I received a Kindle as an early birthday gift, and although I had never even considered buying an e-reader for myself, I am pretty jazzed about this. There are free books out there on the internet! Also, cheaper-than-paper books! That don’t take up space! The paperback I began reading before Kindle entered my life is an entertaining but flimsily written steampunkish fantasy with a pretty cover; I enjoy it, but I regret the space it will occupy on my shelf when I finish it and have already planned to dunk it in my ongoing Swap Bag.
Aside from classic freebies (yep, maybe I will actually read Jane Eyre again), the first Kindle book I downloaded was The Uncoupling by Meg Wolitzer. It’s getting a fair amount of buzz, and I had my doubts at first: the premise is that a Lysistrata-style sex strike hits semi-liberal suburbia, except that the strike is an involuntary response to a magical enchantment rather than a politically conscious choice. All of the straight women in town – old, young, married, single – just up and decide (via enchantment) that they are done with sex. Not interested. Closed for business.
I thought: there is no way this could be any good. Who needs a book about women not wanting to have sex? That’s like the Grand Narrative of all time, next to the one about women being the fairer sex. The twin demons of sexist culture: women are always sexualized but not sexual, presumed sexually available but devoid of their own desire. Less of this, please.
What sold me is a NYT review that included enough snippets and paraphrases of the book that I could see that this paradox is exactly what the author explores with keenness and kindness. I could also see that the book is about English teachers. Wolitzer writes very thoughtfully and compellingly about sexual and romantic relationships, but she also writes thoughtfully and compellingly about being a high school English teacher: the banal drudgery of grading, the baffling behavior of the young, the half-hearted mantra that things aren’t worse now just different, the wonder and pleasure of being a catalyst in the mental and emotional development of these proto-adults. There is an awful funny-because-it’s-true scene about plagiarism that would tickle my former fellow TAs. The book gives a similar treatment to the war in Afghanistan, texting, MUDs (if they are even still called that), and the frozen yogurt craze. The inclusion of all these modern oddities doesn’t feel like a reach or a thin attempt to get all zeitgeisty; they are simply part of the characters’ suburban lives, and naturally they play out some of their uncoupled angst through these devices. They are presented critically, as problematic entities (the frozen yogurt’s tanginess is artificially added), but with a great deal of sympathy.
The uncoupling itself is presented much the same way. There are, of course, some loopholes that are never explained – not least why it only affects hetero couples, although the book does at least acknowledge this aspect of the spell. But what I love is that the spell strikes all of the women in a different way – primarily because they had drastically different love lives to begin with: a loving, physical marriage; an already-decayed marriage; open nonmonogamy; first boyfriends. Without getting too spoily, the adaptations of each couple to the sudden death of physical intimacy is treated both critically and sympathetically - the characters have to renegotiate their boundaries, repair hurt feelings, decide what matters most to them in relationships. Because of that, the book ends up offering a really beautiful portrait of love and communication. I hope someone I know reads it so we can talk about it.
I recently put a plea on my Facebook status for recommendations concerning a book-centric social network type site. I was on Goodreads years ago, but I deleted my account because I started trying to use it as a way to keep score on my comprehensive exam reading. Massive failure. (c.f. Off Track.) But I think that what I’d like to do is share my responses to books like this, get recommendations for further reading Netflix-style, and also see what my friends are reading. I’m sensitive about book recommendations – the life of an English PhD is nothing BUT book recommendations, from professors and peer reviewers and well-meaning relatives – but some of my favorites for reading and dis writing have filtered through friends. So, if you use such a system please let me know which one.
Edited to add: I just joined Librarything. The find-your-friends feature seems to be broken, but you can search my username – LiterarySara – and friend me, which I would appreciate.
Pingback: The wives « Peachleaves