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The Easter Parade

4.02 of 5 stars 4.02 · rating details · 2,764 ratings · 309 reviews

Children of divorced parents, sisters Sarah and Emily Grimes are observed over four decades, and grow into two very different women.Sarah is stable and stalwart, settling into an unhappy marriage.Emily is precocious and independent, struggling with one unsatisfactory love affair after another.Richard Yates's acclaimed novel is about how both women struggle to overcome thei...more

Published (first published January 1st 1976)

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May 29, 2013 Steve aka Sckenda rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 20th-century, women, mothers-and-daughters, new-york-city, marriage, truth, nostalgia, meaning, pov-third-person-singular

“I see,” she said, And when would she ever learn to stop saying “I see” about things that she didn’t see at all?” (344)

“Isn’t it time somebody started talking straight around here?” (414)

The Easter Parade is about two women searching for happiness in New York during the period from 1930 to the early 1970's. At the first sentence, Yates warns us that, "neither of the Grimes sisters would have a happy life...."

Sarah Grimes is the virgin who marries a man with whom she has three kids and who lives...more

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Feb 08, 2011 Eric rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: ficciones

I’m not sure what Yates was up to in two-thirds of The Easter Parade. He certainly wasn’t playing to his strength—that is, the deep, layered scene: the slow death of a party; the waning of an afternoon buzz; the polite prolongation of a tense visit; lives told in gesture; and dialogue so perfect you see speakers without description. Two of the novel’s three Parts flash by in what biographer Blake Bailey, I see, grandly dubs “summary narration” which, he goes on to plead, “serves the larger purpo...more

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May 28, 2013 Jenn(ifer) rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2013, you-should-read-this

If you are a girl and your parents get divorced when you are very young, you will either become promiscuous and incapable of real intimacy OR you will marry some abusive asshat and live your life quietly drinking yourself to death.

All right so maybe that’s not the take home message Yates was going for. After all, Yates himself came from a broken home; his parents divorced when he was just three years old. And he was twice divorced himself, so I guess you could say the man knows a thing or two a...more

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Mar 23, 2009 Jeanette rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: all-fiction, america, domestic-and-relationship-fiction, four-star-fiction, alcoholics-unanimous

4.5 stars

Poor, poor Emmy. She's never understood one single thing in her entire life. Poor Emily. If only she could have learned. Hopping right into the sack will get you the man, sure. But it's better to find out first if he's even worth having. Sadly, I've known far too many women who were so much like Emily. And far too many men who were just like the dorks she wasted her life on.

Easter Parade is another dead-on perfect portrayal of mid-20th century middle-class American life from Mr. Yates....more

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May 18, 2013 Lee rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

God this ends well, by which I mean it ends with the steady rock of the book shattered in a way I didn't see coming. All through it she's so even-keeled and proto-liberated but then comes the crackup once alone. The dictionary definition of four stars? Loved it with reservations, so accessible and readable, the characters so well-drawn, the dialogue evocative of time and place and person, so much suggested about an insidious preoccuption with semblances, the importance of courage/strength/endura...more God this ends well, by which I mean it ends with the steady rock of the book shattered in a way I didn't see coming. All through it she's so even-keeled and proto-liberated but then comes the crackup once alone. The dictionary definition of four stars? Loved it with reservations, so accessible and readable, the characters so well-drawn, the dialogue evocative of time and place and person, so much suggested about an insidious preoccuption with semblances, the importance of courage/strength/endurance, family, time, self, society, and even a suggestion of spirituality/hope/goodness toward the end. The language flows, transparent and attentive. Formally conservative but Yates makes its solidity and elegance feel classic. Four stars because the conflicts seemed obvious (opposing personality-type sisters), Pookie the mother seemed obvious (sociable alkie keeping up appearances), Emily's lovers often seemed stereotypical or expected: the bisexual seafaring super-lover like Michelangelo's David, the neurotic chubby academic in need of some 21st century Cialis, the drunk poet (loved when they went to Iowa City), the perfect man in love with someone else. Sometimes seemed a bit like what Franzen gets derided for -- the same sort of so-called "unlikeable" characters, the same sort of family suggestive of larger societal trends. Basically, if the Grimes family didn't drink so much, they'd've better dealt with the hand dealt them -- alas. Forty-something years handled so deftly in 220+ pages in such a way it didn't feel rushed or smeared or scattered. Effortless balance of summarized sections and scenes, I felt. Loved so many perfectly phrased, affecting phrases. Found the end destabilizing while watching the novel's primary focus lose her shit -- that is, lose her self-sufficiency. About how much people need other people, the scourge of divorce, first the breakdown of the family and then the breakdown of society -- beautifully done for the most part, despite a sense that the conflicts seemed to me a bit contrived, as were a few recurring catchphrases ("I see") that made me think things felt a little too neat. Like the poet John Flanders annoyed at the younger experimental poet at Iowa who throws around the word "audacity," four stars seems like the best a book like this can do, in part because it doesn't deal in audacious magic, per the Bolano equation "supply + demand + magic" -- I don't mean magical realism, I mean something in the art of it that feels supernatural, even if just uniqueness or exagerration of an effect/approach? And I'm not sure I wholly trust art that seems designed to "shatter" a reader along with its central character, even if it suggests historical societal fragmentation? There should maybe be more to it than trying to break your heart, right? And there is: all those vivid images that give it life: Emily on the beach in Europe in a bikini, the little carbuncular knobs near the neck of the hot-bodied seaman, the sky outside Iowa City "as close and white as the snow itself" in winter, the poet guy smiling on the phone in his office. Anyway, a great book -- will read more Yates soon.(less)

