Revolutionary Road

Eric

Rating: really liked it
I let out a whoop of laughter on about page 180, when I finally figured Frank Wheeler out. You see, Frank spent most of his youth a scattered, bashful schmuck. Then after WWII, as a Columbia student and Village-dweller, he started getting laid all the time, thanks to a theatrically brooding pseudo-intellectual schtick. Nevermind that Frank is essentially a glib blowhard, talented in no artistic way (he's one of those tiresome people who whine about Conformity as if America invented it, threaten expatriation, etc.), but the sexual success of his hip, disaffected persona was the only success or strength he had ever really known, so it became the core around which he wrapped his entire being and identity. That's fine, we all need illusions, and if they get you laid, even better--but the hitch is that April, his wife and the last of his conquests, and the woman with whom he now lives in the suburbs, actually half-believes him, thinks that he's a noble soul who needs the rarefied air of foreign capitals in order to flower. This is hilarious because Frank is nothing if not the standard guy, L’homme moyen sensuel: his dissatisfaction with his life, which he pretentiously blames on the conformity and boredom of 1950s America, is actually pretty well mollified once he gets a promotion at work and starts screwing a secretary; the idea of moving to Paris the better to become a 'nicotine-stained, Jean-Paul Sartre kinda guy' vanishes once he starts having more sex; he affects a snooty disdain for his job, but he's actually quite good at it, and, in heartbreaking scene toward the end, when it's all too, too late, demonstrates that he kind of likes it.

But getting back to my whoop of laughter. That laughter didn't diminish my esteem for the novel--regardless of his characters, Yates is a godlike stylist--but for a while there I felt it played more as a macabre farce than as a Tragic Laying Bare Of The Hollowness Of The American Dream. Then the tragic gravity of the characters came rushing back in chapter 7 of part 3, when the narration switches to April's point of view, and Yates starts hitting you where the last pages of 'The Great Gatsby' hit you. I ended up with more compassion for Frank, I saw that his pose of superiority rises, at least partly, out of a desperate fear of ending up like his wilted, used-up working stiff of a father. Frank and April were drifting, lonely people who initially thought that one another looked like the kind of person (the 'golden' boy, the 'really first rate girl') who could whirl their lives into effortlessness and perfection and a final salvation from lifelong feelings of dread and inadequacy...just as everyone else in the book thinks that the Wheelers LOOK LIKE that golden couple with the world at its feet, and all problems solved. Stendahl said 'beauty is the promise of happiness.' That's it, merely 'the promise.' Yates is so eloquent on how easy (and how dangerous) it is to theatricalize our lives. He knows all the little gestures and poses with which we briefly and delusionally elevate flawed creatures into romantic figures.

Glenn Russell

Rating: really liked it


Revolutionary Road - Set in 1955, portrait of American suffocating, grinding conformity. Author Richard Yates on his novel: "I think I meant it more as an indictment of American life in the 1950s. Because during the Fifties there was a general lust for conformity all over this country, by no means only in the suburbs—a kind of blind, desperate clinging to safety and security at any price." Republished as part of the 1980s Vintage Contemporaries series, Revolutionary Road is, for my money, the Great American 1950s Novel. Richard Yates at his finest, a true classic. In the spirit of freshness, I will shift the focus from the story of main characters Frank and April Wheeler to various ways the novel depicts 1950s American society and culture:

THE ALMIGHTY AUTOMOBILE – “Once their cars seemed able to relax in an environment all their own, a long bright valley of colored plastic and plate glass and stainless steel.” Yates’ description here after those 1950s cars are off winding, bumpy, narrow streets and onto the spanking new wide highway. Back in 1955 there still existed a contrast between narrow dirt roads and car-friendly highways and freeways. Richard Yates foresaw how the automobile would quickly come to rule and how American men and women could then relax behind the wheel and feel at home on the many smooth, newly constructed car-dominated roads.

WORRYWARTS – Frank spends all his work day anticipating April in her evening dramatic premier: “A mental projection of scenes to unfold tonight but nowhere in these plans did he foresee the weight and shock of reality.” Frank is a college graduate but hasn’t learned a fundamental, critical truth: constantly projecting your life into the future is a sure-fire formula for disappointment. And all during April’s actual performance Frank incessantly bites his nails and gnaws on his fist until it’s a raw, red pulp. Such anxiety and insecurity – Frank typifies the 1950s emotionally distraught worrywart. As Richard Yates notes above, a society of such worrywarts will cling to safety and security at any price.

