- Hardcover: 214 pages
- Publisher: London Magazine Editions (13 Jun 1977)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0904388212
- ISBN-13: 978-0904388213
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 5,102,608 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Review
"These necessarily brief sketches of marriages between talented and frequently egotistic and self-destructive personalities are never dull. The quoted material and the facts have a bite, style, and poignancy. One is left with a series of fascinating and well-documented studies."
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
Considers the emotional and artistic commitment in the marriages of nine modern writers: Tolstoy. Shaw, Conrad, Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, D.H. Lawrence, Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald. Each of them acknowledged the claims of ordinary life and believed that marriage provided their most profound personal relationship. They found in marriage a stronghold of affection that encouraged and tested their capacity, an antidote to the modern fear of alienation, and a strengthening bond that was deeply valuable.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I'm surprised that I'm the first person to review this book as it's a fascinating read. Meyers provides just the right amount of depth on each writer, qualifying his insights with quotes from their works and peers which enable you to better understand where these literary giants got their inspiration from.
If you are a lover of the Classics this book is a must, but even if you're not it's a great read, as his subject matters were largely eccentrics whose lives were often more outrageous than those of their characters. Joyce's fettishes, revealed in snippets of letters to his wife, are particularly hysterical.
Surprisingly I found this to be an easy read which Meyers is to be commended for. I wish this book had been around when I was studying English Literature at school, as learning about the psyche of these authors enables you to enjoy and understand their works much more.
All in all a book I will continue to dip into for years to come as I read more of these great writers' books.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Better to marry than to have to do one's own laundry
19 Nov 2006
Format:Paperback
Great writers usually make bad spouses. Their dedication to their work means they have less time for real consideration and feeling for other human beings, even those closest to them. Jeffrey Meyers in this work studies the lives of nine important writers, and the spouses they made their lives with. Cold Shaw was happy to be married to a woman he had no physical connection with . Passionate Lawrence was involved in endless public and private wrestling and shouting matches with the woman he loved and hated, who gave him much inspiration for his work. Virginia Woolf was cared for and loved by Leonard Woolf though their marriage was never physically consummated. Conrad too needed to be babied by his wife Jesse and was jealous of their child. Katherine Mansfield needed a Leonard Woolf but received instead a selfish philandering John Middleton Murray who abandoned her during her final illness.Joyce's Nora could not understand her dirty- minded genius of a husband, but provided for him the means to understanding the eternal feminine. Hemingway's super-machismo behavior did his first three marriages in. F.Scott Fitzgerald could not really tame or control Zelda. They both needed help but neither could give it to each other. The greatest of the writers Tolstoy is depicted by Meyers as the worst monster. But here I am not sure he gets it completely right, as the long complex relationship of Tolstoy and the former Sonya Behrs had moments of great love and passion in it, along with the terrible quarreling and disagreements.
On the whole Meyers suggests that the marriages provided support for the writers which enabled them to get on with their work.
On the whole Meyers suggests that the marriages provided support for the writers which enabled them to get on with their work.
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