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May 19, 2007 Tao rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Jean Rhys, Lydia Davis, Ann Beattie

I like this book.

The last twenty pages made me feel very emotional. The novel is very tight. I like it. I like it more than Revolutionary Road. The Easter Parade is very sad, but then you look at the main character's life and you see that her life was not very sad, really, but much better objectively than most people's lives.

Everyone around her was fucked.

7 likes · like · see review

Jun 22, 2012 Mary rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, 2012

"I'm almost fifty years old and I've never understood anything in my whole life."

Are we all destined to go insane? Are we all doomed by the damage our parent unwittingly inflicted on us? Do we never ever learn a damn thing at all? Many of us go through life not realizing until the final hour that history does indeed repeat itself, and our parents -- our well meaning but ill equipped and broken parents -- ruined us.

This is certainly the case for Emily and Sarah, two sisters from a broken home wh...more

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Sep 05, 2010 Michael Hagan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Everyone

It's been a few years since I've read "The Easter Parade," by Richard Yates. I read it first in college many years ago, then in my late 20s, and now in my mid-40s. This book simply gets better and better. Not only is the writing flawlessly rendered, the inevitable circumstances of sisters Emily and Sarah are presented with honesty, empathy and tremendous sensitivity by a master realist who knows exactly how alcoholic families live out their lives. What the TV show "Mad Men" reveals about our cul...more

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Mar 22, 2010 ~Sara~ rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: general-fiction

This was the first book I've read by Richard Yates and I have extremely mixed emotions after it. The portrayal of the characters lives is at times both brutal and heart-breaking and there are glimpses of people you know or things you've seen or experienced throughout the book that make it really hit home. It's a good thing it's not very long because, although it seems true to life, I found it was becoming too repetitive and morose for the storyline. I can only read so much gloom before becoming...more

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Feb 08, 2013 Mark rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Mark by: Mary

Only Johnny Got His Gun can stand toe to toe with The Easter Parade in the unsettling, horrific way it takes one person's life (and in the case of Parade, several other people besides) and makes you ask yourself, Why the hell are we even here?

With the case Yates brings to the table, you can't refute him. You can't even begin. You can stick your fingers in your ears and close your eyes and babble I can't hear you, I can't hear you but this perfectly crafted novel will be waiting. It has time. It...more

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Oct 31, 2011 Mad Dog rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Women who like sad stories, Guys who don't mind 'chick flick' stories

This is my fave Yates book. Rings real true. Really moving, in a sad way.

The family in the book (the Grimes family) is like so many families. The continued lack of communication, the akwardness, the isolation: these problems are all there.

This book did go a little slow for me in the beginning, but the momentum does build and the poignancy increases. And the main character (Emily) is quite likeable. I have also read Rev Road and Good School by Yates, and I really enjoyed those too. Good School...more This is my fave Yates book. Rings real true. Really moving, in a sad way.

The family in the book (the Grimes family) is like so many families. The continued lack of communication, the akwardness, the isolation: these problems are all there.

This book did go a little slow for me in the beginning, but the momentum does build and the poignancy increases. And the main character (Emily) is quite likeable. I have also read Rev Road and Good School by Yates, and I really enjoyed those too. Good School is more upbeat and definitely a SWEETER book. Read that book for a more positive/redemptive (but still realistic) side of Yates. But read this book(Easter Parade) for a realistic trip to the 'darker side of the everyday'.

