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The Marriage Plot

3.4 of 5 stars 3.40 · rating details · 57,078 ratings · 7,569 reviews

A New York Times Notable Book of 2011
A Publisher's Weekly Top 10 Book of 2011
A Kirkus Reviews Top 25 Best Fiction of 2011 Title
One of Library Journal's Best Books of 2011
A Salon Best Fiction of 2011 title
One of The Telegraph’s Best Fiction Books of the Year 2011

It’s the early 1980s—the country is in a deep recession, and life after college is harder than ever. In the caf...more

ebook, 416 pages

Published October 11th 2011 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (first published 2011)

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Mar 02, 2012 Julie marked it as abandoned · review of another edition

Shelves: much-ado-about-not-much

Can't do it. Nope. Just can't. This is so over-written. I can't fathom spending 406 pages reading sentences such as: "It smelled like the Amazonian rain forest, like putting your head between the legs of a native girl who had never heard of Christianity" (p 241). Pages and pages and pages of expository writing. And is there an adverb Eugenides doesn't like? He works so hard to make certain we know that he is all over the 80's iconic images: big hair, shoulder pads and parachute pants make immedi...more

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Apr 06, 2013 Whitney rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: never-again-for-various-reasons, overrated

I'm convinced this is what happens if you combine a Whit Stillman script, Franny and Zooey, and a whole lot of beige. There's some beautiful writing here, unfortunately there's equally lot of bland writing. It doesn't help that the characters are dull either. At times, I couldn't believe that this was nine years in the making...yet at the same time I could. Let's just say the writing has a certain over-wrought feel to it.

Madeleine, the main heroine is a snooze. She's basically a stock dream girl...more I'm convinced this is what happens if you combine a Whit Stillman script, Franny and Zooey, and a whole lot of beige. There's some beautiful writing here, unfortunately there's equally lot of bland writing. It doesn't help that the characters are dull either. At times, I couldn't believe that this was nine years in the making...yet at the same time I could. Let's just say the writing has a certain over-wrought feel to it.

Madeleine, the main heroine is a snooze. She's basically a stock dream girl - to quote one passage: "She may have looked normal on the outside but once you'd seen her handwriting you knew she was deliciously complicated inside". Uh, how about no.

I'm not sure if this was something on the authors part to show us how much Mitchell (the third corner of the love triangle) romanticized her, but the author doesn't seem to make this clear (what he does make clear though is that she's VERY attractive). There doesn't seem to be any real life in her, as Eugenides seems to tell rather than show how allegedly interesting and brilliant she is. It's unfortunate and the book definitely suffers because of it.

Her suitors, Mitchell and Leonard seem to have a little more to them, Leonard more so - his section is where the book finally gets going. He's as vulnerable as he is flawed, and we begin to see why Madeleine is obsessed with him. Yet there's also a point where his motives become downright scary. He's pompous, but unlike the other two, he's at least somewhat interesting. Unfortunately he's given only one section of the book.

The third protagonist, Mitchell, is an intellectual religious studies major from Detroit, so there's a bit of Middlesex-like feel to certain parts of his character, as he also has a Greek background. But Mitchell has the terrible distinction of being "the nice guy" of the story. It doesn't help that he seems to be plagued with the smarmy blandness that Madeleine suffers from. In the end, I really couldn't bring myself to care whether or not these two privileged, neurotic intellectuals would ever find true love with each other.

There's also a lot of references to books and authors, like Barthes and Derrida. At times I felt as if I were reading a dissertation or a meditation rather than a book with a plot - which considering the subject matter, I suppose is intentionally ironic, but still tedious. Overall, I can't help but feel this is something only an English major could love. Definitely a disappointment from Eugenides.(less)

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Oct 29, 2011 Tatiana rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: fans of "One Day"

Shelves: contemporary, tres-annoying, why-the-hype, chick-lit

Pretentious. I try to stay away from this word reviewing books, because too many of my favorites literary novels have been called that and it hurt. But The Marriage Plot is pretentious. And also pompous, elitist, privileged and self-important.

I just can't quite believe that the author who managed to make stories of 5 suicidal girls and a Greek hermaphrodite so compelling, could come up with something like The Marriage Plot and think it a worthy tale to tell. A rich, freshly graduated from Brown...more

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Dec 13, 2011 Scott rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011

After being given a crash course on semiotics, a brief history of relevant authors who were the catalyst for this form of literary criticism, and a reading list of authors whose novels adhere to the marriage plot, the reader is prepared to accept the conventionality of this unconventional novel.

Madeleine is pursued (manically, coyly) by two suitors, fellow soon-to be graduates of Brown University, whose personalities and backgrounds are not so much from opposite poles as they are from different...more After being given a crash course on semiotics, a brief history of relevant authors who were the catalyst for this form of literary criticism, and a reading list of authors whose novels adhere to the marriage plot, the reader is prepared to accept the conventionality of this unconventional novel.

