describing from the children's experience the events leading up to Lindy's running away from home. It is revealing, simultaneously touching and funny, like mention of Lindy's favorite author, Jack "Kerook", and someone named Albert "Caymus"(!) But I wonder how could mother and father possibly have tolerated Lindy's behavior without a serious effort to do something about it? The unawareness of the parents Karen describes is evident from Pauline's unrealistic idea that all would be well if Lindy went to church and joined the youth group.

So true - and so well spoken Mal

WELCOME PAULITA ! Good to have you with us. Thank you for posting.

I agree, MAL. Also, Tyler presents the story from several sides, making the reader privy to the characters' internalized, individual feelings while gradually bringing the narrative forward. The author has an acute sense of observation and a special ear for language. A few words convey the full picture : Michael "reading a section of the paper folded into quarters", the "icky-poo reconciliation scene".

She is very funny at times, and the reader smiles often in recognition. The reflection of advancing age in face and body is described accurately and without flinching. Admirably, she does not make fun of her characters, i.e. she does not satirize their behavior or appearance; she reports what she sees, the interpretation is up to the reader.

Since there seem to be no further comments on or thoughts about chapters 1-4, I propose that we go on to examine chapter 5, "Heidi's Grandfather", and check on the Antons. It contains a wealth of new information for the reader. The year is 1968.

MAL, thank you for your thoughtful post.

Chapter 4 gives the reader a glimpse at Michael's home life before he met Pauline, and the profound effect on him of his brother's sudden fall on the sidewalk, which Michael thought to be a joke that Danny was playing on their humorless mother. In the first few months when good and bad days alternated, Michael was rigid with anxiety and thought of his brother's illness as "something to be concealed. ... It would be so humiliating if outsiders guessed the family's secret!"

Depending on one's temperament, I submit that even today such deeply held feeling and reaction is not totally uncommon. Some talk openly about them, others keep them to themselves.

Danny's condition worsens progressively. Michael retains sketchy memories of the later, harder stages; Danny in a wheelchair, Danny flat in bed, Danny sipping through a straw from a glass their mother was holding to his lips. Michael is sound asleep when Danny dies one winter night shortly before his nineteenth birthday.

"The boring, comforting ordinariness suddenly yanked away. The horrified realization. The sideways glance to find out whether anyone else had noticed that something was wrong with the Antons."

Not everyone mourns the same way; not everybody is temperamentally capable of giving voice to sorrow and showing emotion. Michael and his mother, graying, bitter and laconic, withdraw into themselves and carry on in the cubbyhole of a store where Michael arranges the tins in the shape of a pyramid until the day in December "when a torrent of young women explodes through the door".

In this chapter we also see Lindy's growing rebelliousness and Michael, while (perhaps deliberately) ignoring its seriousness and potential, nevertheless "had been laboring under a sense of dread for months." When the police officers come to the house, "he sits erect, hands clamping his knees, eyes fixed unwaveringly on the detective" and makes no move to comfort the crying Pauline. "It occurred to him not once had Pauline said "we", "our ", or referred to Lindy as "ours". Everything had been "I" and "my", as if the drama were hers alone." The tragedy does not bring them closer together. He bears his grief in silence and in private.

When word finally comes they fly to San Francisco. Lindy, known as "Serenity", is in a hippie-led drug rehab home and not released. But Pagan, her nearly wordless son, goes home to Baltimore with his grandparents.

On the flight home Pauline began constructing the story she would tell from now on about Lindy (pg. 158).

"Another time, Michael might have felt annoyed by this rouged and lipsticked version of the truth. Such concern for the looks of things, even within the family! But today he was touched. It occurred to him that his wife had amazing reserves of strength, that women like Pauline were the ones who kept the planet spinning ..."

They'll do well by Pagan.

HORSELOVER, thank you for bringing up the anniversary picture taken in the Portrait Studio with the blue satin fake-sky backdrop, mentioned on pg. 103

where Karen thinks "They looked self-conscious and stiff and surprisingly young"), and again on pg. 137 where Michael remembers feeling "for just an instant that he ws standing next to a stranger."

Finally the breakup : After "It's been hell", Michael adds

"All this shouting and weeping and carrying on, stalking off, slamming doors, kicking furniture, throwing my clothes out the window, locking me out of the house ---"

And Pauline says, "Why don't you leave then". "If you are so miserable, leave! If I make you so unhappy. If your life is such torment. Go! What are you waiting for?"

That is the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back, the final insult- ironically on their 30th anniversary. Michael walks out, for good, breaking the vicious repetitive cycle. After all, how much is a person expected to take ?

MAL, we are not told that Pauline actually leaves , she "stalks off" until Michael goes after her in the early days, and it seems to become a pattern.