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Jul 27, 2008 Waylonia rated it 5 of 5 stars

Easter Parade is only the second Yates book I've read (after Revolutionary Road, an obvious classic), but it is more proof of his ability to craft meaningful, frequently painful stories with a pared-down prose style that is immediately readable and deceptively 'simple.' Following the lives of two sisters from childhood on up, it's not a happy tale--but then again Yates gives us fair warning of that right in the first sentence. It moves quicker and covers greater ground than Revolutionary Road--...more

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Apr 02, 2009 Kent rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

An engaging enough story, yet another tale of suburban malaise, with that sort of detached, clinical narrative style reviewers like to call "quietly poignant" and "unflinchingly honest". Good for a long train ride. If I lived in a country where long train rides were commonplace, I might read another of Richard Yates' novels. Since I don't, I'll probably just put "Revolutionary Road" on my netflix queue. Or not.

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Apr 20, 2009 Joseph rated it 3 of 5 stars

After a while, it became repetitive and predictable.

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Nov 01, 2011 Abby rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I missed Richard Yates the first time around, in the 60s and 70s. Unfortunately, so did almost every one else. Despite critical acclaim – Revolutionary Road, his first and arguably greatest novel, was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1962 – Yates never achieved wide popularity. We have the recent movie of Revolutionary Road to thank for finally – long after Yates’s death in 1992 – landing the book on the best seller list and bringing his other works to our attention. [return][return]The...more I missed Richard Yates the first time around, in the 60s and 70s. Unfortunately, so did almost every one else. Despite critical acclaim – Revolutionary Road, his first and arguably greatest novel, was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1962 – Yates never achieved wide popularity. We have the recent movie of Revolutionary Road to thank for finally – long after Yates’s death in 1992 – landing the book on the best seller list and bringing his other works to our attention. [return][return]The Easter Parade, like Revolutionary Road, is a searing portrayal of two seemingly ordinary people who might have been expected to lead ordinary but reasonably happy lives. But there aren’t any happy lives in Richard Yates novels, at least not in these two books. His characters all reflect aspects of his own tragic life – unfulfilled promise, the fear of mediocrity, alcoholism, madness. Sarah and Emily Grimes are children of divorce, brought up primarily by a delusional, unstable mother. Sarah, the pretty one, marries young, quickly has three sons and endures an increasingly abusive marriage. Emily, the smart one, goes to college and drifts from job to job and from one failed relationship to another. [return][return]There’s not much in the way of plot in The Easter Parade. Unlike Revolutionary Road, in which the primary action takes place in only a few months and which hurtles headlong toward inevitable catastrophe, The Easter Parade spans four decades and Yates’s precise, spare prose lets his characters’ lives unfold with more clarity than you might think possible in only 225 pages. Reading Revolutionary Road, I thought Yates had brilliantly captured the social milieu of 1950’s suburbia and the stultifying business lives of that era’s young corporate lions. Reading The Easter Parade, I was equally in awe of the accuracy of the portrayal of a young (and later, not so young) “career woman” in New York City in the ‘60s and ‘70s. Yates wasn’t a creative stylist; he wrote straightforward sentences with not a word wasted. And his eye for detail and ear for dialogue are uncanny. The Easter Parade is simple and simply brilliant.(less)

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Nov 23, 2012 Piperitapitta rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Senza pelle.

Letto a cavallo tra il pomeriggio e la serata di oggi, tutto d'un fiato.
Le parole di Richard Yates scorrono come l'acqua di un fiume in piena e trascinano a fondo, portando con sé malinconia, inadeguatezza, disagio profondo, rassegnazione, che aumentano progressivamente con l'aumentare delle pagine sul lato sinistro del libro.
L'altra faccia del sogno americano è il correttore di bozze anziché il giornalista di successo, la donna sola anziché libera ed emancipata, la famiglia che è se...more

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May 09, 2012 Carl Brush rated it 3 of 5 stars

I’ve been meaning to crack a Richard Yates ever since his writing spiked posthumously back into prominence a couple of years ago with the filming of his Revolutionary Road. The film is a winner--well-deserved academy award for Kate Winslet, one of DiCaprio’s few fine performances, one of Kathy Bates’ usual fine performances. Several articles heralded Yates as a forgotten and neglected talent whose work deserved more attention and respect. So it was that I finally got around to The Easter Parade...more I’ve been meaning to crack a Richard Yates ever since his writing spiked posthumously back into prominence a couple of years ago with the filming of his Revolutionary Road. The film is a winner--well-deserved academy award for Kate Winslet, one of DiCaprio’s few fine performances, one of Kathy Bates’ usual fine performances. Several articles heralded Yates as a forgotten and neglected talent whose work deserved more attention and respect. So it was that I finally got around to The Easter Parade.