Madeleine is pursued (manically, coyly) by two suitors, fellow soon-to be graduates of Brown University, whose personalities and backgrounds are not so much from opposite poles as they are from different galaxies. Leonard, the maladjusted manic genius who feeds off of others’ adoration of his wit, looks, and brilliance, is the clear frontrunner in the race for Madeleine’s affections. Mitchell is the “just friends” friend who through an act of (secular, at this point) faith knows that he and Madeleine are destined to be married.

Eugenides goes a little extreme with the juxtapositions of character, but it works. Leonard grew up in a loveless home, where he was made to feel at least partially responsible for the dissolution of his parents’ marriage. Mitchell, on the other hand, came from a loving family that was not financially strapped, as was Leonard’s. While Leonard read Nietzsche and listened to heavy metal music, Mitchell sought a selfless path of spiritual enlightenment, culminating in his stint as a missionary for the patients under the care of Mother Teresa. Man-whore Leonard provoked the jealousy of Mitchell, who is portrayed as more of the fumbling –with-bra-straps and prematurely ejaculating type, in theory if not in practice. To further separate Leonard and Mitchell in the mind of the reader, Eugenides enrolls them into the curriculums of science and religious studies, respectively.

But what of dear Madeleine? As the object of affections, Madeleine is somewhat objectified, even in light of the fact that her educational goals are intended to shed light on the merits and originality of women writers in a period when male authors seemed to be stagnant. With no female counterpart with which to be compared, Madeleine’s character is a paradox of sorts; a feminist-traditionalist if you will.

Although seemingly generic, Madeleine’s character is the lens through which we view the world of primal male behavior. We are not reading about Madeleine as much as we are placed in her position; not unlike the viewpoint of a first person video game. Given the nature of the times (early 80s), which were far from chastity belts but nowhere near in reach of the “glass ceiling”, Madeleine is an everywoman. She is capable of living her life on her own (financially, intellectually), but (emotionally) desires the nuclear families that populate her favorite works of literature.

As the novel progresses, each suitor learns that in order to love Madeleine, they must first learn to love (or at least tolerate) themselves. Cliché, right? Not in Eugenides’ hands.
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Jul 16, 2011 Emily Crowe rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Though I have been a bookseller for more years than I'm willing to confess, I have somehow never read Jeffrey Eugenides, despite his Pulitzer Prize and the fact that The Virgin Suicides is the favorite novel of one of my favorite sales reps (shout-out to Michael Kindness!). It's not that I was actively not reading Eugenides. I just hadn't gotten around to it yet. Enter his new book this October from Farrar, Strauss and Giroux called The Marriage Plot, which my bookstore is considering for its si...more Though I have been a bookseller for more years than I'm willing to confess, I have somehow never read Jeffrey Eugenides, despite his Pulitzer Prize and the fact that The Virgin Suicides is the favorite novel of one of my favorite sales reps (shout-out to Michael Kindness!). It's not that I was actively not reading Eugenides. I just hadn't gotten around to it yet. Enter his new book this October from Farrar, Strauss and Giroux called The Marriage Plot, which my bookstore is considering for its signed First Editions Club, and for which I am one of the readers.

It's the story of Madeleine, Mitchell, and Leonard in the early 1980s, following them in their senior year at Brown and then into the "real world" as they fumble and stumble their way outside the gates of the rarefied and privileged atmosphere of the Ivy League campus they leave behind. Madeleine is an English major smitten with the great English novels when she takes her first semiotics class. Leonard is the brilliant but understated young man whose campus mystique serves to mask his bipolar disorder. Mitchell is the religious studies major who is as given to ponder the mysteries of life as he is to ponder Madeleine as his destined life partner. Mitchell defects to India after graduation while Leonard and Madeline move in together at a small research facility on Cape Cod, but they all meet up again later in New York.

This book is so much better and so much bigger than this summary--it's a story of trying to grow up (but not necessarily succeeding), of academia, of inequality between the sexes, of class and gender stratification, of the absurdities of literary theory in the face of literary substance, of the rise of greed in that decade, and so much more.

Well, I for one think it's excellent. I cannot honestly say that I *love* the book because love implies an emotional connection and I have no such connection with any of the characteres (though the academic setting is dear to me), but I admire it immensely. I think Eugenides writes characters brilliantly, and I think he does a particularly good job writing mental illness--both the frustrations of living with it and the frustrations of loving somebody with it (believe me--as someone with a beloved sibling diagnosed with schizophrenia, it's a tough call who the disease is more difficult for). The back and forth of the plot's chronology flows like memory, like you're caught up in the spell of a master story teller. It's a fine, fine novel and you can be sure that I will be paying very careful attention to Mr. Eugenides and his work from now on. (less)

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Jan 06, 2012 Gary McTiernan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

To compare this to Middlesex is a mistake-akin to comparing grand opera to an intimate chamber piece. This book succeeds because it takes the structure and theme of a nineteenth century novel and turns them upside down. The love triangle which drives the plot reminds me of the Freudian view of self. (view spoiler) At its core is Madeleine(ego), who has spent her time consuming stories about love without absorbing their lessons about life. She falls hard for Leonard (id) and ent...more

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Feb 23, 2012 Teresa rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I loved The Virgin Suicides for its style, imagery and voice. I loved Middlesex for its 'epic' storytelling, its characters and a lyrical flight of fancy near the end that I think I'll never forget. Because of the lofty standards the author's previous works set for me perhaps it is inevitable, despite the trademark humor and intelligence evident in this novel too, that this one couldn't live up to the others. Perhaps it's just that the elements I liked in this novel didn't add up to a cohesive w...more

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Jul 16, 2012 Stefania T. rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ho pensato di scrivere sotto l'influsso di un intero pacco di Gocciole nel sangue e dei Kings of Convenience nelle orecchie, nella speranza di mitigare il panorama di acidità che temo si prospetti.

