The Marriage Book (3 page)

H. L. MENCKEN

A BOOK OF BURLESQUES
, 1916

Between his books, his columns, and his reviews, H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) left no shortage of caustic comments about marriage. Yet the author known as “the Sage of Baltimore” was by all accounts devoted to his wife, Sara, whom he married in 1930.

See
Expectations
;
Jealousy
, for more from Mencken.

Woman is at once the serpent, the apple—and the belly-ache.

JOHN PATRICK SHANLEY

MOONSTRUCK
, 1987

In the Oscar-winning screenplay by John Patrick Shanley (1950–), Johnny Cammareri, dim-witted but well-intentioned, is beseeched for wisdom by his would-be mother-in-law.

MICK STEVENS, 2012

A frequent contributor to
The New Yorker
, Mick Stevens caused a stir with this take on Adam and Eve. The magazine’s popular Facebook page was temporarily shut down because the cartoon was judged to violate the social media site’s nudity and sex guidelines, forbidding “naked ‘private parts,’ including female nipple bulges.” The Facebook page was soon back up, but “Nipplegate” lingered online for some weeks as a topic of discussion.

“Well, it
was
original.”

ANNIVERSARIES

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

NOTE TO SOPHIA HAWTHORNE, 1843

Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–1864) was thirty-eight when he married Sophia Peabody, who was thirty-two. Their ages (old for newlyweds at the time) did nothing to dampen their apparently childish glee: They used her diamond ring to engrave their names on their study window. They also shared a notebook in which they took turns recording their impressions and, as in the case below on the occasion of their first anniversary, writing love notes to one another.

For more Hawthorne, see
Infidelity
.

Dearest love,

I know not what to say, and yet cannot be satisfied without marking with a word or two this holiest anniversary of our life. But life now heaves and swells beneath me like a brimfull ocean; and the endeavor to comprise any portion of it in words, is like trying to dip up the ocean in a goblet. We never were so happy as now—never such wide capacity for happiness, yet overflowing with all that the day and every moment brings to us. Methinks this birth-day of our married life is like a cape [of land], which we have now doubled and find a more infinite ocean of love stretching out before us.

CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL

LETTER TO WINSTON CHURCHILL, 1909

Winston Churchill was already a respected member of Parliament when in 1908 he married Clementine Hozier (1885–1977). He was thirty-three; she was ten years his junior. Through his legendary career as orator, author, home secretary, lord of the admiralty, and wartime prime minister, he remained devoted to his “Kat” or “Clemmie Cat” (her nickname for him was “Pug,” and they signed many of their letters with little drawings of dogs and cats). Their anniversary letters are one example of the loving gestures they extended to each other throughout a fifty-seven-year marriage in which they were often geographically separated but in which “too busy to write” never seemed to play a part.

Blenheim was the Churchill family estate. St. Margaret’s, Westminster Abbey, was where the Churchills were married.

My Darling,

How I wish we were together today—It is just 5 o’clock—This time last year we were steaming out of Paddington on our way to Blenheim—The Pug was reading an account of the wedding presents in the Westminster aloud to the Kat!

Then the Pug embraced the Kat, but unfortunately another train was just passing us quite slowly & its occupants caught him in the very act— My Beloved Winston I hope you are having a very happy holiday. I do long to see you again—Tell Eddie & Freddie that if they don’t return you to me in the pink of health I will never forgive them. . . .

Your most loving

Clemmie Kat

Miaow

WINSTON CHURCHILL

LETTER TO CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL, 1909

Churchill (1874–1965) was in Strasbourg on the couple’s first anniversary.

My darling Clemmie,

A year to-day my lovely white pussy-cat came to me, & I hope & pray she may find on this September morning no cause—however vague or secret—for regrets. The bells of this old city are ringing now & they recall to my mind the chimes which saluted our wedding & the crowds of cheering people. A year has gone—& if it has not brought you all the glowing & perfect joy which fancy paints, still it has brought a clear bright light of happiness & some great things. My precious & beloved Clemmie my earnest desire is to enter still more completely into your dear heart & nature & to curl myself up in your darling arms. I feel so safe with you & I do not keep the slightest disguise. You have been so sweet & good to me that I cannot say how grateful I feel to you for your dear nature, & matchless beauty. Not please disdain the caresses of your devoted pug. . . .

Always my own darling

Clem-puss-bird

Your loving husband

W

WINSTON CHURCHILL

LETTER TO CLEMENTINE CHURCHILL, 1948

Churchill wrote this on the couple’s fortieth anniversary.

My Beloved,

I send this token, but how little can it express my gratitude to you for making my life & any work I have done possible, and for giving me so much happiness in a world of accident & storm.

Your ever loving and devoted husband

W

RICHMOND LATTIMORE

“ANNIVERSARY,” 1956

Best known for his translations of
The Iliad
and
The Odyssey
, Richmond Lattimore (1906–1984) was prolific as a poet, critic, and translator. In addition to serving in the U.S. Navy, he was a Rhodes Scholar, a PhD, and a professor at Bryn Mawr. He married Alice Bockstahler in 1935.

Where were we in that afternoon? And where is the high room now, the bed on which you laid your hair, as bells beat early in the still air?

At two o’clock of sun and shutters. Oh, recall the chair’s angle—a stripe of shadow on the wall— the hours we gathered in our hands, and then let fall.