Whether Yates belongs among the top American authors, I won’t venture an opinion. He may not be a Hemingway or a Fitzgerald or a Faulkner, but he’s certainly worth reading. And Easter Parade sports one of the best opening sentences around. “Neither of the Grimes sisters would have a happy life, and looking back it always seemed that the trouble began with their parents’ divorce.” Sarah and Emily follow different paths. Sarah builds and devotes herself to a family on Long Island. Emily goes to Barnard, works in Manhattan publishing and advertising and moves through a chorus of men. As several characters put it in this 1976 novel, she seems the model of the liberated women.

We follow primarily Emily, the younger, liberated, sister. From childhood to her first sex in Central Park, her first (impotent) husband, her second (depressed) husband.

[As an aside, I wonder if this last one, Jack Flanders, is a bit of an authorial self-portrait. Revolutionary Road was heralded. Yates’s later books, I guess, not so much. Similarly Jack Flanders has published two celebrated volumes of poetry, but now seems dried up. I’ve done no research, so I’m merely speculating.]

As much as the story is about these women, it is about the ravages of alcohol. This is before the alcoholism gene had been identified, but everyone certainly noticed the drinking families. And, indeed, as much as their own flaws and inadequacies put the sisters in trouble, the bottle amplifies and exacerbates whatever perils they step into. Same with their parents.

Thus, in many ways, this is a rather grim, if well-told. story. But there is among the older sister’s younger offspring, a straight arrow Episcopal priest. And not a goody two-shoes, either. Someone you might trust as an advisor. And in the end, through this Peter, there’s a hint of salvation. Of hope. And along the way, an absorbing tale written with inspiring skill.

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Jan 10, 2012 Angie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

Richard Yates’ The Collected Stories and Revolutionary Road are two of my favorite books. Easter Parade does not quite meet the standard of those books, but does display the clarity and precision of Yates’ writing and his honest portrayal of deeply flawed and unhappy people. The Grimes’ sisters could not be more different on the surface. Sarah enters into an abusive marriage and becomes a mother at an early age. Emily goes to college, starts a career, and careens from one doomed love affair to t...more

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Sep 12, 2011 Nikki rated it 3 of 5 stars

I was really excited to read another book by Richard Yates, since Revolutionary Road is one of my all-time favorites. Sadly, I don't think this novel is nearly as good.

The first line is the novel tells you that the sisters, Sarah and Emily, won't have happy lives. Then the next 200 or so pages chronicles the next 40 years of their unhappiness. I sped through this in about two sittings, so it's pretty compelling, but at the end I felt like it was hollow. Their lives are bleak, truly terrible thi...more

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Jul 28, 2011 Allison added it · review of another edition

Yates' novels are masterfully deceptive. You start out reading what seems like a typical story of a typical family -- maybe some of the characters are quirky, yes, but all families are like that. Then, as you read on, cracks start to appear, and what you thought was normal is anything but. The Easter Parade is about a family of three: a mother and two daughters. The mother is over dramatic, the older sister is obedient and overly compliant, but the younger sister Emily seems to have it together...more

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May 16, 2011 Laala Alghata rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

“There were worse things in the world than being alone.” — Richard Yates, The Easter Parade

I’ve been wanting to read Yates quite a while. I was in a bookstore trying to chose between his books, and I picked up The Easter Parade. I was intrigued. I’d wanted to read Revolutionary Road, but I had recently seen the movie and I wanted to shake it out of my head before I read the book. So The Easter Parade it was.

The novel follows two sisters, Emily and Sarah, throughout their lives. The opening line...more “There were worse things in the world than being alone.” — Richard Yates, The Easter Parade

I’ve been wanting to read Yates quite a while. I was in a bookstore trying to chose between his books, and I picked up The Easter Parade. I was intrigued. I’d wanted to read Revolutionary Road, but I had recently seen the movie and I wanted to shake it out of my head before I read the book. So The Easter Parade it was.