Pare stia funzionando.

Il romanzo non mi è piaciuto. Per niente. Per. Niente.
Eppure, giunta ai bordi del temibile baratro del rimpianto - il rimpianto per il denaro ed il tempo persi nella lettura - non ho saltato. Non ho avuto fretta, voltata l'ultima pagina, e sono restata a chiacchierare con il libro...more

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Dec 21, 2011 Tancredi rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: statunitensi

"(...) Madeleine capì appieno in che senso il discorso amoroso fosse di una solitudine estrema. La solutidine era estrema perché non era fisica. Era estrema perché la provavi mentre eri con la persona amata. Era estrema perché era dentro la tua testa, il più solitario dei luoghi."

Temo proprio che questo romanzo si presterà a una miriade di equivoci. Una copertina "romantica", la parola "matrimonio" inserita nel titolo (inaudito!), l'attrattiva fascetta che parla di amore ed una quarta di coperti...more "(...) Madeleine capì appieno in che senso il discorso amoroso fosse di una solitudine estrema. La solutidine era estrema perché non era fisica. Era estrema perché la provavi mentre eri con la persona amata. Era estrema perché era dentro la tua testa, il più solitario dei luoghi."

Temo proprio che questo romanzo si presterà a una miriade di equivoci. Una copertina "romantica", la parola "matrimonio" inserita nel titolo (inaudito!), l'attrattiva fascetta che parla di amore ed una quarta di copertina che riduce la trama essenzialmente allo stra-abusato cliché del triangolo amoroso.
Lette le prime righe, però, clamorosamente crolla il castello di carte delle aspettative e delle illusioni. Questo non è un romanzo d'amore, ma un romanzo che parla d'amore. Sottile differenza, ma significativa, che cela il gioco provocatore di Eugenides.
E' possibile ancora oggi scrivere una storia sul triangolo amoroso? E' morto il romanzo d'amore? Esiste ancora il distaccato narratore in terza persona?
A queste domande l'autore vuole provocatoriamente rispondere, scrivendo un romanzo che, costruito ad hoc, polemizza con la moda del decostruzionismo esplosa negli anni Ottanta: proprio gli anni in cui si muovono i tre protagonisti, tre incarnazioni diverse dell'americano medio di quegli anni, dalla mania depressiva di Leonard, ai conflitti di Maddy, che alla fine sacrifica l'ambiziosa carriera per correre incontro ad un matrimonio precoce, alla ricerca di spiritualità e i tormenti di Mitchell. Lo sfondo, almeno per un terzo del romanzo, è l'ambiente universitario statunitense, che pesa sulla trama con un complesso di citazioni letterarie e riferimenti ricorrenti al postmodernismo, allo strutturalismo, alla linguistica e alla semiotica.
Il mio timore, a questo punto, è che nel reagire con convinzione al postmodernismo (specie quello degli ultimi vent'anni, su cui s'impone il nome di Wallace) Eugenides ricorra paradossalmente ad effetti propri del postmodernismo. Per quanto il romanzo si faccia leggere e l'autore riesca a suscitare facilmente l'immedesimazione, rimane di fondo la sensazione di qualcosa di fortemente artificioso, costruito a tavolino, che vanifica, seppur parzialmente, le buone intenzioni dell'autore.
La trama del matrimonio è dunque la prova che ancora la narrativa americana non riesce a riscattarsi dal gioco perverso di questi ultimi decenni, dei romanzi scritti in risposta ad altri, dei romanzi costruiti ad hoc, che narrano ma non raccontano, che dimostrano ma non argomentano. E' un bel romanzo, ma Middlesex, per me, rimane insuperato: è l'esatta differenza tra lo scrivere con la testa e scrivere con il cuore.(less)

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Mar 07, 2012 Sarah rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: dang-i-wanted-to-love-it, so-this-is-love, favorite-authors

This was the first book that I read in my first house I bought late last year. I saw Eugenides (one of my favorite authors ever) speak and received an autographed copy, which had a dust jacket that my dog Franny chewed his face from. I loved the Fresh Air interview where he spoke about this book, as well. And I had been waiting for this book for soOOOoo long. I was VERY excited to read it once it was finally in my hands.

