Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner (May 16 Group Fiction Read)

[Portia]

Just came upon this article by Joan Didion in the latest The New York Review. http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/...

[Janice (JG)]

Well, I have finished the book. Whew. It felt like the whole book (view spoiler)[balanced on that last sentence -- like on the head of a pin. (hide spoiler)]

My short review is here.

[Sara]

JG: I loved your observation in the spoiler. (view spoiler)[I love that phrasing. "balanced on the head of a pin". Really captures how precarious everything in life is. He tells us in the beginning that time is not static and that there is something we can learn from history if we are open to it. At the end, I think he has learned a lot from his grandparents' lives, but then that is only step one for all of us...can we act on what we know? Can he? (hide spoiler)]

[Janice (JG)]

Sara wrote: "JG: I loved your observation in the spoiler. [spoilers removed]"

It really was a perfect ending.

[Shirley]

Just picked this up from the library today. Will start soon, once I've finished Rubbernecker.

[LauraT]

I've barely started it yesterday - not 100 pages; hope to read on today in teh afternoon but tomorrow I work all day; it will be a "week end book"
For the moment I'm a bit perplexed; I like this jumping up and dow time; and I'm curious to understand what has happened to the narrator to have lost a leg. His grandmother is not totally clear to me yet; I need more time ...

[Sara]

100 pages is a good start, Laura. Anxious to hear what you think.

[Janice (JG)]

LauraT wrote: "I've barely started it yesterday - not 100 pages; hope to read on today in teh afternoon but tomorrow I work all day; it will be a "week end book"
For the moment I'm a bit perplexed; I like this ju..."

It will all come clear... you're getting to know Lyman.

[Theresa]

I am only 100 pages in, just after the arrival to New Almaden. I find it interesting in how the narrator comments on Susan's dress. Her trunks have just arrived and she hears the 6 o'clock whistle. She quickly dresses for her new husband and waits in the hammock. The narrator then goes on to tell us "She was always careful of her clothes... will continue to wear yards of satin, serge, taffeta, bombazine, with bustles and ruffles and leg-of-mutton sleeves, all of it over a foundation of whalebone". She wore these types of clothes even after 3 children and living the wild West. In one photo he describes her as dressing for a garden party, even though the family was at the "very bottom of their fortunes". This is a woman who I think never let go of the genteel lifestyle and people she loved. She so far appears to embrace her new beginnings but it sounds like she always wishes to keep a part of her past. Don't we all do this ourselves? I myself just finished a military life and from home to home I kept up pieces of my old life, to make it feel like home, even though I changed inwardly as a person.

I think Lyman's version of the story in the past has a rosy glow to it so far compared to the grouchy negativity to the present. As he relives the past, does he regret the cards he has been dealt with his immediate family and his health?

[Theresa]

If someone could help me out, how is it Lyman can go through papers of the family in the office on his own but not be able to move his head or use his legs? If your head and legs can't move, how can the arms? Did I miss something?

[Janice (JG)]

Theresa wrote: "If someone could help me out, how is it Lyman can go through papers of the family in the office on his own but not be able to move his head or use his legs? If your head and legs can't move, how ca..."

He recognizes the problem, and won't be alone for long.

[Sara]

I wonder what others think about the relationship between Susan and Frank. (view spoiler)[I can't help thinking the thing that draws her to him is that he represents the refinement she left behind. He is part of the world she left more than the one she has entered. I don't think she ever loves him though, while he is desperately in love with her. She represents the ideal of womanhood for him and he loves that she is tough when she needs to be and enduring, but he also respects the genteel side of her and her creative bent. That he also loves and respects Oliver makes it an impossible situation for him. Susan almost toys with him. She likes having the attention and feeling that he "understands" who she really is beneath her Western personae. She knows she needs to discourage him, but so much of what she does has the opposite effect.