The novel follows two sisters, Emily and Sarah, throughout their lives. The opening line, “Neither of the Grimes sisters would have a happy life, and looking back it always seemed that the trouble began with their parents’ divorce”, makes it clear that their lives won’t be happy ones (and, to be honest, if you know anything about Yates it should be that). I read the book over a couple of days, completely engrossed in the characters, stopping only to stare at the sky and try to understand how I think people should act, and how I think my life will play itself out.

“But that was part of the trouble. She lived in memories all the time.”

The book was definitely emotive. Even if you don’t feel strongly for the characters (they are flawed, definitely, but sympathetic nonetheless), I think Yates successfully makes you think about how your life could change into something you don’t recognize without the reason for the change being necessarily bad. Emily, the book’s main protagonist, makes her share of awful decisions, but in the end, she isn’t a bad person.

“Whenever she walked, and sometimes she walked for hours, she only found the past.”

Something that made me a little sad was when I posted the bolded quote (about being alone), a vast majority of the likes and reblogs happened on Christmas Day. There absolutely are worse things than being alone, and I suppose in the end it doesn’t matter if it’s a holiday or a normal day, but it hurt me a little to feel people’s pain.

The book is wonderfully written and I can’t wait to read more of his books. The man is a master. It’s depressing to think when he died none of his books were in print. I hate it when someone becomes famous after they die, I wish they could know the impact they made. When I shut this book, I went through a cacophony of emotions. I worried about ending up in a similar position, about dying alone, about never finding the person to share my life with. I worried about the problems in the world that seem like they’re going nowhere and of people in different walks of life who are trapped in lives they don’t want. Reading this book and The Road so close together was probably not very good for my mental health, but it definitely made for great reading.
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Dec 04, 2010 Ann rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is one of those rare paradoxical finds : a book about a depressing subject that nevertheless leaves you invigorated and eager to read more by the same author. It's the story of two sisters in New York, Sarah and Emily, whose lives are followed from the 40s through the 70s. In a nutshell: it's a story of broken dreams, unfulfilled wishes and wasted lives. Sarah's marriage to a young Englishman does not bring her an association with a wealthy, classy family, as she'd hoped, but instead dooms...more This is one of those rare paradoxical finds : a book about a depressing subject that nevertheless leaves you invigorated and eager to read more by the same author. It's the story of two sisters in New York, Sarah and Emily, whose lives are followed from the 40s through the 70s. In a nutshell: it's a story of broken dreams, unfulfilled wishes and wasted lives. Sarah's marriage to a young Englishman does not bring her an association with a wealthy, classy family, as she'd hoped, but instead dooms her to a lifelong codependency with an alcoholic, abusive blue-collar worker. Emily seeks refuge in a college education and a life as a "career girl". She drifts from man to man, demonstrating an impeccable talent for choosing the wrong man over and over again. She manages to feel superior to the domestic slavery her sister endures, but doesn't do much better for herself. In the end, Sarah dies of alcoholism and Emily has a nervous breakdown. There is hope of redemption in the very last pages, though.

It would be easy to describe this book as a litany of thwarted ambitions, starting with the girls' father (a frustrated newspaper man), including Jack, one of Emily's lovers and a spent poet, and ending with the girls' never-realized literary dreams. But it's much more than that. It is so well written, with so much honesty, that you keep reading on despite the painful descriptions of bad marriages and alcoholic degradation.

I was struck by two additional thoughts while reading this book. The first was that people drank so much in the 50s and 60s! And not just beer and wine, but hard liquor. It seemed to be part of every business lunch, every social gathering. I would be interested to find out whether this is just my impression from reading books about that period, or whether the statistics on alcohol consumption over the decades bear that out. The second was, that despite Emily's education, her employment opportunities were limited, just because she was a woman. It is hard to imagine that systematic, unspoken, generally accepted sexism today.