This book was a major letdown, truth be told. I really love and admire The V...more

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Jun 29, 2012 Al rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'm afraid that I don't know enough about the old marriage plot novels (Austen, Elliot, James, etc.) that this one references to really "get" everything Eugenides is trying to do here. For example, I initially found Madeline to be fairly thinly rendered in comparison to the more fully fleshed out intellectual and emotional lives of her male counterparts, but by the end I thought that might be part of the point (ie. that she exists on the page only as an ideal mirrors the way she exists to her su...more

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Jan 26, 2012 Sandy Tjan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012, ebook, contemporary-fiction

BookFiendUSA: So, how was it? My GR friends’ reviews are all over the place on this one. How does it compare to Virgin Suicides or Middlesex?

SandyBanks1971: It’s…OK. Not badly written at all, but nothing incredible either. I can’t compare it with Eugenides’ earlier works, as I have never read anything by him before.

BookFiendUSA: Seriously? You’ve never even seen the Sofia Coppola movie?

SandyBanks1971: Nope. But I’ve read the synopses of the earlier books, and I can tell you that there are absol...more

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Mar 19, 2012 Susan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

The first part of this novel examines (in a manner both accurate and funny) the big fuss over deconstruction back in the day of 80's academia. And then it goes on to actually deconstruct the traditional marriage plot via the "discourses" of religion, philosophy, and lit crit. However, this is not a cold novel of ideas; au contraire, JE creates a moving love triangle formed by three smart, lively 20-somethings as they navigate the post-college recession and discover the "real world" with its subs...more

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Sep 05, 2012 J.S.A. Lowe rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Okay, fine, Jeffrey, you win. You made me care about these twenty-something white college kids despite myself. Setting certain crucial sections in a) the psych unit and b) a hospice in India was probably what saved you, as well as a loopy last-five-pages accellerando during which you niftily dump the marriage plot device on its head. Also some unvarnished sex scenes and more than one wincingly convincing young-couple argument. But you know what? I still hold you to those first 200 pages of REALL...more

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Nov 25, 2011 Mindy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

While there are passages that are beautiful in only the way Eugenides can write, they act more like flashes of brilliance in an otherwise dull and lazy novel.

The first part of the book shoves Semiotics into your brain and reads like the most terrible and awkwardly pretentious college courses that no one should ever have to suffer. And throughout it all, I kept feeling like this book was only for English majors (and maybe Philosophy majors), and had an agenda that did not involve telling a good s...more While there are passages that are beautiful in only the way Eugenides can write, they act more like flashes of brilliance in an otherwise dull and lazy novel.

The first part of the book shoves Semiotics into your brain and reads like the most terrible and awkwardly pretentious college courses that no one should ever have to suffer. And throughout it all, I kept feeling like this book was only for English majors (and maybe Philosophy majors), and had an agenda that did not involve telling a good story. And really, why read fiction if not to read a good story?

But the biggest flaw for me, that I just absolutely can’t forgive, is how falsely Eugenides portrays “manic depression.” You’d think a writer of his caliber and fame would have taken the time to research it--and god forbid, actually talk to and spend time with someone who is bipolar. Hell, Wikipedia even has an accurate enough description of the disease that Eugenides could have gone from that and not failed as epically as he did.

Furthermore, Madeline is the flattest female character I’ve read of late. She’s spoiled and from a well-off family, which would be tolerable if Eugenides gave readers a reason to care about her. But he doesn’t. We’re told in the beginning she’s a romantic and loves books, and while we see her bookshelf and the authors she takes comfort in, that’s the end of her development as a character. Eugenides spends the entire novel yanking her to and fro, and it isn’t until the second half of the book that he finally figures her out and gives her some roundness (most notably through a sort of personal in-joke in reference to the "Madeline” children’s books). The one character who may have some depth is Mitchell, who is so clearly the only character that most closely resembles Eugenides in personality and experiences.

And what’s up with the ending? (view spoiler)(less)

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Feb 22, 2012 Christina Boodhan Juras rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: not-finished

I am about 75 pages into this book and so far, I am not enjoying it.
It's about a college student in the U.S. who is writing a thesis about the way marriage plots are used in literature, mostly classics of which I haven't heard of too many of them. That seems to be the subplot. The main plot is about the student, Madeleine, and her "relationships" with her parents and these 2 love interests, Mitchell and Leonard.
I'm annoyed by the characters so far. It's almost as if they are trying too hard to b...more

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Feb 08, 2012 H rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: book-club

I only finished a quarter of this book before I had to return it to the library (express check-out). I think it should have been called The Marriage Plop. Granted, I'm no literary genius, just some schmuck with a science degree, so I don't get all the references, but beyond that I found each character hideously irritating and didn't really care how the story progressed or ended.

The book club consensus was as follows: Some of us liked it, most of us didn't, but EVERYONE was disappointed.

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Jun 23, 2012 Lily rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audio-loan

Just finished listening to TMP this morning. My reactions have been up and down, with a particularly positive reaction to the ending and final chapter. The title (and entire book) and characterizations were a nice take off on the popularity of Jane Austen and Victorian novel marriage plots. The recording ends with an interview with Eugenides.

Not certain how well Eugenides did his research on manic depression as a disease, with its consequent effects on human behavior. There are other books and a...more Just finished listening to TMP this morning. My reactions have been up and down, with a particularly positive reaction to the ending and final chapter. The title (and entire book) and characterizations were a nice take off on the popularity of Jane Austen and Victorian novel marriage plots. The recording ends with an interview with Eugenides.