I feel so bad for Oliver, who wants to respect and trust his wife and friend and in doing so gives them enough rope to hang themselves. The loss of his daughter is an added responsibility. While Susan must bear the most of that, Oliver must ask himself what if he had confronted this growing attraction as soon as he knew it was there. What if he had asked Frank to leave and not continually asked him back again? What if he had made the claim on Susan that he was entitled to make? Some of what Oliver feels toward Susan might be a reflection of his own self-inflicted guilt. (hide spoiler)]

[Janice (JG)]

Sara wrote: "I wonder what others think about the relationship between Susan and Frank. I can't help thinking the thing that draws her to him is that he represents the refinement she left behind. He is part of ..."

Interesting question. I think (view spoiler)[it may have had everything to do with communication. Susan had virtually no one to talk to and share with during her life out west with Oliver, and she was a reader and a good thinker, so she would definitely have missed that. If you couple Frank's intellectual feedback with his good looks and his attention to Susan (because Oliver was always just out of reach, in her mind), then the attraction between the two seems inevitable. I think Susan flirted with Frank, and I think Frank was sophisticated enough to know he wasn't going to run into a woman quite like her in the west, and fell hard for her. Also, there are people who are really attracted to what they can't have, and Frank may be that type, especially knowing that he was threatening the marriage of his best friend. I was surprised, given his loyalty, that he kept finding ways to be near her, and kept his fantasy alive. I also thought his suicide was out of character for him, and it didn't sit well with me. I think he did it out of shame, and he didn't have the courage to face Oliver. (hide spoiler)]

[Sara]

Janice(JG) wrote: "Sara wrote: "I wonder what others think about the relationship between Susan and Frank. I can't help thinking the thing that draws her to him is that he represents the refinement she left behind. H..."

(view spoiler)[I think his suicide was about the child and nothing else. He knew he was wrong to be pursuing Susan, but what he could never have lived with was that the child had lost her life because of it. He was willing to run away with Susan, even knowing what that would have done to Oliver. (hide spoiler)]

[Jennifer]

Sara wrote: "I wonder what others think about the relationship between Susan and Frank. I can't help thinking the thing that draws her to him is that he represents the refinement she left behind. He is part of ..."

(view spoiler)[I agree. I think Frank represents what Susan left behind. He epitomizes what she wants in a companion (intelligent, communicative, refined). When she's with Frank she is herself, the cultured and educated woman from the east. She's afraid to lose this identity which is why, I think, she is drawn to him. (hide spoiler)]

[Gill]

I agree with all of the above! (view spoiler)[ I thought she was rather insensitive in not recognising and/or ignoring just how intense Frank's feelings for her were. But then I was also irritated with her for marrying Oliver, and yet looking down on him throughout most of their time together spoiler> (hide spoiler)]

[Sara]

Yes indeed, Gill.

[LauraT]

Gill wrote: "I agree with all of the above! [spoilers removed]"

Same here Gill! I didn't like Susan at all; I do understand she had an hard life, but somehow she chose it for herself, probably out of spite for the marriage of her best frined with the man she thought right for her.
But, on the other her, she paid dearly for all her sins

[Jennifer]

Gill wrote: "I agree with all of the above! [spoilers removed]"

(view spoiler)[ I agree! Susan was so caught up in her own issues (losing herself and her friends perception of her) that she didn't care how her actions affected Oliver and Frank. I think she knew at times how negative of an impact she had on their lives, but her desire of self outweighed all that and she just kept on until the death of her daughter. (hide spoiler)]

[Janice (JG)]

And for all that (view spoiler)[we are left with wonderful Lyman, deciding that forgiveness is the way to resolve and evolve. (hide spoiler)]

[Gill]

Janice(JG) wrote: "And for all that [spoilers removed]"

Yes, and what a hard lesson for him to learn, and in such a roundabout way.

[Shirley]

I'm afraid I'm going to leave this one for now. I've read about 30% and admittedly, not had much time for reading recently. It's well written and I think at another time I would enjoy reading this, but I think it's time to leave it.

[Gill]

Shirley wrote: "I'm afraid I'm going to leave this one for now. I've read about 30% and admittedly, not had much time for reading recently. It's well written and I think at another time I would enjoy reading this,..."

There's plenty of other times to read it, Shirley. And lots of other books to enjoy right now!