The Group

Rating:
Summary: Unabashedly melodramatic, yet delightfully readable
Review: Mary McCarthy's deft and sometimes sordid examination of "The Group" is enlightening, if sometimes melodramatic. The novel reads a bit like a soap opera at times, especially when the reader deals with the tumultuous lives of Kay and Harald, two young newlyweds with a penchant for finding trouble in their marriage. Harald is hardly likeable, Kay often flippant, and their friends oblivious or at the very least unresponsive to their increasingly abusive problems. Of course, Kay and Harald are only the tip of the iceberg in this novel.

Dottie, Lakey, and the other members of The Group--eight Vassar graduates trying to make their way after college--all find out plenty about the roughness and beauty of living through the course of the book. Yet it is impossible to say that this is a superficial work, because McCarthy never treats her characters lightly. Yes, they act a little flighty at times, but there is always a human edge to their stories. When Dottie takes a lover she shouldn't, according to The Group, the entire affair is treated with remarkable sensitivity and candor. Therein lies the charm of this particular work.

McCarthy has a knack for getting a lot out of her characters. She peopled this novel with plenty of personalities, but they never simply read as sketches or caricatures. Even Kay and Harald, the queen and king of the over-dramatic (an ironic and clever connection to the theater they both love so much) are amazingly well-written and well-thought out. Sure there are moments when the reader may roll his or her eyes in annoyance at some of the more pandering moments, but there is always the next page, ready to lead the audience back into the charmingly fragile relationships that make this book so lovely.

While this may not be the epitome of McCarthy's writing, it is certainly a novel worth the read, and well worth the thought it should generate afterwords.

Rating:
Summary: Unabashedly melodramatic, yet delightfully readable
Review: Mary McCarthy's deft and sometimes sordid examination of "The Group" is enlightening, if sometimes melodramatic. The novel reads a bit like a soap opera at times, especially when the reader deals with the tumultuous lives of Kay and Harald, two young newlyweds with a penchant for finding trouble in their marriage. Harald is hardly likeable, Kay often flippant, and their friends oblivious or at the very least unresponsive to their increasingly abusive problems. Of course, Kay and Harald are only the tip of the iceberg in this novel.

Dottie, Lakey, and the other members of The Group--eight Vassar graduates trying to make their way after college--all find out plenty about the roughness and beauty of living through the course of the book. Yet it is impossible to say that this is a superficial work, because McCarthy never treats her characters lightly. Yes, they act a little flighty at times, but there is always a human edge to their stories. When Dottie takes a lover she shouldn't, according to The Group, the entire affair is treated with remarkable sensitivity and candor. Therein lies the charm of this particular work.

McCarthy has a knack for getting a lot out of her characters. She peopled this novel with plenty of personalities, but they never simply read as sketches or caricatures. Even Kay and Harald, the queen and king of the over-dramatic (an ironic and clever connection to the theater they both love so much) are amazingly well-written and well-thought out. Sure there are moments when the reader may roll his or her eyes in annoyance at some of the more pandering moments, but there is always the next page, ready to lead the audience back into the charmingly fragile relationships that make this book so lovely.

While this may not be the epitome of McCarthy's writing, it is certainly a novel worth the read, and well worth the thought it should generate afterwords.

Rating:
Summary: I should have asked Grandma....
Review: Okay, straight off I'll admit that I'm not a senior citizen so maybe there's something about this book that I'm missing. Or maybe some of you will agree with me. It was just a bit too much. Eight main characters who are all,at some point, THE main character. This being as it was, I found it impossible to get attached to any of them. I didn't really care about the conslusion though I suppose I should have felt sad about the tragic end of this wierdly timed romp. (I never was quite sure what year it was...)

Rating:
Summary: NEW BEST FRIENDS
Review: The Group By Mary McCarthy

This classic tale of innocent girls becoming interesting women lives up to its reputation. Moving easily from educationally historic, to intriguingly racy, through unbearably sad, laughably dated, juicily gossipy, The Group invites thoughts on the necessity of the not-yet-born modern feminist movement. So what if McCarthy's Vassar friends turned on her after recognizing themselves in this tell-all roman a clef? It's worth it for what she gives to the rest of us, her new best friends.

Rating:
Summary: Still relevant after all these years...
Review: THE GROUP was published when I was very young, however, I was aware the book had created quite a stir because my Republican, Roman Catholic father and Democratic Protestant mother had many heated arguments over its content--which includes discussions about childrearing, hetero and homosexuality, mental illness and psycholanalysis, body functions, and Communist-party affiliation.

I have finally read Mary McCarthy's book and found it absolutely wonderful. Having completed it, I feel I understand my mother and aunts a little better. They were of the same genertion as Polly, Libby, Lakey, Kay, and the other eight Vasser graduates who are the protagonists of the book. Although my relatives attended state colleges in Wisconsin, I was exposed to "thinking" women who for the most part lived lives comparable to the women depicted in THE GROUP. All but one of my aunts married, and she became an "old maid school teacher." Some of my uncles were more liberal than others, but all of the men including my father had expectations about how their wives should conduct themselves after marriage and motherhood. I came of age at the tail end of this oppressive period when women were still called girls.

As we read about the oppression of women in other parts of the world today, I cannot help but wonder if younger men and women can fully appreciate how recently civil rights have been extended to U.S. and European women. It's so easy to discount feminists but without the resumption of the Woman's Movement in the late 1950s and 1960s, a husband like Harald might still be able to have his wife Kay committed to a psychiatric hospital if she defended herself from his drunken attack.

