Customer Reviews

The Way We Were

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It is extremely hard to judge this book solely on it's own merits because the shadow of the film, staring Robert Redford and Barbra Streissand, looms so large. What I can say is that readers expecting to find the story depicted in the film will not be disappointed. This is one instance where the filmmakers were very true to the novel, in many cases lifting dialogue verbatim from the book. Having said this, I am afraid most will find that the screenwriters didn't leave much. The book is serviceable and we do learn a bit more about Katie and Hubble and the times in which they lived but what becomes apparent is how much dimension and color the movie actually adds to the story. Granted, Laurents is drawing from his own life and writing about his friends and their experiences but somehow their stories work better when we can see them. Redford and Streissand, as well as the rest of the talented cast, imbue the characters with a depth and implied history that isn't as apparent on the page and the movie story, frankly, feels tighter and more focused. As if the author made one final edit. If the reader is simply interested in seeing how the story depicted in the film developed, the book is interesting but compared to the film itself, there is no contest. The best way to experience Arthur Laurents' story is to watch the film by the same name.

for the reader because of what it's about: (1) A woman who loves a man & changes herself because of her love for him, only to find that he can't change despite his love for her; (2) set in Hollywood before & after HUAC & the blacklists. It's interesting for a writer or scholar, too, because it shows how a master playwright & screenwriter adapts to the novel. But Laurents DOESN'T adapt to the form, and I think I know why. He depends on others (actors, directors) to make his plays & screenplays engaging & entertaining; but in a novel, he has to do these himself. He hints that he can't when he mentions rewrites of his chief character's second novel, and the defects he finds in it are those of the book he's writing! Also, Laurents's customary method for constructing plot--mixing & matching from a menu--works well for plays & movies where the writer is the maker of plots, but not in the novel, where manners are more important than actions & motives are more important than manners. Laurents writes a novel like a screenplay, episode by episode, a technique that works for F. Scott Fitzgerald & Terry Southern, because they confine themselves to the superficial & don't seek to explain manners or motives. Laurents tries to explain, and the result is clinical. What we have here is Scott & Zelda transported to the Forties through Sixties, with Laurents fleshing out characters with people he has known or heard about. The result is interesting, not engaging. Still, a good read on a summer's day, if you can get Barbra Streisand out of your ear.