LOGORRHEA – “Could you please stop talking.” So asks April of Frank ridding home after her theatrical disaster. She doesn’t realize she is asking the impossible since this is America 1955 where silence has become the dreaded enemy; an entire society of know-it-alls drowning in their own chatter. Talk as a prime tool to establish how absolutely right you are. And if anyone else doesn’t see it your way or dares to disagree, God help them, they must be quickly set straight. Yak, yak, yak, jabber, jabber, jabber, fueled by those two prime 1950s pick-me-ups: chain smoking and martinis.

BABBITT LIVES – Frank and April’s suburban realtor, a two-faced, despicable, intrusive gatekeeper of the growing suburbs, Mrs. Givings, runs around doing her best to make sure new residents equate personal value with real estate value. Frank’s inability to stand up to this loutish, boorish woman speaks volumes about his insecurity and pitiful lack of character.

A WOMAN’S PLACE – Nowhere is Frank’s hypocrisy and ugly ego on display more than in his dealings with his wife, April. Frank condescendingly snickers at the middle-class mentality and lifestyle where “Daddy is always the great man and Mommy always listens to Daddy and sticks by his side” but Frank quickly boils over into a rage at those times when April doesn’t do exactly that, listen to him and sticks by his side. Turns out, April is quite capable of speaking her own mind, especially in matters of importance such as dealing with her pregnancy and the decision to have a child. This novel captures how the 1950s scream out for much needed women’s liberation.

TELEVISION RULES – Frank and April’s choice to have a TV in their new suburban house: “Why not? Don’t we really owe it to the kids? Besides, it’s silly to go on being snobbish about television.” The author's penetrating insight into 1950s mentality: educated men and women want to scoff at television, thinking their tastes much too cultivated and refined to constantly stare passively at the boob tube, but that’s exactly what they do for hours and hours. “Owe it to the kids” – sheer balderdash.



THE WORLD OF MEN AND GIRLS – Every single scene in Frank’s midtown Manhattan office is a revealer of the strict stratification in the grey flannel 50s - men doing the serious work on this side; girls performing secretarial and filing on that side. And it goes without saying every single person in the office is white. Frank’s father’s name was Earl, a serious handicap in a world of Jims, Teds, Toms, Mikes and Joes, since in workplace USA men are called by their shortened first names. Ah, to make such a big deal over names! Just goes to show how suffocating and strict the conformity. Sidebar: I always have found it amusing that as soon as the post-1950s business world discovered women will work harder than men, generally do a better job than men and work for a lot less pay then men, all of a sudden, surprise, surprise, huge shift in the American workforce.



TRUE REBELLION AND PSYCHIATRY – Serious energy is infused into Yates’ story when April and especially Frank are given a dose of what it really means to rebel against standardized, conventional society: John Givings, fresh from a mental hospital, pays a number of visits to their home. In the black-and-white 1950s world, if someone had to be dragged off to a mental hospital aka nut house, loony bin, funny farm, that person was instantly labeled totally insane or completely crazy, placed on the same level as a leper in a leper colony. And God help the poor soul who is told they should see a psychiatrist. In the 1950s, telling people they need mental help was a key method of intimidation and control, as Frank well knows when he tells April she needs to see a shrink.

THE LURE OF MONEY AND SUCCESS – Oh, Frank, how you spin 180 degrees when a company executive sits you down, gives you some honest-to-goodness appreciation and judges that you, Frank Wheeler, have what it takes to join him in a new business venture and use your ingenuity to move up in the company and make some serious money. With such a glowing prospect, following April’s plan of moving to Paris so you can sit around and “fine yourself” begins to smell like a big pile of dog you-know-what.

THE KIDS – Frank and April have two children: six-year-old Jennifer and four-year-old Michael, running back and forth in the backyard, playing with the neighborhood boys and girls but most of the time sitting in front of the TV watching cartoons. And where will Jennifer and Michael be as teenagers in 1969? At Woodstock, wearing their hair long, smoking grass, listening to Joan Baez and Richie Havens and Santana. Bye, bye 1950s. Good riddance!


American author Richard Yates, 1926-1992

Ben

Rating: really liked it
For the longest time I just wanted a family, kids, a decent job, and a happy life in suburbia. That was all I wanted. That's it. It seemed so simple, predictable, and reliable. It was my ideal image.