THE GROUP covers the years 1933 to 1940--it begins just after the stock market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression and ends with England on the verge of invasion from the Nazis. The book was described as a "gem of American social history" by 'The Nation' but it is also a very good read. (Supposedly, McCarthy based her characters on friends from her Vassar days, so one never knows how much is really fiction.)

Reading this book, I found myself outraged and sad and laughing out loud. The discussions about child rearing are enough to make you hoot -- especially if you have been exposed to the "bottle versus breast" battle. As the victim of parents like Priss and Sloan who read entirely too much literature, I went onto subject my children to the techniques of Dr. Spock, and am now am amused by the current thinking of my daughter and daughter-in-law who also read child-rearing literature and attend discussions and are struggling with potty-training and aggressive behaviour. If you have ever raised children or are trying to raise children you will enjoy the exchanges between parents and spouses and friends in this book.

The passages describing mental illness caused me react with everything from laughter to impotent rage. Polly's father is resentful because his melancholia has been rediagnosed as manic-depression -- only he's never had the manic experience. Polly's obsession with her psychoanalysis is familiar. Kay's incarceration in the "looney bin" and description of the several floors of the mental hospital dedicated to recovery--from the seventh floor lock-up with padded cells to the fourth floor "just like a college dorm" from whence the cured patient depart--is frightful. This is a great book. Don't let its publication date fool you, it's as salient today as it was the day it was written.

Rating:
Summary: A Really Good Woman's Novel
Review: This novel is really several intertwined stories of about 6 upper-class girls who graduate from an ivy league school in the 30's, but the decisions they must make and problems they have to deal with are still very comparable to our day.

These girls are the creme of society but, of course, they have their misconceptions and make their mistakes just like we ordinary folk do. Kay marries a man who she thinks is a genius, but who's also conceited and selfish; another (whose name I can't remember) marries an up-and-coming obstetrical specialist who forces her (with the best intentions) to have their baby his way.

Libby is determined to become a great writer, but, unfortunately, all her verve, self-confidence, and connections can't make up for the fact that she has no talent. Polly's family lost all their money in the Depression and, when her lavish-spending father comes to live with her, she's forced to sell her blood to pay his debts. Lakey, really the most sophisticated and intelligent, and the leader of the group, is nonetheless a very unhappy misfit, for reasons we find out later on, in the very satisfying ending.

Although there is a good deal made about the upper-class setting - how these girls are aware of themselves as being leaders of their generation and role models - nonetheless the author (who must herself have been part of this milieu) is aware that, in a sense, this is ludicrous, and that the girls are in some ways, despite the best of educations, limited by their lack of perspective. There is also a strong moral underpinning to the story - the author is not a cynical person, she believes in true love, happiness, etc., and knows what goes around comes around. This allows you to sympathize with and root for the girls.

If you like women's novels (Jane Austen, et al.), I think you'll like this one.

Rating:
Summary: Satire of 8 women who grad from Vassar, 1933
Review: This upper-class New England satire of the post-college lives of 8 women has definitely stood the test of time. I read it maybe 30 years ago and just reread it: it still works, and at my present age, I find myself appreciating McCarthy's superb writing on an entirely new level. Each of the women comes from a different background, has widely different experiences both in Vassar and after graduation, and sees her world after college thru different eyes. Told mostly thru the point of view of one member of the group, McCarthy's classic story lacerates socialism, the Ivy League, the prevalent double standards of the era, men - and psychoanalysis. Is there anything she doesn't excoriate with her talented tongue. Um, no, I don't think she's missed a thing.

Rating:
Summary: So-so for a "modern literary classic"
Review: This was a good book, I read it in 2 days on vacation. I think it suffered, though, from the author trying to follow too many characters in the space allotted. The reader gets a chapter only for some characters, 'Lakey' figures only at the beginning and the very end, and there are so many from the group that I got them confused. As a study of women and their interrelationships, Superior Women by Alice Adams is a better bet: it is more in-depth (only following four college friends) and covers 40 years instead of 10.

Rating:
Summary: More Jackie then Jane
Review: While I found this book diverting and fine for a bus read, the reviews comparing it favorably to Jane Austen are quite off track. Mary McCarthy writes a piece of sudsy melodrama--far more reminiscent of a Jaqueline Susaan novel than an elegant comedy of manners.

It's a slightly elevated pot boiler, pure and simple. One step up from "Peyton Place" and "The Best of Everything"---and that's largely because it revolves around Vassar grads and has a few $10 words tossed in.

Rating:
Summary: The Mother of the 'Girlfriends' Books
Review: With all the recent interest in books about women and their relationships with other women ( Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Saving Graces, etc.) I was interested in going back and reading one of the groundbreakers of this genre.

"The Group" follows eight Vassar graduates from the class of 1933 and chronicles their diverse lives. The reader first meets them one week after graduation at the wedding of one of the girls and follows them for over 400 pages until they are all reunited seven years later at the funeral of one of the group. Along the way we are given a lesson in social history as we share their courtships and marriages and take a hard look at the social mores of the 30's. Mental illness, virginity, the breast v. bottle debate, and political upheaval all come up for examination as the girls reach the conclusion that an education, even the very best one, does not guarantee emotional balance. This is a sometimes profound, sometimes hard-biting satirical look at American women in the important period between the two World Wars.

In 1966 the novel was transferred to the big screen with an all-star cast featuring Candice Bergen as Elinor Eastlake, the group leader. Though much of the book's and the movie's shock value (the lesbian issue) has been lost in the 21st century, this still remains a viable novel on women and the bonds they forge.