Not certain how well Eugenides did his research on manic depression as a disease, with its consequent effects on human behavior. There are other books and authors on the subject who have influenced my thinking on the topic more (e.g., Kay Redfield Jamison, Sylvia Nasar, Rachel Reiland) and, while the actions "felt" right, I wondered if Eugenides put as much research into the topic as he did into yeast cultures (which he talks about doing in the interview) or Quaker practices (more informative than on yeast biology, to my reading). Likewise, taking a crack at the FDA, justified or no, seemed more like an intellectual, liberal cliche than a researched position for the case at hand.

The necessary, modern stories were embedded (m-d stood in for handicapped). I did not like the reversed-time-telling of many of the stories -- the transitions to the present, then filling in the back stories. It was a clever technique, but I appreciated the cleverness more than its effects on comprehending the story or reacting emotionally to it.

I wondered how much Leonard was an ode to David Wallace, as Milly was to Henry James's beloved cousin in The Wings of the Dove . I wanted a paper copy (rather than audio) to trace via the Internet M's trek through India. I was touched by Eugenides deft handling of Madeline's parents and their positions vis-a-vis her marriage, even though I wasn't quite happy with the intonations for the voice on the recording of her mother -- apropos, but a little harsher than need be? But, I was surprised by the final chapter and sat pondering as it ended on how appropriate to our day and age. This one chapter alone (in the context of the others) restored Eugenides to my personal collection of respected authors (although Middlesex would have kept him from being kicked out).

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Dec 01, 2012 Jennifer rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I think I had high expectations for this book because 1) it is written by Eugenides; 2) it contends with the idea that a happy ending means someone gets married; and 3) it was a very readable length for a novel. (I have been unable to finish a few books lately so I'm proud of myself for finishing this one!) I dig the book's premise, and one of the Avenue Q themes of what do you do with an English major, that questions whether the happy ending of a novel needs to involve a couple forming despite...more

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Oct 21, 2011 Linda rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I am enjoying the marriage plot. Set in a college town in the Eighties, it appeals to those of us who majored in literature or did post grad studies. Madeleine's love life is often hilarious, sometimes sad. Eugenides
writes great satire. Here is an excerpt:"Reading a novel after reading semiotic theory was like jogging empty-handed after jogging with hand weights. What exquisite guilt she felt, wickedly enjoying narrative! Madeleine felt safe with a nineteenth century novel. There were going to...more

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Dec 07, 2011 Stuart rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Eugenides last book, Middlesex, was a fun read. Sure it had its clunky spots, but it was a warm-hearted thing with a solid Midwestern sensibility. The Marriage Plot is, on the other hand, overbaked, overwritten and just plain annoying. I guess if you took Jane Austen, put her in a time machine set to 1982, forced her to get an English degree loaded with classes that featured 1980s style (i.e., narcissistic and pointless) critical theory, and then forced her to get a MFA, you'd get this, a really...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Lou Robinson rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: work-book-club

The April work book club pick, I was looking forward to reading The Marriage Plot as I am a big fan of Jeffrey Eugenides' book Middlesex. But I'm afraid it was a bit of a let down. Not awful, but certainly not as interesting a story as his previous novels, and I think that was the main problem I had with the book, I didn't really care what was happening to the main characters, three students of Brown University, Providence USA in the 1980s. The three form a dysfunctional love triangle and this i...more

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Feb 06, 2012 Sara rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 12, 2012 Trena rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

If this had been written by someone else it might have gotten 3 stars. But, oh, Jeffrey Eugenides, how you have let me down.

My top three books of the last decade were The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and Middlesex. So when I saw Eugenides had a new book out I was pretty thrilled, though the title scared me. But I thought, "Surely this isn't about something so trite as heterosexual marriage." In a way I was wrong. Because it is about somethi...more

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May 01, 2013 K.D. Oliveros rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to K.D. by: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die (2012 new addition)

Shelves: drama, coming-of-age, sex, 1001-new-addition

Definitely inferior to his two earlier bestsellers, The Virgin Suicides (4 stars) and Middlesex (3 stars) but I still liked this. It is still has that tongue-in-cheek, contemporary satirist prose of Eugenides. His playful words, the effective use of settings to heighten his scenes, his easy tone and light (generally) mood are all in this book. The revelation in the end is not as shocking as Virgin and there is no overbearingly strange character like the hermaphrodites in Middlesex here. However,...more Definitely inferior to his two earlier bestsellers, The Virgin Suicides (4 stars) and Middlesex (3 stars) but I still liked this. It is still has that tongue-in-cheek, contemporary satirist prose of Eugenides. His playful words, the effective use of settings to heighten his scenes, his easy tone and light (generally) mood are all in this book. The revelation in the end is not as shocking as Virgin and there is no overbearingly strange character like the hermaphrodites in Middlesex here. However, somethings in here reminded me of his early works like the controlling parents (similar to Virgin) and the medical case of Leonard Bankhead can be as interesting as that of Cal's case (the hermaphrodite in Middlesex). There is also the Greek characters and settings here that were one of the main flavors in the middle part of Middlesex. But do you want to know what make this positively different from the first two?