It seems that society has done a good job of putting that thought in everyone's head. The best thing for a young man is for him to go to college, get married, get a reliable job with a steady company, have babies (2 or 3, of course), make friends with neighbors, have birthday parties for the kids, do little cocktail parties with the adults. Then he needs to tell his kids to do the same thing. And the cycle continues.

That's "just what you do."

I know that mindset isn't as prevalent now as it was when this was written in the 50s. And I haven't a doubt that the aforementioned lifestyle was/is the best life for many people. No doubt at all.

I think the problem lies in rushing into that lifestyle, before really knowing what you're getting into, without really knowing your spouse, without even knowing who you are, and what you really want, and what would really be best for you. People get trapped and don't even know they're trapped; caught inside their anger, not even knowing what they're angry at. Trapped inside the jail that is their home, forced into a miserable life of their own choosing, not knowing why or how it got that way, and even more miserable about it for that very reason.

And it's scary for me, because a few bad roles of the die and I could have ended up like Frank-fucking-Wheeler.

And it's funny. That whole lifestyle. Especially the tedious details and what often becomes our self-obsessive thoughts. You know why it's funny? Because it's both ridiculous and real. So all the laughter this novel caused me was because shit, man: it's real. It's very real that most of us are this ridiculous; it's very real that we go through the motions each day unaware, petty, and self-absorbed; it's very real that the most "normal" among us are among the most insane. It's very real that a lot of people are living the ideal lifestyle and are fucking miserable.

And no matter our life situation, we're always hoping for more. That keeps a lot of us going. And we're all pretty fucking shallow too, aren't we? Yes. People die all the time, and we get over it. Yes. We. Do. And often quickly, I might add.

The word "timeless" probably gets thrown around too much. But this novel doesn't just seem timeless. And it doesn't just seem relevant today. It seems fucking instructive. Be careful what you wish for, and pay attention to who you are, and don't suck others dry, and don't suck yourself dry, and search for truth no matter how painful.

And we continue to be self-absorbed and ridiculous. We make our decisions based on what we think will bring us the most happiness, like life is a game of chess. And it is. And it goes on.

And I still want my reliable job and my white picket fence. And a pretty wife. And babies. 2 or 3 of them.

But you see, I'm crazy.

Will Byrnes

Rating: really liked it
I read this in anticipation of seeing the film. It is a grim tale. The primary characters are April and Frank. They both hold a rather lofty opinion of themselves, but fail to actually do anything with their gifts, real or imagined. They find themselves stuck in a classic suburban nightmare of disenchantment with their circumstances and resentment of each other. The affection they do feel for each other comes and goes, mostly goes, as they wallow in their narcissism. She imagines a wondrous life for them in Paris. He comes to realize that maybe he is, really, ordinary, and not the extraordinary person he has convinced himself and many around him that he is.


Richard Yates - 1926 - 1992 - image from The New Criterion

There are themes here about character being revealed in how we cope with stress, with self awareness. Ultimately April opts out, unable to cope. Frank attempts to adjust to his opportunities in the world when it becomes clear to him that his loftier, esoteric leanings were a form of self-delusion.

All the characters here are pained. Perhaps the most overtly pained person is the institutionalized, violent son of a real estate agent. His role here is as truth teller.

This book was written in the early 60’s about the 50’s. It has surprising relevance today, particularly if one sees it as a character study. The mores of those times have hopefully passed. Abortion, while still frowned upon, is not illegal or as deadly as it was then. The characters here are also skewed a bit, with more detail being given to Frank, for example, than to April. We see inside his head quite a bit more and understand him better. It does not make us like him any better.

I found many of April’s outbursts inexplicable, blaming herself, outwardly at least, for this and that. I could not see how she would reach such conclusion. Yes, I know people do this, have even swum those waters myself. But, while I may be missing something here. I found it a bit tough to swallow.

Revolutionary Road is definitely an interesting piece of work, with a keen eye for self-delusion, and a larger-picture scan of an era. Good stuff if you do not mind being a bit bummed out. It may encourage you to give a thought to how you might be kidding yourself. And that makes it a worthwhile read.

Fabian

Rating: really liked it
Imagine my surprise when I came across Stephen King's "Best Books of 2009" List (one not condescending enough to include solely those published this year), & saw that 2nd place belonged to Revolutionary Road. Glad I am not alone in feeling a strong deep sad empathy for this book. The story is EXTREMELY well told. The story, about young "revolutionaries" who end up doing exactly the opposite of what they've set out to do, is quite simple but very epoch-rich. It has different P.O.V.s, which deviates from the outstanding film, & the ending is more shattering & bitter than the one presented on the silver screen.