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Sep 27, 2010 Teresa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Sarah and Emily Grimes� s parents divorced when they were young, and according to the narrator, the divorce is where their trouble began. Sarah marries young, has three sons, and makes a few abortive attempts at writing about her family. Emily goes to college, has a career in writing and editing trade and advertising copy that merely pays the bills, goes through one man after another, and makes a few abortive attempts at writing about her own experiences. Both women seem to stand for the two str...more Sarah and Emily Grimes� s parents divorced when they were young, and according to the narrator, the divorce is where their trouble began. Sarah marries young, has three sons, and makes a few abortive attempts at writing about her family. Emily goes to college, has a career in writing and editing trade and advertising copy that merely pays the bills, goes through one man after another, and makes a few abortive attempts at writing about her own experiences. Both women seem to stand for the two strands of femininity that emerged in the 20th century� the subservient wife and the liberated women. And both of these strands have a shadow side� a bleak, ugly shadow side.[return][return]Although this book is sometimes described as the story of the two sisters, the focus is mostly on Emily. We see her disengage from her family and get into a series of impossible relationships. She has many lovers, but her relationships are transient, and she never seems to experience a meeting of souls. Sarah� s different, but equally bleak, story seems to be there to provide contrast, perhaps to make it clear that domesticity is not the root of all happiness and that settling down would not necessarily be the answer for Emily. Unhappy women are unhappy in many different ways.[return][return]So why are these particular women so unhappy? The narrator blames the divorce of the girls� parents for their troubles, which I find interesting, given that the book was published in 1976, and their parents would have divorced in 1930, before divorce was as common as it is today. Today, divorce alone would seem like an insufficient reason for the women� s troubles, but what about in 1930, or even in 1976? And why would two women from the same family cope so differently? Yates� s characterization of the sisters is such that even their most illogical and frustrating actions make a certain kind of twisted sense.[return][return]I was very impressed with Yates� s beautifully spare writing style. His descriptions are clear and precise, and not a word is wasted. At times, Yates� s economical prose style does make the book move a little too quickly. It covers 40 years in only 230 pages, and I didn� t always have a clear sense of how much time was passing. A few times, I was startled to learn Emily� s age or realize that she had been in a relationship for more than a couple of months, but this is a minor flaw, if it� s even a flaw at all. The passing of time does work that way in life sometimes.[return][return]The back cover of the Picador edition mentions that the two sisters � finally reach for some semblance of renewal,� but don� t believe it. This is no inspirational story of people who find a way to persevere through the challenges of life. It� s about the ugliness and bitterness that reside in so many ordinary people. It� s about hopes that never come to fruition and the horror of mediocrity. It� s a great book, but not a hopeful one. I� m glad I read it; there are scenes that will stick with me, and I� ll probably read more Yates in the future, but I� d only recommend it to readers who don� t mind coming face-to-face with the darkness in ordinary life.[return][return]See my complete review at my blog.(less)

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Jul 30, 2010 Antonia Crane rated it 4 of 5 stars

Easter Parade is not a happy story about happy families. Richard Yates captures the sad decline of alcoholism and delusion better than anyone I’ve read in ages. Easter Parade is the tale of two sisters, Emily and Sarah as watch their mother descend into mental illness and alcoholism. Both sisters suffer in different ways while their mother drinks herself into a psyche ward. Emily floats from man to man with no understanding of how to progress in life without disappearing into the next man. With...more

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Apr 09, 2009 Katherine rated it 3 of 5 stars

I picked this up because it's by Richard Yates, which means it would be a sordid yet tender little tale of mid-century decline told in precise and never-grandiose prose, and because I thought the title (metaphorical double meaning: "The Resurrection Parade") was very cool.

At first, I felt uncertain about The Easter Parade because there seemed to be this underlying assumption that if their vacillating, favorite-playing dad and social-climbing mom had not gotten divorced, the Grimes girls would ha...more

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May 13, 2009 Cecily rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: miscellaneous-fiction, american-canadian

Hurt oozes from every page of this story, more explicitly than in much of Revolutionary Road, although the characters are generally somewhat flimsier.

This is the story of two sisters who were 9 and 5 when their parents split up in 1930, after which they move around New York environs with their mother at regular intervals, always chasing “flair”, but without the means to achieve it. Sarah, the older one, grows up to lead a conventional life (early marriage and children, long term domesticity), wh...more