1. Too hot sex scenes. Madeleine Hanna is this liberal arts college graduate who is getting her first experiences in sex and when her boyfriend asks her what her sexual fantasy is, she says, ashamed of being seen as a deviant, it is to be pampered. However, later in the story she says the real one and when her boyfriend carries it out, she reaches orgasm bigtime. From then on, she sticks to her boyfriend no matter what other people, including her parents, say.

2. The use of classic literature that has "marriage plot" (women chasing men to get married especially during the Victorian era). While reading you can't help but notice how Madeleine's life revolves between Leonard and her bestfriend Mitchell Grammaticus. It is similar but not exactly the same as that of Isabel Archer in Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady or to Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, or to Helen Graham in Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. Not exactly the same because in having this book, Jeffrey Eugenides creates his own kind of heroine and tries to put it side-by-side these women of classic literature.

3. Semiotics. Literature students will be able to enjoy Eugenides' use of semiotics (study of signs including symbols, metaphors, analogies) in communication. Eugenides' prose is easy to read and understand but it is tricky because if you read more carefully, he uses a lot of normal-day metaphors and analogies that can escape your attention. So you have to be careful while reading.

Overall, this book may not be as engaging as his first two earlier novels but I guess, Eugenides is one of the contemporary authors who do not rewrite themselves by coming out with a fresh piece of meat each time they prepare the dinner table.

Eugenides seems to take 9 years to write and publish a novel. Virgin was published 1993, Middlesex in 2002 and this book, The Marriage Plot in 2011. Having said this, I am sure his fans (and that includes me) will not mind waiting for another 9 years for his 4th book. It will surely worth all the wait.

He is this good! (less)

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Oct 28, 2011 Kim Katusha added it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011

Er zijn boeken waar je na afloop weinig over weet te zeggen. Dit komt bij mij niet erg vaak voor, en als het al voorkomt is er het voornemen om dan maar te schrijven over het boek dat ik ervoor las. Of het boek dat ik erna zal lezen. Nu, echter, wil ik graag schrijven over het boek dat ik las en daar moet ik het dan maar mee doen. Ik weet niet of ik veel zinnigs te zeggen heb maar, nouja, the road goes ever on.

***

The Marriage Plot is geen liefdesroman. Ik zag het ergens staan, in een review of o...more Er zijn boeken waar je na afloop weinig over weet te zeggen. Dit komt bij mij niet erg vaak voor, en als het al voorkomt is er het voornemen om dan maar te schrijven over het boek dat ik ervoor las. Of het boek dat ik erna zal lezen. Nu, echter, wil ik graag schrijven over het boek dat ik las en daar moet ik het dan maar mee doen. Ik weet niet of ik veel zinnigs te zeggen heb maar, nouja, the road goes ever on.

***

The Marriage Plot is geen liefdesroman. Ik zag het ergens staan, in een review of op een website. Ik zag het staan en dacht: nee nee nee. Nee. Dat is te gemakkelijk! Dit boek vertelt over drie zeer verschillende personages die zichzelf een plaats proberen te geven in de wereld die ze (nog) niet altijd even goed begrijpen. Het gaat over zelf-actualisatie. Het mooie van dit verhaal is hoe Eugenides laat zien dat het leven voor iedereen anders is. Iedereen leert zijn of haar waarheid op een andere manier kennen, en in een ander tempo en het is niets dan boeiend hoe deze personages zich 'ontwikkelen'. (Ik weet dat het woord daar past maar ik vind het zo klinisch, ontwikkeling is een naar woord als je het mij vraagt.)

