About Schmidt (Hardcover)

~ Louis Begley (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Albert Schmidt is a retired lawyer who misses his recently deceased wife, has an unhealthy diet, is a mild anti-Semite and owns a nice home in the Hamptons he feels compelled to offer to his daughter as a wedding present. Said daughter, Charlotte, is a yuppie in all the worst ways. She handles public relations for tobacco companies, doesn't want the house in the Hamptons, and is about to marry a buttoned-up Jewish lawyer. The conflict takes off from there in this finely told tale of retirement, inheritance, and death. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Both Auchincloss's sophisticated comedies of WASP manners and the terrain mapped in Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day come to mind as comparisons for Begley's new novel, but his discerning intellect and lapidary prose distinguish this powerful story of a man whose fall from grace has a double-edged irony. Albert Schmidt retired from his job in a white-shoe New York law office during his wife's terminal illness. In his 60s, he lives in her magnificent family home in the exclusive Long Island community of Bridgehampton, where he makes sardonic observations about those who betray his archaic values and rigid social standards. The most egregious traitor is his beautiful, brilliant (i.e., Harvard summa cum laude) daughter, Charlotte, whose decision to marry a blatantly ambitious Jewish lawyer is a bitter blow to Schmidt?although he remains outwardly civil. Schmidt has no idea that his cool, remote behavior has alienated Charlotte, that she is aware of the veiled anti-Semitism he himself denies and that her new family, which Schmidt thinks vulgar, offers the warmth and human contact he has never provided. With sublime, delicious irony, Begley shows Schmidt's bizarre metamorphosis from a pillar of rectitude to a silly old fool; a Puerto Rican waitress younger than Charlotte is the instrument of Schmidt's descent down the primrose path. Taking advantage of Schmidt's loneliness, streetwise Carrie uses her sexual wiles to move herself and her drug-dealing boyfriend into his house and life. Begley guides the narrative with smooth aplomb and dry humor, providing a wealth of acutely observed social detail and a clear depiction of emotional dysfunction. Though his classic Holocaust novel, Wartime Lies, is a standard Begley can't improve upon, this elegant, sophisticated novel is another study in self-deception that confirms his reputation as a masterful literary novelist.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Random House Value Publishing (November 24, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0517276240
• ISBN-13: 978-0517276242
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #8,027,922 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Case closed - Schmidt not guilty, March 2, 2003

By	Matthew Krichman (Durango, CO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: About Schmidt (Ballantine Reader's Circle) (Paperback)

This book is so simply written that it just might fool you into thinking that it is a simple book. Far from it. This is a rich, layered, nuanced plot with complex characters and powerful themes of loss, anti-Semitism, aging, and generation gaps. I found myself getting so lost in the pure pleasure of reading this novel that I frequently forgot that I was reading a book that was short-listed for the National Book Critics' Circle Award - a prize usually given to novels that require effort to muscle your way through.

Begley's background as an attorney shows through clearly. He is not your typical writer. You'll find little of the literary fluff, not much symbolism, no strong attachment to any particular technique or structure. Instead, his minimalist prose allows the reader to focus on the story, on the characters, and most importantly, on the themes. Much has been said about the notion that the reader is supposed to pass judgment on Schmidt - hence the title, a legal reference implying that the author is presenting a case or a brief. But is there any doubt about who is guilty and who is innocent here? Schmidt, for all of his flaws, is clearly the hero. Yes, he feels more comfortable with people of his own kind than with outsiders, but who doesn't? His heart is in the right place, for the most part, and Begley draws a rich portrait of a daughter who becomes self-absorbed in her unjustified resentment as she distances herself from her father. Begley's exploration of this rift is beautiful for its subtlety, and for its ability to present a morally unambiguous case without sacrificing its complexity.

Who can explain, however, the bizarre adaptation for the screen that recently came out? It resembles the book in virtually no respect, and makes one wonder why the bothered to pay for the rights to the book. The book as it was would have made an excellent movie - one can only speculate as to why and how Hollywood took such an excellent book and, with much effort, turned it into such a mediocre film.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I want to hang out with Schmidtie!, July 30, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: About Schmidt (Hardcover)

Having never read Begley before, I did not know what to expect. I'm happy to report that once I got used to his style (complex sentence constructions), I settled in and really enjoyed this book. Albert Schmidt, it seems, should be someone whose butt we want to kick. He's grouchy and way too stuck on himself. But he's also quite observant, and this is ultimately what made me like him. He can sniff out a phony at twenty paces and he's not afraid to challenge those who pry too deeply (witness his altercation with his son-in-law-to-be's mother, a psychiatrist who takes it upon herself to lift Schmidtie from the depression he's been in since the death of his wife. He combats her phychiatrist's offensive with his attorney's defense and it's rather humorous). Though Schmidt spends much of the book moping around and looking back on his life, he begins to let his hair down when he takes up with a feisty waitress, who gets him thinking about possibilities. Is she only doting on him to get a big tip? The passages in which Schmidt and Carrie's relationship develops are really touching. In Albert Schmidt, Begley has created a truly memorable character in less than three hundred pages. Begley's prose is elegant -- it's obvious he worked hard on this book. I wish I could say the same for Richard Ford, whose "Women with Men" I read just before this book. Compared to Begley's latest work, Ford's collection is light and airy, puff pastry crud. I recommend Ford read "About Schmidt" before he embarks on his next project

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Old man fantasy camp., December 29, 2004

By	Bob Mackey (Youngstown, OH) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: About Schmidt (Ballantine Reader's Circle) (Paperback)

I originally bought this book almost two years ago after enjoying the movie; after attempting to start it twice, I gave up on it. Recently, I had some extra time and needed a book to read.

Why didn't I learn my lesson?

About Schmidt is the story of a recently widowed and lonely retired man with very few links left to the outside world, and who is about to lose his daughter to a Jewish man(Schmidt is mildly anti-semitic). While this could have been an interesting character study, Schmidt is fiercely unlikable character who doesn't do much and whose problems are solved in an unrealistic manner.

This lack of realism also carries over into the dialogue, with every character being able to pull these highly intellectual and rehearsed speeches out of absolutely nowhere at a moment's notice. Long-winded and hard to follow, Begley has chosen to write his dialogue without quotation marks, making things even tougher for the reader.

Begley's ego can be seen in the novel in more than just the lack of quotation marks. What begins as a rough but slightly interesting look at loneliness soon evolves into absurdity as Schmidt begins to have a relationship with a woman 40 years his junior. After the halfway point of About Schmidt, the book just turns into Schmidt being irresistible to this woman(for no apparent reason), and constant sex between the two with absolutely no tension. What little danger Schmidt could possible be in is quickly resolved, and awkwardly tied into the main story. Nothing important or interesting in About Schmidt is really resolved. Schmidt just has a lot of sex with a younger woman and he(and the book) forgets about everything else. What could have been interesting(Schmidt's 2-page visit to South America) is never explored.

I have the itching feeling that About Schmidt is just some kind of strange Louis Begley fantasy. My dislike of the author grew as I read the interview section in the back of my book; all of Begley's answers are curt and give absolutely no interesting information. Also, I just discovered that the further adventures of Schmidt can be read in the sequel to this book. Come on! Reading the synopsis of the sequel made me realize how much of an old man fantasy the Schmidt character is.

About Schmidt the movie is a wonderful and observational look at loneliness and relationships. About Schmidt the novel is garbage. Honestly, the two are not the same in even the most basic ways; you can possibly compare three IDEAS between the two works. However, don't let this book keep you from seeing the film.