Young Hearts Crying (Vintage Classics)

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Liars in Love Richard Yates.

A Special Providence Richard Yates. The Fountain Overflows Rebecca West. Here be Dragons Stella Gibbons. Revolutionary Road Richard Yates. A Single Man Christopher Isherwood. A Good School Richard Yates.

Young Hearts Crying

Easter Parade Richard Yates. Lady Oracle Margaret Atwood. Cakes And Ale W. Three Men in a Boat Jerome Jerome. Of Human Bondage W. Bestsellers in Contemporary Fiction. Friend Request Laura Marshall.

Little Fires Everywhere Celeste Ng. The Clockmaker's Daughter Kate Morton. A Gentleman in Moscow Amor Towles. Normal People Sally Rooney. Nine Perfect Strangers Liane Moriarty. The Tattooist of Auschwitz Heather Morris. Nineteen Eighty-four George Orwell. Crazy Rich Asians Kevin Kwan. China Rich Girlfriend Kevin Kwan.

Yes, all the protagonists pour whiskey as if it were on perpetual discount. First hundred or so pages generate a conception of ''Revolutionary Road'',''Disturbing the Peace'' and every other Yates drama, however the next three hundred over pages, this is his most extensive book but not the most consuming one settle the ever anticipated tragedy into something No character is necessarily appalling or morally corroded.

Their lives aren't an inescapable train wreck, the author allowed himself something uncharacteristic, to channel them through the narrative ''deprived of'' a heartbreaking moment at the end. Surprised after closing the book, by no means dissapointed, merely left in a bit of a msigiving. First part of the novel deals with their marriage, second and third with divorce from each point of view. My mother says that women grow older and men grow mature- an unfair but a biological truth. Men can reinitiate their life well into midife crisis, have kids and simply start over.

Women, on the other hand have fewer options as the double digits continue to roll. We've seen it happen on numerous occassions. This happens to be my own conclusion about what Yates was all about in ''Young Hearts Crying''. Could be wrong, any input is welcome. Anyway, this makes me a Yates completist, however I'm not through with him, not by a long shot. What was a kid of 18 able to construe from those book at that age?

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Jan 10, M rated it it was ok. What is with this guy and juvenile, disillusioned suburban couples??? It was moving, with elegant prose that was never pretentious a feat few novelists I've read have evinced and the story was troubling, to be sure, but incredibly moving and deeply felt. YHC has the gorgeous writing, but little else to redeem it, or its characters. There are too many characters with few distinguishing features who keep r What is with this guy and juvenile, disillusioned suburban couples???

There are too many characters with few distinguishing features who keep re-appearing - once again we have a couple whose child seems totally off their radar, let alone ours or the author as in Rev Road, but there it seemed fitting for the characters, here it just seemed strange - we have a whole lot of immaturity and little visible growth - we have increasingly predictable plot changes hm, a new woman is introduced, let me guess, she will be with Michael before the next page - a whole lot of objectification of women - primarily weak and unlikable women to boot - and in general a sort of, what was your point kind of feeling.

I think Yates is super talented and the writing was enough to hold me - but the bottomless pit quality to the storyline was more than I could take. Jan 31, F. The wife even performs in local theatrics. However, when the couple breaks up the novel seems to lose all focus, just drifting along through their post-married lives. Jun 21, Jeremy rated it really liked it. Young Hearts Crying is a novel about failure and hope, examining the lives of an American couple from painful beginning to painful end. Only 'end' would be an inapt word for a novel that, like Revolutionary Road, doesn't offer a cheerful resolution.

Yates's literary canon is known for underlining the quiet despair of middle-class suburbia that is masked by cheerful conformity.

As a critique of middle-class life, his Revolutionary Road stands above Paula Fox's Desperate Characters in execution, v Young Hearts Crying is a novel about failure and hope, examining the lives of an American couple from painful beginning to painful end. As a critique of middle-class life, his Revolutionary Road stands above Paula Fox's Desperate Characters in execution, vision, and characterization. As in Revolutionary Road, Young Hearts cultivates an eloquent show-and-tell narrative, almost with an autobiographical tone for third person.

Michael is a poet with high hopes for an artistic future, and Lucy is an heiress eager to prove that her worth is more than her inheritance.

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Michael penned a critically successful poem that occasionally lulls him out of perennial disappointment. For him, it doesn't matter that he hasn't managed to pull the poetic trigger again in a way that satisfies his own impossible standards - that breakthrough poem, which later lands him a job at a prestigious university, was proof enough that he did, can, and should live up to his lofty ideals, regardless of how illusory they are.

At first, the couple seem content to live a simple, dry middle-class existence. Before long, suburban dreariness curdles Michael's idealistic blood, and then later, Lucy's. Michael's unfulfilled ambitions lead to an alienating and contagious restlessness and later, several stints in institutions that, when united with Lucy's own unrealistic longings, leaves their marriage in shambles.