Indeed, Pauline was much better off than many a wife after a divorce and finally has the freedom she always wanted. Did it make her happy ?

My computer mouse has been both erratic and totally inert yesterday and today, and I hope I can manage to actually finish this overdue reply to the last posts.

It is no surprise that a man as scrupulously honest as Michael provides for his wife and, though it is not spelled out in the story, it is probable that he signed ownership of the house over to her. Pauline would like to undo what she realizes, to her credit, as her mistake, but there is no turning back for Michael. The adult family members adjust soon enough, and even Pagan, only seven at the time, reacts with remarkable equanimity to the external changes in his life. Pauline sees him as "too self-contained" and

"she would have preferred if he'd fallen apart, sobbed in her arms, demanded reassurance."

Pauline for her part begins to see that she has taken Michael for granted for a long time.

HORSELOVER, Tyler has written this book impartially, showing the reader the events through the eyes of different characters to whose innermost thoughts we are privy. She does not assess blame, does not favor one spouse over the other. Yet it is not unusual for a reader to feel more drawn to one character than another, to have a personal reaction and to care about what happens to them.

I think it would have been uncharacteristic for Michael to leave Pauline improvident, and he doesn't. We are not given the terms of the divorce settlement, but from all appearances Pauline's life outwardly at least continues without change. The resentment and bitterness of the separation slowly subsides, and she can count on Michael to come when needed. The inner loneliness, of course, is another matter altogether.

MAL, the Antons were married in 1942. They celebrated their fifteenth wedding anniversary in 1957 (see pg. 137). By the time they separated in 1972, women's liberation (remember bra-burning and Ms. Magazine), was a fait accompli .

Can we see how their different temperaments affected the course of their lives apart ?

Why can't Pauline find a permanent attachment, unlike Michael ?

Our discussion is nearing its end.

What are your thoughts on the final outcome of the story?

Are you satisfied with the way it was resolved?

Thank you for your post, MAL, and astute observations.

It is gratifying that Michael, who did not deliberately go out to look for a new companion, finds peace with Anna, a friend from the past and part of the original circle. Theirs is a cautious, gentle courtship that develops over time without undue haste. Michael's musings give an indication of how tortured (and "burdened" = his words) he must have felt over the three decades, precisely because the family and their livelihood were his responsibility day and night, as MAL has mentione in her post.

Tyler has given a balance to her narrative by writing in Pauline's, Michael's and Karen's voices; George's will be heard also. And then there is the clincher, if I may call it that.

What do you make of the last two chapters, Lindy's reappearance and its effects on the family? Is the reaction predictable? surprising? anticlimactic? We've come close to the end of our discussion.

Thank you ladies for your thoughtful posts. I have not yet read the book but plan to since her novels always seem to speak to me - and to many women I imagine. Your posts, however, stood by themselves and I followed them with interest. The discussion on Carolyn Heilbron dampened my enthusiasm for computerized discussion of difficult ideas but this exchange was fine. I find it hard to "discuss" when unable to see facial expressions etc. as it seems to lead to lots of misunderstanding. Interesting this computer world.

There's nothing like coming in at the very end but I've just finished the book and wanted to see what others thought of it. I love to read this author's books and feel she is able to sketch in words the frailities we humans have. I think the story ended the way it had to but I kept hoping that Karen or George would encourage their parents to talk to a religious person,social worker,someone-I think they might have tried-Pauline not to throw temper tantrums or to gain some understanding why she did and Michael to loosen up a bit more- 30 years is a lot to just give up on.It might not have kept them together but I think it would have helped them be a bit more happy.

Dear Friends,

Tuesday evening my capricious mouse gave up for good, but buying a replacement had to wait: it snowed heavily (again) Tuesday night into Wednesday, and there were the usual problems with snow removal and plowing of the driveway. In sum, I am greatly relieved to be back on line after 48 long hours. Thank you, MAL, for posting here to explain my absence, lest you should think I was falling down on my job - Heaven forbid!

I wanted to say HELLO to PAULITA. I am glad you followed our discussion. Many thanks for your post.

Hello, TUDY, WELCOME, good to see you here, and thank you for posting. I have savored this book and smiled in recognition at Tyler's often hilarious description of human foibles and prejudices. Yet there is also an element of sadness, I feel, because the outcome is predictable in a way and, ultimately, inevitable.

Pauline never fully gets over the separation and divorce, she is suddenly without an anchor, trying to fill her days, has sleepless nights and feels desperately alone. None of the men she meets and talks about with her old friends in the city pass muster. From what we read, none would have been the right match. MAL, I see the dinner date with Dun as both farcical and as a heart-breaking reality check for Pauline.