Jeffrey Eugenides is een erg goede schrijver. Iedere hoofdpersoon is echt, leeft. Leonard vanwege zijn diepe dalen en indrukwekkende pieken, Madeleine vanwege haar naïviteit en haar liefde voor boeken. Mitchell is mijn favoriet in dit boek. Zijn vermogen om lief te hebben, op verschillende manier en in diverse situaties, is enorm. Hij is nieuwsgierig en staat open voor de mening van eigenlijk iedereen. Hij luistert.
Naast het verhaal dat voortbeweegt als een rivier, zo vloeiend, is het ook de schrijfwijze die indruk wekt. Hij schrijft én mooi, én helder. De filosofie en mystiek waar Mitchell zo in is geïnteresseerd is prachtig verweven door het hele boek. Ik houd van de manier waarop Mitchell alles aanneemt als een cadeautje, en een andere manier van denken niet direct als persoonlijke kritiek weer van zich af stoot. Hij neemt de tijd om dingen te laten inzinken, en als het dan niet helemaal past laat hij het los. Hierin is hij heel anders dan Leonard en Madeleine.
Leonard zit zo enorm in zijn hoofd dat alles op stel en sprong moet gebeuren. Hij vertrouwt niemand en neemt meerdere keren het heft in eigen hand. De medicijnen die hij slikt vanwege zijn manische depressiviteit doen hem niet veel goed. Leonard komt enorm aan, moet vaak naar de WC, zweet enorm. Hij haat zijn medicijnen. Hij besluit langzaam minder pillen te slikken, Leonard houdt zichzelf voor dat vele genieën dingen hebben ontdekt door op zichzelf te experimenteren, en voor even gaat het dan ook goed. De manie laat echter nooit lang op zich wachten, en dan begint het hele proces weer van voren af aan. Hij haat de pillen maar doet ook geen moeite om zijn jeugdtrauma's te onderzoeken. Soms heb je het idee dat hij expres in die cirkel blijft hangen omdat het, lullig gezegd, comfortabel en herkenbaar is.
Madeleine is te naïef om te zien dat Leonard de verkeerde kant op gaat. Haar liefde voor hem is gericht op de jonge man die zijn pillen op tijd slikt en zich 'normaal' gedraagt. Ze weet dat hij geniaal is, dat hij geen fijne jeugd heeft gehad, maar komt pas achter zijn mentale staat als hij in het ziekenhuis terecht komt na zo'n maniakale fase. Madeleine denkt dat alles aan haar ligt en probeert Leonard iedere keer het dal weer uit te helpen. Zij wil dat hij beter wordt, hij weet dat manisch-depressief zijn nooit over zal gaan. Dit kan natuurlijk niet goed gaan en de manier waarop het vastloopt, eindigt, is lief en verrassend en zorgde bij mij voor een zucht van opluchting.

Stukken waar ik erg van heb genoten:
"It didn’t help that it was spring. Every day, people seemed more and more unclothed. The magnolia trees, budding on the green, looked positively enflamed. They sent out a perfume that drifted through the windows of Semiotics 211. The magnolia trees hadn’t read Roland Barthes. They didn’t think love was a mental state; the magnolias insisted it was narual, perennial." (pag. 65)
"'If you dislike a conception of God as masculine,' Mitchell said to Claire, 'why replace it with one that's feminine? Why not get rid of the whole idea of gendered divinity?'" (pag. 138)
"Wouldn't it be nice to be done with it? To be done with sex and longing? Mitchell could almost imagine pulling it off, sitting on a bridge at night with the Seine flowing by. He looked up at all the lighted windows along the river's arc. The thought of all the people going to sleep or reading or listening to music, all the lives contained by a great city like this, and, floating up in his mind, rising just above the rooftops, he tried to feel, to vibrate among, all those million tremulous souls. He was sick of craving, of wanting, of hoping, of losing." (pag. 161)
"What he mainly remembered about the class was this guy who used to show up wearing baggy secondhand suits and beat-up shoes, sort of a drunken preacher or Tom Waits look. He carried a black briefcase with metal edges, the kind of thing that might have contained fifty thousand in cold cash instead of a paperback volume of the Upanishads edited by Mircea Eliade and a half-eaten blondie wrapped in a paper napkin." (Leonard over Mitchell, pag. 260)

En natuurlijk de eerste zin die alles zegt over Madeleine en werkelijk briljant is: "To start with, look at all the books." Happy reading, y'all. Dit boek is het geld waard.(less)

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Apr 08, 2013 Justin Evans rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

A discussion of this book with my wife leads me to believe that I am the only person in the world who didn't know - 'plot' spoiler - that one of the three main characters is a manic-depressive headkerchief wearing philosopher/scientist who chews chewing tobacco and is both found irresistible by women and also looks like sasquatch, i.e., one of the three major characters is David Foster Wallace. For the first two thirds of the book I was excited to see what Jeffrey would make DFW do; what weird F...more A discussion of this book with my wife leads me to believe that I am the only person in the world who didn't know - 'plot' spoiler - that one of the three main characters is a manic-depressive headkerchief wearing philosopher/scientist who chews chewing tobacco and is both found irresistible by women and also looks like sasquatch, i.e., one of the three major characters is David Foster Wallace. For the first two thirds of the book I was excited to see what Jeffrey would make DFW do; what weird Freudian links could I draw as this Big White American Male Author of Big Books* wrote about another BWAMABB? Well, let's just say that DFW doesn't get the girl.

That's probably for the best, since the girl in question is somehow i) catnip for unconventional intellectuals, ii) more or less a sorority girl, and iii) meant to be fascinated by post-structuralist theory and Victorian novels, despite showing no glimmers of intelligence during the 400 pages of this novel. 'Leonard' is better off without her. As is 'Mitchell,' who is possibly the other half of DFW's personality (concerned with sincerity and religion). He is also the only person you could possibly care about in this book. I don't mean that they're all unpleasant, because I love novels in which all the characters are unpleasant. They're just anodyne.

As for structure, the novel flips between 'perspectives,' but since there's no difference between the styles for each section, that ends up meaning not much more than you read the same stories two or three times for no obvious reason. That's another reason you can't care about the characters: they don't exist.

Again, that wouldn't be a problem if the book wasn't trying to be a self-conscious, plot-based, character heavy Victorian novel for the 21st century. But it is. This is a nice idea, but TMP is a failure when judged as such. It lacks all the virtues of the Victorian novel (breadth, plot, intelligent approach to social issues, strong and individual narrative voice).