Academy-Award winning director Sam Mendes made a wise decision in giving April Wheeler a brighter limelight to contend with Frank's, the husband & sole protagonist of the novel. In the film, there is a constant wrestling match which is underlined by the fact that THESE ARE JACK AND ROSE from Titanic and we must instantly feel for them. Mendes is a genius, too, in the casting of his (ex)wife Kate Winslet, who is arguably the best actress of our generation. So while Mendes has the ability to play sly film director, almost-auteur, Richard Yates has much more to contend with. His meditation on the cost of real freedom is basically flawless. He plays with dialogue in the same awesome way that a dedicated playwright like Edward Albee did. He describes in simple ways just how awful the everyday can truly be for a bright, dedicated yet frail American in the 1950's. Makes a stark contrast with today's impediments on a marriage! After so many years it seems that sometimes people make jails for themselves with as little ease as they dream big dreams...

Ahmad Sharabiani

Rating: really liked it
Revolutionary Road, Richard Yates

Revolutionary road‬, Richard Yates. ‏‫‬‭New York‏‫‬‭‬‭‭‬‭‭: Bantam Books‭‏‫‭, 1962. 247 Pages.

Revolutionary Road (released December 31, 1961) is author Richard Yates's debut novel. Set in 1955, the novel focuses on the hopes and aspirations of Frank and April Wheeler, self-assured Connecticut suburbanites who see themselves as very different from their neighbors in the Revolutionary Hill Estates. Seeking to break out of their suburban rut (and consequently blaming herself for all of Frank's "problems"), April convinces Frank they should move to Paris, where she will work and support him while he realizes his vague ambition to be something other than an office worker.

The promise of France brings the two together in love and excitement again, and Frank seemingly ends his relationship with Maureen. While April sees the emigration as an opportunity to escape their dull environment, Frank's plans are more driven by vanity of his own intelligence, which April panders to. When the dull and prim neighbor Mrs. Givings begins bringing her "insane" son John around to the Wheelers' house for regular lunches, John's honest and erratic condemnation of his mother's suburban lifestyle strikes a chord with the Wheelers, particularly Frank.

Their plans to leave the United States begin to crumble when April conceives their third child, and Frank begins to identify with his mundane job when the prospect of a promotion arises. After arguing over the possibility of aborting the child, Frank tries to manipulate April into seeking psychiatric help for her troubled childhood.

April, overwhelmed by the outcome of the situation, suffers something of an identity crisis and sleeps with her neighbor Shep Campbell, while Frank resurrects his relationship with Maureen. April attempts to self-abort her child, and in doing so is rushed to the hospital and dies from blood loss.

Frank, scarred by the ordeal and feeling deep guilt over the outcome, is left a hollow shell of a man. He and his children spent time living with their uncle, hence mirroring the youth of their mother.

تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز سی و یکم ماه می سال2014میلادی

عنوان: جاده رولوشنری - فیلمنامه؛ فرزاد حسنی؛ تهران، افراز، سال1391، در248ص؛ شابک9789642438969؛ موضوع فیلمنامه های نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده20م

عنوان فیلم: جاده انقلابی؛ کارگردان: سام مندس؛ تهیه‌ کننده: بابی کوهن؛ سام مندس؛ اسکات رودین؛ نویسنده: جاستین هیث؛ بر پایه همین رمان از: ریچارد ییتس؛ بازیگران: لئوناردو دی‌کاپریو؛ کیت وینسلت؛ کیتی بیتس؛ مایکل شنون؛ موسیقی: توماس نیومن؛ فیلم‌برداری: راجر دیکینس؛ تدوین: طارق انور؛ توزیع‌کننده: پارامونت ونتیج؛ تاریخ‌های انتشار: روز بیست و ششم ماه دسامبر سال2001میلادی؛ مدت زمان فیلم: در119دقیقه؛ محصول: کشورهای آمریکا و بریتانیا؛ زبان: انگلیسی؛

کتاب و فیلم هر دو روایتگر زندگی یک زوج خوشبخت (فرانک و آپریل ویلر) است، که در دهه پنجاه سده ی بیستم میلادی در «ایالت کانکتیکات (جاده رولوشنری)» زندگی می‌کنند؛ این زوج به تدریج احساس می‌کنند که در زندگی زناشویی گرفتار شده‌ اند، و شادمانی مورد نظرشان را نیافته‌ اند و ...؛

تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 05/04/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 25/12/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی

Candi

Rating: really liked it
4.5 stars

“Intelligent, thinking people could take things like this in their stride, just as they took the larger absurdities of deadly dull jobs in the city and deadly dull homes in the suburbs. Economic circumstance might force you to live in this environment, but the important thing was to keep from being contaminated. The important thing, always, was to remember who you were.”

