Married: A Fine Predicament [Hardcover]

Anne Roiphe (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 16, 2002

Since she first gave voice to the struggles of a generation of women with Up the Sandbox, Anne Roiphe has been a unique chronicler of how we live in relationships and in families. In Married, Roiphe offers an elegant defense of married life from the wry perspective of a wife and mother who survived the 1950's, the sexual revolution, and the women's movement.Drawing upon a captivating range of examples from history, literature, and popular culture--ranging from Jane Austen's Emma to Bill and Hillary Clinton--as well as her own two marriages, Roiphe looks at the state of wedded union from an emotional as well as a social perspective. With her trademark blend of wit and wisdom, she explores such questions as why we have marriage, the stresses that threaten a marriage, what marriage asks of us, and what marriage gives to us.Just as she won women's hearts by celebrating the neglected joys of motherhood in Fruitful (shortlisted for the National Book Award), Roiphe is certain to capture a wide audience with her passionately affirmative answer to the basic question we ask about marriage. Does she think it's worth it? In Married Anne Roiphe answers with a resounding "I do."

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Readers disgusted by sugarcoated, mushy sentiments will welcome this latest installment from the prolific Roiphe (Up the Sandbox; Fruitful). Neither antiromantic nor hopelessly giddy, Roiphe's book takes an honest look at what happens after couples say "I do," and asks why the institution has survived at all. These days, "You don't need to get married to have children and you certainly don't need to get married to have sex and you don't need to get married to make a mark in this world. Why on earth would anybody bother?" One answer, in Roiphe's gentle prose: "if you live in a railroad station sooner or later you board a train." Her remarks about parenthood can be caustic: children reveal a marriage's weak spots in much the same way as "[the] blue light the police use to reveal blood spots." In Roiphe's mind, the "predicament" of coupledom is tricky: it offers security, but may be boring; fidelity breeds trust, but limits experience; parenthood leads to emotional growth and a smaller, more routine world. Roiphe draws her conclusions not only from her own multiple marriages but also from a trove of cultural sources from Shakespeare and Madame Bovary to The Sopranos. Her ideas, though informed by feminist sentiment, are not shocking: despite her doubts, she ultimately sides with monogamy, motherhood and marriage a safe move, which guarantees her a sympathetic audience of liberal female readers still hankering for the altar.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

These two new memoirs consider the vagaries of marriage. Roiphe, whose numerous fiction and nonfiction works often treat women's and family issues, here picks up that theme by analyzing formal marriage from a variety of perspectives. Thorough and readable in her presentation, she considers all the arguments, dangers, objections, and benefits. In the end, although she does not want to "condemn anyone or legislate anything," she concludes, "We need...a hand in our hand. That is the justification for marriage." Marriage, she argues eloquently, can survive the initial romantic dreams, financial and midlife crises, boredom, everyday noises in the bathroom, and sudden appearance of children. Anderson relates her own experience repairing a marriage that was falling apart. When her husband announced a job move, she declined to follow and instead spent a year in semi-isolation, an experience she recorded in her memoir A Year by the Sea. The present title follows up that year. Her husband decides to retire, join her by the sea, and remake his own life. Although this work lacks the detail of Roiphe's book, it is a popular, readable account of a couple resettling for each other. Discussion questions for readers' groups are included in the back. Public libraries will want to consider both titles for their collections. [Anderson's book was previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 11/1/01.] Nancy P. Shires, East Carolina Univ., Greenville, N.
- Nancy P. Shires, East Carolina Univ., Greenville, NC
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books (April 16, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0465070663
• ISBN-13: 978-0465070664
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,588,709 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pre-Marital Must Read, June 7, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Married: A Fine Predicament (Hardcover)

I've become so accustomed to Pollyannaish [style] in the field of marriage/divorce that I opened this book more than a little cynical about what I would find -- just more "10 Simple Steps to Feeling Giddy About Your Mate" drivel. But the first few pages hooked me. Here is perhaps the most objective, show-no-mercy, honest book about marriage and divorce I've read. Having gone through my own marital struggles over the past eighteen years (and still married) I was at once sobered, enlightened, discouraged, and at times just a little hopeful about this sticky entanglement we call marriage. That she writes from a feminist point of view did not at all distract or demean this male reader.

The genius in Roiphe's writing is she doesn't take the typical overworn and silly Mars/Venus approach to describing all marital ills. People are complex, their issues are complex, their childhoods are complex, their value systems are complex, their ever changing needs and wants and motives are complex and when two complex people come together in marriage all hell can and often does break loose -- IF people are awake and listening to what is going on in their souls and in their marriages.

If I were a pre-marriage counselor this is the first and perhaps only book I would give to the naive young couple before me. Only then would the simplistic formula books on marital bliss make any sense...if, that is, they ever make it to the alter.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars lucid, witty, August 6, 2002

By 

Karen Sampson Hudson "Karen Sampson Hudson" (Reno, NV United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Married: A Fine Predicament (Hardcover)

Anne Roiphe does not present herself as a sage who knows all the answers. In "Marriage: A Fine Predicament" she muses on her two marital unions. The first one, made at a young age to a self-absorbed playwright, produced a daughter and some hard-won self-insight and wisdom. The second, a longlasting union with a psychoanalyst who helped her raise their blended family of five daughters---two his, one hers, and two theirs--has given her optimism and faith in the institution of marriage.

She worries for some of her daughters, as yet unmarried, and ponders whether arranged marriages---the norm in many places over many centuries---work out better than "romantic" ones. She roams over many topics, including the introduction of children into the marriage, the influence of in-laws, the differing gender-natures of male and female, the recurring patterns of relationships in families.

I enjoyed the book for Roiphe's witty, elegant yet clear-as-water prose, although I didn't agree with all of her statements and/or conclusions. Since she wrote in far less than didactic style, I don't think she'll mind. Readers, especially those who are wives- and- mothers over a certain age, will find her excellent company as she probes our common concerns. Highly recommended!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Self-important and ultimately unimportant dreck., December 10, 2008

By 

Mike Girardi (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Married: A Fine Predicament (Paperback)

Bearing in mind that this book was picked up for 33% of the cover price (an illustration of the true value of such a work), I had to discard it after the first chapter. My inclination was to do so earlier, mind you, but in the interest of fairness I drudged through the first two dozen pages. Roiphe spends most of our time telling us how badly she's had it, her misandry dripping from every line. It's difficult to empathize or feel for any author who complains about her money woes in the same paragraph in which she sells an emerald brooch. Compound this example with the fact that the author is, by her own admission, a serial-wedder, and thus disqualified to speak to the nuances of marriage. The only resounding honesty in this book are her repeated mentions of her daughters and her desperate yearning to see them married. I would no sooner take guidance about a marriage from an embittered veteran of a handful of divorces as I would seek career advice from a veteran of unemployment lines.