In the first chapter (another virtue of the Victorians that's missing: reasonable length chapters), Madeline describes how much she likes Jonathan Culler's 'On Deconstruction,' particularly compared to Derrida. There's an obvious mistake here (Culler's best book, by far, is 'Structuralist Poetics'), but it's an apt metaphor for this novel. Eugenides is Culler to Foster Wallace's Derrida. If you really want to know what DFW was trying to do, without reading him, you can get it out of this book, i.e., how do you write literature/live unironically after post-structuralism? Like Derrida's philosophy, DFW's work was (deeply) flawed, but valiant. Like Culler's work, Eugenides' is simplified. Unlike Culler's, it's excruciatingly poorly executed. Stay away, and if you really need a realist/naturalist response to recent post-post-modern works, re-read Freedom again. At least Franzen wrote that aging rocker's rant in the middle to entertain you while he was giving the Franzen character a *HOT* girlfriend.

PS: To those who claim that this novel is pretentious or elitist or highbrow, I can only say, compared to what? The Trader Joe's catalog? If you can't tell the difference between Derrida and Dickens, you shouldn't be reading books at all.

* Defining characteristics of a Big White American Male Author of Big Books, I'm starting to think, is that He can't create female characters who are *in any way* interesting, unless you count them being *HOT*. Which I do not. (less)

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Jan 07, 2012 Librarian rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: adultfiction, character, friendship, lonely-people, pop, relationshippy

I am trying to decide if I really liked this book so much because I really liked it so much, or if I really liked it because it made me feel smart without really having to do anything. I fear it is the latter, but check back with me later on that. That said, the story is about the relationship between Mitchell who loves Madeleine who loves Leonard. I never figured out who Leonard loves. It's basically an intellectualized, sort of depressing rom-com, if that even makes any sense.

26 likes · like · see review

Nov 16, 2011 Jillwilson rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book deserves at least 3 and a half stars - I wish Good Reads had more differentiation in the ratings. I read this novel because of an article I read about the writer and this novel titled 'How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Write ‘The Marriage Plot’'. I really liked the article and thought the book sounded good (http://www.themillions.com/2011/10/ho...)

The article quotes from the actual text of the book:
"In Saunders’s opinion, the novel had reached its apogee with the marriage plot and had...more This book deserves at least 3 and a half stars - I wish Good Reads had more differentiation in the ratings. I read this novel because of an article I read about the writer and this novel titled 'How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Write ‘The Marriage Plot’'. I really liked the article and thought the book sounded good (http://www.themillions.com/2011/10/ho...)

The article quotes from the actual text of the book:
"In Saunders’s opinion, the novel had reached its apogee with the marriage plot and had never recovered from its disappearance. In the days when success had depended on marriage, and marriage had depended on money, novelists had had a subject to write about. The great epics sang of war, the novel of marriage. Sexual equality, good for women, had been bad for the novel. And divorce had undone it completely. What would it matter who Emma married if she could file for separation later? How would Isabel Archer’s marriage to Gilbert Osmond have been affected by the existence of a prenup? As far as Saunders was concerned, marriage didn’t mean anything anymore, and neither did the novel."

Who wouldn't want to read a book playing around with what was possible in a post-marriage plot world? It's set largely in about 1982 in north eastern America and it's about a triangle relationship - Madeleine, Leonard and Mitchell. Because I was young then (1982) and just out of uni, the novel draws in aspects of my cultural world - vey nostalgically appealing. It might not work so well with another demographic. As I drew towards the end, I was intrigued to think about how Eugenides would end it - it seemed to me to be VERY difficult to find a satisfying end - but he really manages this part well. I loved reading about the advent of post-structuralism and the impact it made at this time. He also writes well about manic depression. It's made me want to read more of his books.

The Guardian gives the novel a less than enthusiastic review - I liked it more than they did though there is a lot of merit in this review:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/...(less)

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Mar 20, 2013 Danielle rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

first and foremost, i would like to thank mr. eugenides for the history lesson in literature, among other 'fun facts' throughout this book. i found myself more engrossed with these 'fun facts' than the actual book in itself.

now that's out of the way.....

the book was interesting and i liked it well enough to finish it (that's something, right?!), BUT .....why the F would anyone want madeleine?! i couldn't wrap my brain around ANY interest in madeleine; due to this, i couldn't ...umm...what's the...more

2 likes · like · see review

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About Jeffrey Eugenides

Jeffrey Kent Eugenides is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and short story writer of Greek and Irish extraction.

Eugenides was born in Detroit, Michigan, of Greek and Irish descent. He attended Grosse Pointe's private University Liggett School. He took his undergraduate degree at Brown University, graduating in 1983. He later earned an M.A. in Creative Writing from Stanford University.

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“Depression is like a bruise that never goes away. A bruise in your mind. You just got to be careful not to touch it where it hurts. It`s always there, though.” — 134 people liked it

“That was when Leonard realized something crucial about depression. The smarter you were, the worse it was. The sharper your brain, the more it cut you up.” — 91 people liked it

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