Richard Yates takes a well-honed surgeon’s blade, painstakingly dissects a marriage, examines its tortuous viscera, and leaves it fully exposed for all to observe. The reader becomes a surgical assistant of sorts, a witness to the searing scrutiny of all that has been laid bare. As increasingly squeamish as I became, I was still held captive by the spectacle. The more I realized what Yates had accomplished, the more weak in the knees I became, the more impressed by his genius.

The attractive and promising young couple, Frank and April Wheeler, and their two children are the perfect image of a suburban family. You can almost see them standing there in front of the proper white house with the big picture window and the neatly manicured lawn. The illusion is burst, however, right from the start. We know it’s going to disintegrate when Yates draws an analogy by use of an amateur play that turns into a flop. April, once an aspiring actress, is at the center of the stage and Frank the adoring husband in the audience. The play begins on a high note and quickly goes downhill from there. By the end of the evening, both cast and audience depart with an air of humiliation.

“… time and again they read the promise of failure in each other’s eyes, in the apologetic nods and smiles of their parting and the spastic haste with which they broke for their cars and drove home to whatever older, less explicit promises of failure might lie in wait for them there.”

As things spiral downward and Frank and April’s marriage takes a turn for the worst, April steps in with a grand plan to move to Paris and begin a new life there. They know they don’t belong in the suburbs, Frank doesn’t deserve a tedious job at the company where his own father once worked, and April has her own lofty ambitions. They are a couple marked for success. Or are they? The marriage suddenly seems to be on the right path once again. They are hopeful for the transformative dream they plan to realize by the end of summer.

"Never before had elation welled more powerfully inside him; never had beauty grown more purely out of truth; never in taking his wife had he triumphed more completely over time and space. The past could dissolve at his will and so could the future; so could the walls of this house and the whole imprisoning wasteland beyond it, towns and trees. He had taken command of the universe because he was a man, and because the marvelous creature who opened and moved for him, tender and strong, was a woman."

Yates not only gets inside his characters and reveals their most private ruminations (many of them quite arrogant, self-serving, and callous), he also writes some of the most convincing dialogue between couples and among friends and acquaintances that I have ever read. No doubt he was either an active participant or a keen observer of more than one marital altercation that had escalated to a feverish pitch! There’s really not a single likeable character in the entire novel. I think this was done with purpose. Richard Yates wanted to expose not just his central characters, but also the superficiality of the entire lot.

If there is one person with whom one could align, it would have to be the son of the Wheeler’s real estate agent. John Givings has been institutionalized following a breakdown, much to the embarrassment of Mrs. Givings who has her own image to uphold as real estate agent for this perfect suburban neighborhood. When her grand plan to introduce him to the Wheelers as a form of ‘therapy’ is put in motion, we realize that John is the mouthpiece for all that has gone wrong in this grand illusion of Revolutionary Road. He says what everyone wants to say, but won’t as a matter of propriety. He, more than anyone else, points out what has gone wrong with the American dream. With no filter whatsoever, John blurts out one brazen opinion after another. But even these truisms have a ring of sarcasm to them. We may not like this young man either, but he sure as hell offers a refreshing honesty that no one else seems to have.

“… maybe it does take a certain amount of guts to see the emptiness, but it takes a whole hell of a lot more to see the hopelessness. And I guess when you do see the hopelessness, that’s when there’s nothing to do but take off. If you can.”

Revolutionary Road was written in 1961 and portrays the life of a 1950s young suburbanite couple, but it could really take place at any time. The fantasy and dissolution of the American dream is astutely sketched. Yates explores the illusion of marriage as a way out of a less than ideal childhood, as a way to achieve your independence and aspirations, and as an institution to be upheld no matter what the consequences. He places these fictions under the microscope and then dismantles them. This is a book that will make you uncomfortable; I squirmed throughout. However, I believe this is Yates’s intent, and he fully succeeded in achieving his goal. I couldn’t help comparing this book to John Updike’s Rabbit, Run, which I finished just a day before starting this one. Both are scathing portraits of marriages gone wrong, but Updike left me a bit of hope for Rabbit, that aggravating bastard! Frank Wheeler can take a hike and never come back for all I care.