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Feb 16, 2013 Ali rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book has been sat on my shelves since October when I was fortunate enough to win it in the last literary blog hop giveaway. The book was sent to me by Samstillreading. Richard Yates was a new author for me, someone I had previously been quite unaware of. There are I see several Yates novels and some short stories re-issued by Vintage – making me feel I should have been more aware of this writer. Now having finished reading this quite remarkable novel I can’t help but wonder a little about t...more This book has been sat on my shelves since October when I was fortunate enough to win it in the last literary blog hop giveaway. The book was sent to me by Samstillreading. Richard Yates was a new author for me, someone I had previously been quite unaware of. There are I see several Yates novels and some short stories re-issued by Vintage – making me feel I should have been more aware of this writer. Now having finished reading this quite remarkable novel I can’t help but wonder a little about the man behind it.
“Esther Grimes, or Pookie, was a small active woman whose life seemed pledged to achieving and sustaining an elusive quality she called ‘flair.’ She pored over fashion magazines, dressed tastefully and tried many ways of fixing her hair, but her eyes remained bewildered and she never quite learned to keep her lipstick within the borders of her mouth, which gave her an air of dazed and vulnerable uncertainty. She found more flair among rich people than in the middle class, and so she aspired to the attitudes and mannerisms of wealth in raising her daughters. She always sought ‘nice’ communities to live in, whether she could afford them or not, and she tried to be strict on matters of decorum.”
Sisters Sarah and Emily Grimes are the daughters of a 1930’s broken marriage. They love their father at something of a distance; as children they are proud that he writes headlines for the New York Sun. Emily, unlike her older sister, never really gets to know their father completely, while their slightly unstable mother moves the fractured family from place to place, a series of suburbs, and for Sarah and Emily a series of schools. Eventually their mother Pookie – moves them back to the city. It is here that Sarah meets her future husband, and from where Emily goes to college. Emily has always looked up to Sarah, beautiful and sensible, now smiling goldenly out of a public relations photograph for the Easter Parade on the arm of her handsome fiancée, her future seems certain.
The story which follows and which spans more than three decades is mainly that of Emily. Sarah comfortably married with three boys is very much in the background, as is Pookie, and Emily rarely see them. Emily embarks on a series of unsatisfactory relationships – even marrying once-again unsatisfactorily – and slowly begins to carve out a career for herself, as a librarian, a journalist and then as an advertising copy writer. Never totally out of touch, yet never really close, Sarah and Pookie remain at the back of Emily’s mind. However a dramatic and tragic event pulls the sisters together again years later, when Emily must reassess many things she had taken for granted.
“Tony sat stolidly in a chair across from the sofa, wearing paint-stained dungarees and looking like an exhausted labourer. Beside him, Howard Dunninger smiled uneasily. The only self-assured member of the group was Peter, who had turned into a striking young man. He was dressed in spattered work clothes too – he and his father had been painting the house before their guests arrived – and Emily liked his looks. He wasn’t tall and he wasn’t quite handsome, but he moved around in a graceful way and there was something humorous and wise about his face.”
Yates’s writing is elegant, spare and in the main unemotional – though his portrayal of families in denial and uncomfortable family get togethers is poignantly brilliant. This is a fairly slight novel at around 226 pages – yet there is so much packed into it. Richard Yates is certainly not easy on his characters, unhappy, self-deluding, selfish and damaged; slowly unravelling, they are characters that stay in the readers mind. Not wanting to give away too much – I will only say in conclusion that the story is utterly compelling and hugely readable; I almost ate up the pages. The ending for me, is just unforgettable.
For those of you wanting to read things that are cosy and happy happy happy, Richard Yates is possibly not for you. However I thoroughly enjoyed The Easter Parade and will definitely be looking to read more Yates in the future.
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Oct 23, 2012 Ubik 2.0 rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Easter Parade è uno dei romanzi più intrisi di tristezza che mi sia stato dato di leggere; ma non si tratta in questo caso di quella tristezza "calda", commovente e lacrimogena che emana da un melodramma ben congegnato nel muovere le corde più profonde dell'animo (mi viene in mente A voce alta - The Reader di Benhard Schlink).

Qui invece si deve fronteggiare una tristezza fredda, disperata e ineluttabile come il destino che intrappola i protagonisti (nella fattispecie le protagoniste) del raccont...more

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Oct 15, 2011 Paula rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the first book I have read by Richard Yates and it was a well written book. Richard Yates writes characters brilliantly and without sounding too sexist, it was hard to believe a man had written the book because the dialogue between the sisters is so realistic.

The book is very sad and told in a very straightforward manner, Sarah, the eldest sister grows up and gets married, she loses her confidence and produces her 'happy face' to hide what is happening within her marriage which Emily do...more

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Mar 14, 2011 Laurel-Rain rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

From the moment of their parents' divorce, when they were nine and five years old, Sarah and Emily Grimes move forward to very different kinds of lives, spanning decades: from 1930 to the 1970s, we experience how the significance of their tarnished childhoods informed their destinies.

Over the years, their lives diverged, with Sarah married to her "charming" romantic partner, Tony Wilson, while Emily finished college at Barnard and began the first of a series of positions. Her serial relationship...more From the moment of their parents' divorce, when they were nine and five years old, Sarah and Emily Grimes move forward to very different kinds of lives, spanning decades: from 1930 to the 1970s, we experience how the significance of their tarnished childhoods informed their destinies.