The rest of the novel -- which is much too long -- follows their lives as they pursue mostly sour relationships and drive themselves crazy under the pressures of unrealized ambitions. The characters are rarely, if at all, at peace. And there's a depressing sense that they are victims of capriciousness not of their own doing. We feel that the stronger they long for things and the more risks they take to acquire them, the more they're entitled to have them.

Young Hearts, Yates's fifth title, was written when the author was in his 50s. But like Revolutionary Road, this novel isn't a period piece.

It's about unfulfilled yearning, a couple's failed relationship, a family's relationship, the friction between generations, the existential choices people make and the consequences that follow. Above all, it's about the human experience. Later in the novel, Michael has finished a book of poems he admits isn't greatness but considers a promise of coming greatness. I don't doubt Yates shared these feelings about much of his work, including Young Hearts Crying--especially after the New York Times panned it Yates was well into obscurity when this was published.

Overall, the novel feels unfinished, unwieldy, and uneasy in structure. And yet, this is precisely why I liked the book. The structure is appropriate for the subject matter. Art, or the desire to live up to impossible self-standards, is what they'd been chasing all their lives. When we part with Michael, he is a man obsessed with his increasingly wizened, withering look, a man who seems at peace with the prospect of a soon-to-be-ex-wife, a man who, as Yates puts it, would no longer be "plunging ahead in pursuit of ephemeral things.

This starts in the 50s when Michael falls in love with Lucy at university. He is determined to support them as a writer and would rather make ends meet writing for Chain Store Age than be tainted by touching her trust fund. As they glimpse more bohemian lives of their friends, they become increasingly unsettled and more aware of that. It is also about the process and toll of writing, although Michael is a writer whose main word-related quality is saying the wrong thing in the wrong way when it matters most.

The story proceeds in three parts, spread over subsequent decades, with the second focusing on Lucy and the third on Michael it might be intriguing to read 3 and 2 the other way round and consider what would need changing to make that work. It felt less polished than other Yates I have read. For example, I felt there were many gaps, particularly an understanding of what Michael writes, his style, what drives him etc, and the lack of input from friends and relatives at various times in their lives.

Despite its weaknesses, I found it utterly compelling I dreamed about it and was almost reluctant to get to the end. Aug 21, Mike Uva rated it it was amazing. Reading this book I feel like I might have handed out the "5 stars" too easily to some of the other books on my list. This is one of Richard Yates's last books and much like The Easter Parade and Revolutionary Road it's about ordinary people looking to discover what they are good at, figuring out what to do with their lives and how to be happy.

There were a few passages I read last night over and over, and I was reminded how reading a certain book at a certain time can change your life. Totally Reading this book I feel like I might have handed out the "5 stars" too easily to some of the other books on my list. Totally absorbing and every word is perfect. View all 3 comments. Lleno de esos momentos en los que las relaciones personales se diluyen. Nov 25, Patrick McCoy rated it really liked it Shelves: The novel is organized into three parts.

In the first part he shows the coupling and slow uncoupling of would-be poet Michael Davenport and his wealthy art-loving blue-blood wife Lucy. This section of the book is reminiscent of his greatest success, The Revolutionary Road. They decide to live off Michael's modest salary as a commercial writer despite the fact that Lucy has millions of her own m There's more realistic heartbreak and misery in Richard Yates' sixth novel Young Hearts Crying They decide to live off Michael's modest salary as a commercial writer despite the fact that Lucy has millions of her own money.

They mix with other artistic types who have varying degrees of success-one a painter has early success and recognition as a painter. Perhaps, a spoof of the abstract expressionists that were rising to success in postwar ar America-people like Jackson Pollock. Mental health is a an issue in the novel as several characters seek out therapists and psychiatrists. Michael has a major mental breakdown post divorced that is more fully described in his section of the book.

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However, the divorce doesn't come without causalities in this novel, they have a young daughter Laura. The second section of the novel follows Lucy's attempts for happiness post-divorce. She has some bittersweet affairs and tries her hand first at acting at behest of her first lover a stage director, then writing, and finally painting before giving up on an artistic career. The writing section is quite entertaining as it clearly reveals that Yates was once a creative writing teacher himself, confirmed in his biography as a writing instructor at the New School.

She is essentially unfulfilled and unhappy. The last section of the book follows Michael's post divorce life that begins with an affair with a younger woman and a psychotic episode that lands him in Bellevue Hospital for a year-later he has a relapse as a visiting scholar at a writing colony in New England. Finally, he meets a younger woman who adores him and remarries only to eventually divorce her as well. His quest for respectability and success as a poet has some modest success, but he eventually gives it up to teach for stability.