“It depressed him to consider how much energy he had wasted, over the years, in the self-denying posture of apology. From now on, whatever else his life might hold, there would be no more apologies.”

BlackOxford

Rating: really liked it
Really Tough Love

Yates has a reputation as a chronicler of the smug years of post-WWII America. Perhaps. But as an artist, he is much more than a period sociologist. Yates’s understanding of the folie a deux which we call marriage is profound. The reasons two people find each other attractive are buried in experiences of which neither is conscious much less rationally able to think about.

To call such attraction love is euphemistic. It may be, at best, an attempt to redeem or complete oneself that might eventually develop into love but only if the underlying reasons are resolved sufficiently and replaced. Subsequent decisions to bring children into such an indeterminate situation are likely based on equally fatuous thinking. It seems amazing therefore that the survival rates of marriage are as high as they are and that more of us are not functionally psychotic.

Yates raises the perennial if not eternal question of the nature and implications of commitment. I recall the distinction made when I was in the services between making a contribution and making a commitment: in one’s breakfast of bacon and eggs, the chicken has made a contribution; the pig is decisively committed. Does this anecdote express the reality or essential ethics of commitment? Are the reasons for making commitments, misguided or not, relevant to a continuation of a commitment? Do changed circumstances, including improved awareness of motives, abrogate the demands of previous commitments? Can 'Til death us do part' be anything more than irrational optimism and encouragement?

Personal sovereignty is analogous to national sovereignty. The implication would seem to be that treaties, contracts, agreements are never unconditional, never intended as eternal. There may be consequences of non-compliance with any of these, but acceptance of consequences is part of sovereignty - the share out of community property, loss of mutual friends, increased psychological and social tensions; and of course the fate of the next generation. The calculus of contract-termination may be complex but doesn't seem to imply any absolute moral constraints. On the other hand, can what we believe to be considered judgment be anything more than hapless struggle?

The alternative to withdrawal of commitment is what seems to fascinate Yates. We try to ‘work things out.’ In order to deny, or at least delay, the possibility of broken commitment, we tell each other stories. Stories about the past and how we arrived at the present could prove therapeutic by uncovering unconscious reasons and reasoning. But we tell stories about the future instead, about alternatives lives - in exotic locations, doing interesting work, with stimulating friends and colleagues. The stories promote hope but little else.

We hope these ‘ideals’ can compensate for any originating defects. But it’s likely that Yates is correct: these ideals simply reinforce the power of the neuroses already in play. A new script perhaps but the same denouement. There is no way to anticipate the psychological baggage we take on with our partner. The piper will be paid. Pain is inevitable. The issue is who pays and when. Unambiguously happy endings are not within the range of the possible.

Robin

Rating: really liked it
Once in a while, it happens, that you suddenly look around and feel completely bewildered, like you're looking at everything for the first time, and all you can do is ask yourself, "how in hell did I get here?"

It's what happens sometimes to people who have lived a while, carried along by the tide of life, who put faith in certain constructs and coloured nicely within the lines, only to wake up and realize they had been kidding themselves.

This book is all about the self delusion of Frank and April Wheeler, owners of a lovely white house with a picture window on Revolutionary Road. They feel superior, they think they're above the 1950s conformity and the sellout of the American Dream. But... they're not.

It seems no one is, except for John, the young man who occasionally leaves the asylum on a day pass. He sees things pretty clearly and doesn't censor himself, much to the horror of his aging parents.

Richard Yates' view of marriage and 1950s American life is incredibly bleak. He makes John Updike and Raymond Carver look positively hopeful, and in fact, they are. Those guys keep reaching out for connection, however imperfect, while Yates, on the other hand, identifies and captures the solitary experience unlike any other writer I've encountered. The simple act of a husband turning off his hearing aid as his wife, unaware, expresses her deepest pain, exemplifies how Yates sees us: alone.

It sounds depressing - and it is. But the artistry here exhilarated me. The absolute perfection of scenes: a roadside fight between husband and wife that results in a fist on metal, a wounded mistress whose breasts look like sad faces, a father trying to keep it together while small children pester him with the desire to "help" with an arduous task. It's nothing short of truth, a masterpiece.