Over the years, their lives diverged, with Sarah married to her "charming" romantic partner, Tony Wilson, while Emily finished college at Barnard and began the first of a series of positions. Her serial relationships also distinguished her life from Sarah's.

Their father was mostly absent in the early years, with occasional outings to remind them of his presence; their mother, whom they had dubbed "Pookie" at some point, was actively present, moving from place to place, with her chatter a constant "voice over" and a reminder of what not to become.

An Easter Parade from their teens seemingly defined the sisters, with Sarah being the beautifully dressed one who would model for photographers and who had a real romance going on, while Emily's romances lived only in her fantasies.

They chose their individual journeys, but toward the end of their lives, their sad destinies were a constant reminder of how lives sometimes disappoint and veer off course for unknown reasons.

Themes of how early promise can erode is most evidenced by how Sarah's once-promising and beautiful life morphs into something straight out of a very sad movie. She clings to her early dreams of how things should be by resisting any kind of change; the brutality and ugly moments in her life are glossed over in her own mind, reminding us that nothing changes without our own desire to make that happen.

Emily's departure from the path to marriage begins early, with a brief and ill-fated union that seemingly turns her off to that particular journey. Yet her sad, hopeless short-term relationships bring little satisfaction or fulfillment, and the careers that seemed to sustain her, soon yield nothing but pain and loss.

I could not put "The Easter Parade: A Novel" down, with its deep interior journey into how lives can go awry. The characters were both likable and unlikable, which made them even more real. What might seem pathetic also seemed understandable and almost inevitable, given the times and the choices each character made.

Even as I kept hoping that the characters would find fulfillment, if not happiness, I knew that the end was clearly visible even at the beginning; further, that real life is not about reaching a destination but lies in the struggle that defines each unique journey.

Definitely a five-star read, and recommended for those who love real life experiences, with all the pain and loss amidst the hope that occasionally shines through. (less)

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About Richard Yates

Richard Yates, or Dickie, shone bright upon the publication of his first novel, Revolutionary Road, which was nominated for the National Book Award in 1961. It drew unbridled praise and branded Yates an important, new writer. Kurt Vonnegut claimed that Revolutionary Road was The Great Gatsby of his time. William Sytron described it as "A deft, ironic, beautiful novel that deserves to be a classic....more Richard Yates, or Dickie, shone bright upon the publication of his first novel, Revolutionary Road, which was nominated for the National Book Award in 1961. It drew unbridled praise and branded Yates an important, new writer. Kurt Vonnegut claimed that Revolutionary Road was The Great Gatsby of his time. William Sytron described it as "A deft, ironic, beautiful novel that deserves to be a classic." Tennessee Williams went one further and said, "Here is more than fine writing; here is what, added to fine writing, makes a book come immediately, intensely, and brilliantly alive. If more is needed to make a masterpiece in modern American fiction, I am sure I don't know what it is."

In 1962 Eleven Kinds of Loneliness was published, his first collection of short stories. It too had praise heaped upon it. Kurt Vonnegut said it was "the best short-story collection ever written by an American."

Yates' writing skills were further utilized when, upon returning from Los Angeles, he began working as a speechwriter for then-Senator Robert F. Kennedy until the assassination of JFK. From there he moved onto Iowa where, as a creative writing teacher, he would influence and inspire writers such as Andre Dubus and Dewitt Henry.

His third novel, Disturbing the Peace, was published in 1975. Perhaps his second most well-known novel, [booK: The Easter Parade], was published in 1976. The story follows the lives of the Grimes sisters and ends in typical Yatesian fashion, replicating the disappointed lives of Revolutionary Road.

However, Yates began to find himself as a writer cut adrift in a sea fast turning towards postmodernism; yet, he would stay true to realism. His heroes and influences remained the classics of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Flaubert and short-story master, Chekov.

It was to his school and army days that Richard turned to for his next novel, A Good School, which was quickly followed by his second collection of short stories, Liars in Love. Young Hearts Crying emerged in 1984 followed two years later with Cold Spring Harbour, which would prove to be his final completed novel.

Like the fate of his hero, Flaubert, whose novel Madame Bovary influenced Revolutionary Road and The Easter Parade, Richard Yates' works are enjoying a posthumous renaissance, attracting newly devoted fans across the Atlantic and beyond. (less)

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“And do you know a funny thing? I'm almost fifty years old and I've never understood anything in my whole life.” — 30 people liked it

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