Wrist on wrist, we relive memory: shell of moon on day-sky, two o’clock in lazy June— and twenty years gone in an afternoon.

TENTH-ANNIVERSARY POSTCARD, CIRCA 1960

RONALD REAGAN

LETTER TO NANCY REAGAN, 1972

Whatever his reputation as an actor, governor, and, eventually, the fortieth president of the United States, Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) was also famously committed to his second wife, Nancy Davis (1921–), his fiercest defender and most ardent fan. He wrote this anniversary letter to her while he was governor of California.

My Darling Wife

This note is to warn you of a diabolical plot entered into by some of our so called friends—(ha!) calendar makers and even our own children. These and others would have you believe we’ve been married 20 years.

20 minutes
maybe—but never 20 years. In the first place it is a known fact that a human cannot sustain the high level of happiness I feel for more than a few minutes—and my happiness keeps on increasing.

I will confess to one puzzlement but I’m sure it is just some trick perpetrated by our friends—(Ha again!) I can’t remember ever being without you and I know I was born more than 20 mins ago.

Oh well—that isn’t important. The important thing is I don’t want to be without you for the next 20 years, or 40, or however many there are. I’ve gotten very used to being happy and I love you very much indeed.

Your Husband of 20 something or other.

W. S. MERWIN

“ANNIVERSARY ON THE ISLAND,” 1988

William Stanley Merwin (1927–), the United States Poet Laureate in 2010, started his career with a bang when his first book of poems,
A Mask for Janus
, was awarded the Yale Series of Younger Poets prize in 1952 by W. H. Auden. The son of a Presbyterian minister, Merwin grew up in New Jersey and Pennsylvania but settled in Hawaii in 1976, a practicing Buddhist. Much of his poetry explores themes of nature, myth, and love. Merwin has been married to his third wife, Paula Schwartz, since 1983. They live atop a dormant volcano on a former pineapple plantation in Maui, presumably the island of this poem.

The long waves glide in through the afternoon while we watch from the island

from the cool shadow under the trees where the long ridge a fold in the skirt of the mountain

runs down to the end of the headland

day after day we wake to the island

the light rises through the drops on the leaves and we remember like birds where we are night after night we touch the dark island that once we set out for

and lie
still at last with the island in our arms hearing the leaves and the breathing shore there are no years any more

only the one mountain

and on all sides the sea that brought us

VICKI IOVINE

“SEVEN HABITS OF REALLY HAPPY WIVES,” 1998

“Expect Him Not to Change” was the last of the seven “habits” that appeared in the author’s article in
Redbook
magazine. Vicki Iovine (1954–), a onetime
Playboy
centerfold, has been the successful author of the Girlfriends’ Guide books on everything from pregnancy to teenagers. Her marriage to music mogul Jimmy Iovine ended in 2009 after more than two decades.

Remember, you’re adorable too, and you owe it to yourself to be happy as often as you can. If you’re willing to put that off until he starts remembering your anniversary and giving you a gift he picked out himself that fits, is romantic, and costs a little more than it should have, then you’re the sucker, girlfriend. Buy your own anniversary gift, give it to him to give you on your anniversary, and compliment him on his choice. Remember, the important thing is that you have an anniversary to celebrate.

H. DEAN RUTHERFORD

LETTER TO PATTIE RUTHERFORD, CIRCA 2012

Harvey Dean Rutherford (1932–) wrote this letter to his wife on their fifty-ninth anniversary. A former pastor in Oklahoma City, Rutherford is part of a large family of clergy. This letter was posted on the blog of his son, Dudley Clayton Rutherford, chief pastor of California’s enormous Shepherd of the Hills Church.

Patsy Lou,

Happy 59th wedding anniversary! That old granddaddy clock has written on its face, “tempus fugit,” which means “time flies.” I knew it was quick, but now it seems like we’re having Christmas three times a year. I am not absolutely sure that we will make it to our sixtieth, so I’d
better put some words on paper. Looking back, I now wonder why we had any reluctance at all to be married. The deep love I have struggled to define has now defined itself in time. We’ve lived together way too long to not know that we were made to live together. Living out the years with you keeps getting better. Once we figured out that we could not change each other, we became free to celebrate ourselves as we are. So my dear Trish-the-fish, we are gloriously together and it has never been dull company. It’s kind of weird that we have been together for eight decades and yet still think of ourselves as young. There are plenty of moments when I find you to be that blushing and shy girl who took my cheap ring and name and then agreed to explore the world with me.

We began to dream and work and love and worship. Sure, we only started with forty dollars and a fistful of promises, but we were wealthy. I can still remember that Georgia wedding 59 years ago today and oh my, how young we both were. We experienced the sweet warmth and love of youth. We felt that God had decorated the night sky with stars just for us. We drove every false and threatening thing out of our lives with simple truth and honesty. We have met 240 changing seasons and met each challenge. I still smile when I think, how wealthy we thought we were when we were really so very poor. And talk about money, those five children came along. I’ve almost forgotten how they got here or what it took to get them here. You can remind me later. But I’ve always known that they came from God and belonged to Him. And I remember my promise before they were ever born, that they would never take “first place” in my heart, the “first place” that you have always held. I love those once-upon-a-time “tax deductions,” but I could never love them as much as I have loved you.