Yates shows, with unflinching commitment, what happens when people look straight on at something, and how devastating that can be. It's terrifying to watch what we have built crumble around us. But I have to believe (and this is where I allow a crack of light to penetrate Yates' darkness) there can be something new and true built in its place.

karen

Rating: really liked it
watching this movie last night made me want to read the book immediately after. and it's not a terrible movie, it's just a little... hammy, and the tone is uneven - whether these people are meant to be seen as victims of the stultifying, euthanizing effects of suburbia, or if they are at root unlikable people who deserve to be taken down a peg for their arrogance and their conviction that their involvement in this thing we call "suburbia" is just playacting, not to be taken seriously. the book doesn't waver, not to me. i always read it as a story of awful people poisoning each other and blaming their wasted lives on each other instead of taking responsibility for their own shortcomings, which, being a generally unsympathetic person, i can applaud. and his writing - absolutely wonderful.

the real character in this novel of course, is suburbia. soul-sucking, dream-gutting suburbia that neutralizes all its inhabitants and blandifies the pointy, interesting bits. this isn't the lynchian or music for torching view of the suburbs/small-town charm, where the beneficence of suburbia is compromised by its seedy undertones. suburbia, here, is the aggressor, slowly draining its characters of any charms and releasing them back into their after-dinner drinks and their morning commute to the office. and woe if you think you are somehow special or "above it all", particularly if, like the wheelers, your aspirations outweigh your capabilities and your "specialness" is only ego. i grew up in a version of suburbia, and while it wasn't in the same time period, and it wasn't as bad as all this, the writing struck a chord in me and it's good that i am away. suburbia is a bitch, but at least they'll always have paris...

oh, wait.

come to my blog!

Kristi Siegel

Rating: really liked it
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Zack

Rating: really liked it
What a wise book. Many rate it as depressing, and yes, it tells a very tragic story. But at the same time, it's also a tremendously funny book. It's just that its humor stings because it's based in the most human of weaknesses: Self-rationalization.

Frank and April Wheeler are the prototypical post-WWII suburban couple -- happy on the outside, endlessly frustrated on the inside. But author Richard Yates isn't interested in just dissecting the suburbs. Frank and April are painfully aware of their shallow surroundings, but they've always tried to convince themselves that they're better than this life.

Their frustration -- mainfested in arguments that are painfully realistic and bitter -- comes from a sense that they should be doing more, that they should accomplish something with themselves. But, as the failed local theater production that opens the story points out, they're also haunted by the fact that perhaps not only were they not meant to be great, but they were never on the road to greatness in the first place.

Scene after scene crackles with familiarity. There's the conversation with another couple that leads to awkward silence until the neighbors' troubles provide a desperately-needed topic of discussion. There's the description of how Frank came to get his job, a dead-on commentary on college graduates looking for financial stablity with little output. And there's April's heartbreaking lament about the validation she hoped to find for herself in the real world, and what she's found instead.

It's not that the Wheelers are unjustified in their decisions -- their backstories flesh out Frank's need not to be his blue-collar father, and April's desperate desire for a loving family. But their attitudes toward facing the world are hopelessly compromised by their insecurity. Neither is truly happy with themself, and April's harebrained idea about moving to Paris is just an excuse to avoid the real issue: It's not the suburbs that's draining the life from their marriage, it's them. In the end, April realizes they were never really in love with each other, just the idealized images they created for each other.

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD has enjoyed a cult reputation for decades, but has often had a hard time gaining widespread acceptance. I think the reason for this is because it's filled with truth -- the kind that makes people nod in recognition and wince in embarassment. It achieves one of the highest goals of fiction: It makes you question yourself and the world you live in. It's not without hope -- even after the climactic tragedy, life goes on. It's just up to you to try and understand the book's lessons, and figure out if there's anything you've learned.

Emily May

Rating: really liked it
I don't usually feel sorry for wealthy white people with a pretty suburban house and two sweet kids... but I have to hand it to Yates-- he made living in that domestic situation on Revolutionary Road seem like a suffocating nightmare.

Two miserable selfish people making each other more miserable. Strangely compelling.

Chrissie

Rating: really liked it
I love e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g about this book.

Start with the cover—the big red family car, the white suburban houses in the background, the silhouette of a tree and a tumble of fallen, autumnal leaves scattering the ground. Doesn’t it put you in the mood of the hopeful fifties in New England, in America? That is the setting of the book. We look at a couple of suburban families, three to be more exact. What happens over the course of almost a year? That is it; that‘s the story. Two are young families with young kids. The third is past middle-age with an adult offspring, certified as insane. He, the “insane”, is about the same age as the kids’ parents.

