Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates – What Happens When a Writer Doesn’t Write

Revolutionary Road was Richard Yates’ first novel, published in 1961. It tells the story of Frank and April Wheeler, who live a typical suburban life in 1950s America. They seem to have been sucked into a vacuous sort of existence, which they dream of escaping by moving to Paris.

So is this book a satire on 1950s American values? Well I wasn’t sure. There are plenty of references to boring working lives in the service of buying houses and ice-cream coloured cars. On the other hand there are some personal decisions going on here too. When Frank leaves university he chooses to take a boring, undemanding job in a business equipment firm, because that would leave him free to concentrate his attention on other more important work in his spare time. The thing is he never gets round to the painting, sculpture, composing, or writing to which his spare time was meant to be devoted. Does Frank blame society for a sort of personal laziness?

Revolutionary Road isn’t just a satire on 1950s American values, with America empty and materialistic while Paris represents some unachieved creative nirvana. In America or Paris, you just have to get on with some creative stuff. Maybe Frank Wheeler is the book’s author Richard Yates, if Richard hadn’t knuckled down in his home office and got on with his writing. In a way this bleak book offers grudging encouragement. You are where you are, and wherever that is offers an opportunity at fulfilment. You too can create a beautifully written, compelling, complex book like Revolutionary Road. That’s what I took from it, before getting on with some editing.