Lindy's return after twenty-nine years seems anticlimactic; it is too late, too much was lost and can never be retrieved. The reception by the family is decidedly muted.

HORSELOVER, were the Antons as different from other families as Karen and George felt ? That is a good question.

I think not. All families live through crises of one sort or another, but children may think that makes them "different" from the families of their peers. I know as much from personal experience.

I'd like to come back to the last chapter tomorrow and then your closing thoughts. Many thanks.

It is indeed probable that family therapy would have helped at least the Anton children a great deal, although it may not "worked" for Pauline and Michael. As MAL said, when partners are so entrenched in their positions that they are incapable and unwilling to even consider the possibility that the other has legitimate grievances, there is scant hope.

I never knew of marital or family counseling in the seventies, but heard of individuals having psychotherapy which, at a rumored cost of $100 per session, was not exactly cheap, especially for the long run. Since then, counseling has long been demystified and is a helpful tool for individuals and families in crisis. Yet there is no concomitant decrease in the number of divorces.

Despite the advice of the golden-haired woman with the wand in his dream never to look back, Michael does precisely that and more: walking eagerly to Pauline's house, his face to the sun. An unsatisfing ending, for me. Does it convey a foreboding, or is it merely a sign that Michael is losing his sense of reality?

I appreciated your observations, HORSELOVER and MAL. We have now come to the end of our discussion. I have enjoyed sharing my thoughts of this book with you and am grateful for your participation.

So long and take care till we meet again in another discussion.

Sadly, the book reminded me of my own parents' unhappy post WWII marriage. There were a lot of quick marriages in those days both just before, during and after the war. Pauline and Anton probably could have worked out their marriage problems working class people didn't do that sort of thing - they just stuck it out. This book takes place in an immigrant, working class section of Baltimore - very tight knit with everyone basically have the same background: mostly Eastern European. Pauline doesn't even begin to fit. She's a WASP. I'm surprised at Michael's mother's easy acquiesence to a marriage in a Protestant church. That would have been unacceptable to a lot of the people I grew up with. I grew up in a working class neighborhood in Philadelphia where virtually everyone was either Catholic or Jewish. The Protestants had pretty much moved to the suburbs or lived in the fancier parts of the city like Chestnut Hill. I graduated from a Catholic girl's high school and one of my classmates told me about being treated badly by a priest because she had chosen to marry a Protestant - and this was in the late 60's! Then there are their personality differences - they drove each other nuts! I love Anne Tyler - her characters are quirky and memorable. Hope you all liked it too!

I had to return my copy of this book to the library several weeks ago and so, once again, have been out of sync with the discussion. Which was great, by the way - I kept wanting to have it back again for something I had missed.

But what I wanted to comment on is Anne Tyler's way with words, or her style, or whatever it is that has drawn me into each of her now 16 books. The plots are fine, the characters by their very ordinaryness (?) intriguing and all that but the way she has of pulling us in. I'm not even quite sure how she does that. And, darn it all, the only specific example I can think of now is when Michael and Pauline first walk in and meet Pagan. I seem to remember something along the line of Michael's looking across the room to where Pagan was sitting and noting that his hair looked so....foreign. Isn't that a great line - it says so much in so few words.

And there were many, many other phrases that I wanted to read and then re-read to relish the wonderfulness of how she put them together. To me, Tyler's plots have been secondary to the exquisite way she describes them to us.

Anyone else feel this way?

Gosh, how long do we have to wait for her next book?

Welcome Larraine to Senior Net and to the Books and Literature part of Senior Net.
We are Very Happy to welcome you as we love to meet others of like minds and you are. You will be recieving a welcome Letter from us so Please watch for it, do Not discard it but if you do just let us know and we will send you another.
I understand about people sticking it out in a bad marriage back when we children as my folks did that also.
Ginger

Thank you all for your posts, MAl, LARRAINE, DIANE and GINGER.

Yes, DIANE, Tyler's writing has affected me in exactly the way you've described. The style is deceptively simple but the issues and quandaries of her characters are ones we understand and may have faced ourselves, directly or indirectly. Her characterizations are realistic and often quite funny, but never ever at the expense of even the quirkiest of her protagonists (e.g. the puppeteers in Morgan's Passing ), which is what I tried to define earlier as "neutral" writing.

All her novels reflected the era in which she and we readers were living at the time, but in The Amateur Marriage the narrative spans six decades of often tumultuous American History; quietly, sparingly told in ten chapters, a true literary feat IMO.

I am grateful for your participation and glad I could share this reading experience with you out there.

Thank YOU, Traude. I hope to see your name in another book discussion soon.

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