His life is also unfulfilled and unhappy. However, we also see how his mental illness may have been passed onto his daughter and we see Lucy finally find peace as an activist with Amnesty International. Yates doesn't flinch from showing either character behaving badly or destructively, but somehow as a reader we still care about them and root for their success, which is inevitably will lead to failure.

This book led me to look more closely into Yate's life and I learned that among other things he was a sort of mentor aka a "writer's writer" to the "dirty realists" Tobias Wolff, Raymond Carver, Richard Ford, Andre DuBus, etc There was a great essay about his career and how he went out of print after his death, "The Lost World of Richard Yates: However, his books did find new life and are now in print, perhaps inspired by the essay, but also due to the fact that his books were mentioned as inspiration for the TV show set in the 60s, Mad Men.

Young Hearts Crying is another worthwhile story of heartbreak and disappointment from a writer who mined life's un-fulfillment for prose. Men de lever absolut ikke lykkeligt til deres dages ende. I stedet tager han forskellige jobs som skribent, bl. Lucy flakker rundt mellem forskellige grene af kunst — fra teateret til skrivemaskinen til malerier — uden at finde sig til rette nogle steder. Know what we did, Lucy? We spent our whole lives yearning. Jul 14, Kirsty rated it really liked it. Young Hearts Crying , published in , is his penultimate novel, published eight years before his death.

The New Statesman describes his work as follows: Here, Yates presents not just a married couple or a family to us, but a whole community; we are given a feel for how intrinsically individuals fit into a particular place or setting. The protagonists of the piece, regardless, are a young married couple named Michael and Lucy Davenport.

The pair are very much in love at the beginning of the novel, yet cracks soon begin to appear within their marriage. When Young Hearts Crying begins, Michael is a new Harvard graduate, who wants desperately to become a poet. As protagonists, Michael and Lucy are both well built. Whilst Michael is not at all likeable I would go as far to say that he is actually moderately awful in most of his thoughts and behaviour , Lucy is; the balance struck between the pair, augmented by their small daughter Laura, is pitch perfect.

Young Hearts Crying is not overly heavy in its plot, and whilst one is able to guess what is going to happen as the story moves forward without any great effort, these elements do not make it any less compelling. I always say this of Yates, but he is an incredibly aware and perceptive author. Young Hearts Crying is so well written, and whilst it is not his strongest novel, it is a great, striking and relatively easy read nonetheless.

Apr 20, Simon A. Smith rated it it was amazing Shelves: Bad title, amazing read. I can't say it enough Richard Yates is an unbelievable writer who always gets it right. This is the second or third best book in the Yates collection, imho. Rev Road is his masterpiece, and then you have the short story collection s and a very close third is this book. I can't believe it took me this long to read it. If you like realistic dialogue and spot on reactions, emotions and motivations this is for you.

If you're an aspiring writer, this'll learn you som Wow. If you're an aspiring writer, this'll learn you something, kid. Guess my biggest problem with Yates is that, however fun and fast-paced all of his novels are, none of them is as good as Revolutionary Road. Perhaps that's also because the ones I've read so far are basically the same novel written over and over again. Let's see what my feature reading of Yates will bring me Yates is the kind of author that doesn't appeal to me at all, lol, but I'm glad you're enjoying him.

It's been a while since I've read an author's books back to back — so interesting how you can sense a mellowing over time. Must read more Yates…. I've been resisting putting more Yates on my "someday" list because I don't know much about his books that aren't Revolutionary Road or The Easter Parade, but then you review another one, and it sounds so, so good. It's the only one I've read, unfortunately, but this one sounds really good.

I rarely read books by the same author back to back — maybe I should try it. This one sounds good Rachel. I don't know why I haven't read any other Yates after Revolutionary Road! I liked it so much, and I'm enjoying your reviews of Yates's other work. This sounds like another wonderful Yates book. I will look out for The Easter Parade at the library tomorrow and hopefully they will have it. If not then I heard you might be re-reading Revolutionary Road which I am keen to read and so will definitley join in for that.

I love how the book goes off into two parts after the divorce sounds wonderfully interesting. Having a passion for something…anything, is something that I talk about quite a lot with family and friends. I can't imagine a life without it. I think it's really cool you're reading his novels back to back like this—you really get a sense of how his work has changed and developed over time and what themes he continues on with or discards.

I would love to read his work, though I only have Revolutionary Road on hand—and have meant to read him for ages. I've been wanting to do that, read three books by the same author and then perhaps a biography of the author, really immerse myself in their world. Verity — Did you? I have never done it because I'm afraid of saturating myself too much in one author, but I'm really enjoying it!

I should do this more, I think — it's great to see the changes in an author's style over time.

FOR DISCERNING READERS

Yes, I'm not sure you would like him…I like depressing books but I know they're not to everyone's taste! JoAnn — Yes, I think he did mellow a fair bit.

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