Name: The Marriage Plot
Rating: 3.5 (135 reviews)
ISBN: 9780374203054

Jeffrey Eugenides

The story concerns three college friends from Brown University—Madeleine, Leonard, and Mitchell—beginning in their senior year, 1982, and follows them during their first year post-graduation

The Marriage Plot

Soooo amazing. All of the characters were so complex. My kind of suspense! LOVE Jefferey's writing style as well.

Bella

Brown University, 1982. Madeleine Hanna, incurable romantic, is studying Jane Austen and George Eliot - authors of the great marriage plots. A madeleine contemplates the age-old motivations of the human heart, real life, in the form of two very different men, intervenes. The charismatic Leonard Bankhead attracts Madeleine with an intensity she fells powerless to resist. Meanwhile her old friend Mitchell is certain of only one thing in life - that he and Madeleine are destined to be together. As all three leave college, they must decide the ending of their very own marriage plot [Source : 4e de couv.].

ikkychan

I'd dare to say this is one of the best triangle love story i've read, most entirely because of the ending.<br /><br />I got introduced to Eugenides through watching Sofia Coppola's "The Virgin Suicides" and i fell in love with his poetic, melancholy way of narrating,. True, this book is not as mesmerizing as 'The Virgin Suicides" but i've got to hand it over to him as his book captured my full attention as i greedily flipping through the pages.<br /><br />This is a story of 3 selfish, ego-centric gen X: Maddy, Leonard and Mitchell, who had the misfortune of entangling in years and years of unbreakable triangle love bond. They attended the same university where Maddy, whom already in a platonic relationship with a painstakingly irresolute Mitchell (just because she doesn't want to make the FIRST move, like ughhh get a grip, young lady, it's the 80's already, not 40's) then got herself swooped off of her feet by an alluringly charismatic Leonard. These three man-(and woman)-child will eventually find their way to be wiser and better, for the sake of human character development.

This book profoundly impacted me, and I revisit it all the time. Jeffrey describes feelings and behaviours I have never been able to articulate 

A National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist Named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times Book Review • NPR • The New Republic • Salon • The Seattle Times • Houston Chronicle • The Miami Herald • Publisher's Weekly "Remind[s] us with uncommon understanding what it is to be young and idealistic, in pursuit of true love, and in love with books and ideas."—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times "A grand romance in the Austen tradition."—USA Today Are the great love stories of the nineteenth century dead? Or can there be a new story, written for today and alive to the realities of feminism, sexual freedom, prenups, and divorce? It's the early 1980s. In American colleges, the wised-up kids are inhaling Derrida and listening to Talking Heads. But Madeleine Hanna, dutiful English major, is writing her senior thesis on Jane Austen and George Eliot, purveyors of the marriage plot that lies at the heart of the greatest English novels. As Madeleine studies the age-old motivations of the human heart, real life, in the form of two very different guys, intervenes---the charismatic and intense Leonard Bankhead, and her old friend the mystically inclined Mitchell Grammaticus. As all three of them face life in the real world they will have to reevaluate everything they have learned. Jeffrey Eugenides creates a new kind of contemporary love story in "his most powerful novel yet" (Newsweek).

A Novel

Patrick Book

Maybe it’s a case of dangerously high expectations, but I couldn’t enjoy this! I’ve actively put it off for a few years because ‘Middlesex’ was so mind-bendingly, precedent-setting good that I was worried he couldn’t follow it up. So it might be my fault, but this just didn’t seem to speak to me at all.

The characters were self-centered, the setting for the most part bland, their class looming over everything, and I enjoyed reading it! Eugenides did what he set out to do and found success in it, which I appreciate. Maybe I didn’t like Madeleine and Mitchell because I didn’t like Darcy or any of the other Austen folk. It was fun to reminisce about college and how fun it was. I  went through some heavy covid fomo but that’s to be expected. Leonard hit close to home, we went to the same high school (go warriors), we both get sad sometimes, we like to intellectualize things that would be better left alone. Interesting how we only got one chapter in his voice. I’m excited to read the rest of Jeff’s works, they might just be all-timers.

Eli Alvah Huckabee

What a delicious book this was to read until about 2/3 of the way through. Then it just kind of lulls suddenly into a deeply anticlimactic and depressing finish. But Id still recommend it to someone who has an appreciation for Eugenides. It is overall worth the read (this is hard to write cause Im still not sure I believe it).

Irene Alegre

I didn't feel like this novel was pretentious, as many reviewers say. It's tough, and a somewhat hard read, but to be honest I'd still take it to the beach. It's not so hard to follow that it becomes boring. And yes, it's a book about many things that revolves around topics of high importance. It's not your novel if you are looking for a light read, or if you expect a Middlesex II. This is not Middlesex, this is not The Virgin Suicides. This is The Marriage Plot. I appreaciate an author's evolution and progress as something good. You might not enjoy what he's evolved into, but that's a totally different story.

++ on semiology, classic literature and love
-- as above :-)

Finn Salter

I’m tired of reading books where the male characters are just constantly objectifying women. Ugh.

Jess Madson

I always feel strange critiquing books because I don't even write at all, much less write Pulitzer 
 Prize-winning literature. That disclaimer aside, I just couldn't get into this one and it took me a while to read it...I'm not sure why. I think it just kind of bummed me out overall and I didn't feel like the story had any kind of meaning or message - I finished it and thought, so what? Maybe I'm not smart enough for Eugenides.... I did think the characterization was well done (especially Phyllida) and I enjoyed the references to being an English major :)

Summer Stanley

Started so engaging with what seemed like dynamic and interesting characters. The final fourth of the book however spiraled into predictability and most of the characters lost their intrigue or became down right awful. Disappointing.

Abby Hoggatt

I really wanted to love this book, and for a short while I couldn't put it down. I feel like there were just so many parts of it that left me unsatisfied. Too much buildup with no resolution. Maybe that's the point of the book, but it just didn't do it for me!

Catarina

Uns dias penso "3 estrelas", outros "ok, 4 estrelas". Talvez 3,5 estrelas? Não sei. Vou ser simpática e deixar 4, a pender revisão. Parecendo que não, isto é uma boa representação da minha opinião sobre este livro.

Anna Pinto

A lot more "normal" than The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex. The absence of strangeness and epicness made this book the least enjoyable for me.

It's the early 1980s. In American colleges, the wised-up kids are inhaling Derrida and listening to Talking Heads. But Madeleine Hanna, dutiful English major, is writing her senior thesis on Jane Austen and Geroge Eliot, purveyors of the marriage plot that lies at the heart of the greatest English novels.

The Marriage Plot

Reviews

Highlights