I love what the book says about conformity.

I love the dialogs. They are utterly perfect, so absolutely real. The prose captures to a T how couples interact--how we behave and the things we say to one another.

The book looks at life in New England communities in the fifties, but it speaks to us still today. I could site example after example of how it so well mirrors conjugal relationships—then and now. One must suffice. Isn’t it often the female of a couple that cares less about what others, those observing a verbal dispute, might think? Who says, “Lower your voice?!” The husband or the wife? Which of the two desires to keep disputes private?

The story illustrates the reality of the American Dream. We start on the surface; everything looks hunky dory, but what lies underneath? Cracks begin to show. Kids picnicking, playing on the lawn, frolicking under a sprinkler. A radio announcement advertises men’s clothing at rock-bottom prices. Parties, cocktails in hand and spouses eyeing a neighbor’s wife or husband. Clothing, the feel of the weather, the tension and atmosphere in the air, facial expressions and body poses are all minutely and expertly drawn. Emotions resonate—vibrating anger and cold detachment, attraction and sexual appeal. It is this that makes the book work so well for me. Life is drawn with a blend of the serious, the absurd and the ridiculous. Pathos and humor are intermixed.

Mental stability is a central theme. Is it only the insane who, lacking inhibition, dare to speak out against the emptiness of everyday lives--of going to a job you hate, of never daring to step out of line to honestly speak your mind? Why do we abdicate control of our lives to others? Why are people generally so scared of being different? Why are we so complacent, satisfied by so little?

Life is a mix of the serious and the funny and both are drawn here. The ups and downs of marriage—disagreements and arguments, loss of tempers, biting retorts, lashing out of bitter words and regrets and reconciliation. too. Then, with sore points visible, the book circles back and looks at why problems have arisen. What in the past has shaped the characters? People get married scarcely knowing who they are themselves, and then, when married, are expected to figure out how to deal with another, someone they know even less. These are the themes the book looks at, and I think it does this extremely well.

The audiobook is magnificently narrated by Mark Bramhall. Every single character sounds exactly as they should. He brings out what the author wants said, yet he never over-dramatizes. The young and the old, the male and the female, all the different character types are perfectly drawn. Five stars I have given the narration. It perfectly captures the nuances in the author’s prose.

I want to champion the book’s message, and I find it to be extremely well executed.

Cecily

Rating: really liked it
Yates is adept at picking apart the well-intentioned duplicity within couples, which both causes and prevents further hurt, misunderstanding and deception, and the chasm between thoughts/dreams and actions.

The competitive dynamics of suburbia are similarly exposed. Keeping up appearances is important, which is why, at the start of the novel, April is so upset at the debacle of the am dram.

Plot

This is the painfully insightful story of a youngish couple, with two small children, living in New England in the 1950s. Both have lingering hurt and dysfunction from their childhoods, which exacerbates the slow and painful disintegration of their relationship. April has the idea of a fresh start in Paris, where she will support Frank till he works out what he wants to do with his life. This exciting possibility and shared aim changes the dynamic of their lives.

Caution (but only a slight one)

Don't read this if you're in a long term relationship that is in difficulties, especially if you are stuck in a dull job as well: it may be too pertinent. That caveat aside, it's not a depressing book: as with all his books (which all have strong autobiographical elements) there is cold beauty in the pain of struggles with work, relationships, drink, and money.

Original Clichés

There are a few potential literary clichés used well and originally, so that each gives insight in a fresh way: (view spoiler)[ the Knox corporation being something to escape from and later something that provides escape; the nosey neighbour with "kinetic energy in the set of her shoulders...[and] angrily buttoned-up clothes"; John Givings as the wise fool, and Frank's unfinished path to nowhere (hide spoiler)].

Passages about Frank's work, and especially his cavalier approach to sorting his In Tray (pages 85 and 124) made a great metaphor for his approach to life, laden with overtones of Kafka - a tough target, hit with panache - much like the whole book.

Yates Revival

I read this just before the film came out because I wanted to see the film. Good call. I loved the book and enjoyed the film.

Apparently the resurgence of Yates' popularity predates that and was prompted by this excellent article about him and his works:
The Lost World of Richard Yates, by Stewart O’Nan, in The Boston Review, here.