The Wife (30 page)

Now Bone was waiting to see what I would tell him. I wanted to tell him nothing. What Joe and I had done together was my business and not his. I didn’t want to make a gift of this information; I didn’t want to let him run with it. It was mine, and I’d do with it what I wanted, but not yet. Joe had just died and I was now alone, the slap of it stinging, the rest of life waiting.

Talent, I knew, didn’t just disappear from the earth, didn’t fly up into separate particles and evaporate. It had a long half-life; maybe I could use it eventually. I could use parts of what I’d seen and done and had with him, making something vicious or beautiful or loving or regretful out of it, and maybe even putting my name on it.

“What you were talking about the other day at the Golden Onion,” I said to Nathaniel. “About Joe and me? About his writing, and how he hadn’t seemed talented early on?”

Bone nodded, and his long hand jerked slightly, as though his impulse, like any journalist’s, was to reach for his notepad. But he stopped himself and ran his hand through his hair instead.

“Yes,” he said.

“Well, I wanted to say that what you implied isn’t true.”

“It’s not?” His voice became suddenly flatter, and he looked hard at me.

“No,” I said. “It’s not. It would be great if it were,” I went on. “If I could claim to have written like that.” He kept looking at me, shaking his head. “I guess in a way I was sort of playing with you the other day,” I said. “Sorry about that.”

“Oh,” he said, slouching down, turning into himself. “I see.”

Then he shrugged, absorbing the disappointment all at once, starting to move on. For though he hadn’t gotten what he’d hoped, he’d actually
been there
in Finland when Castleman died, and that was an extraordinary feat, he imagined. He would flesh out the final scenes for his manuscript based on the words of ancillary figures in the story: nurses’ aides in strange, pie-crust-crimped hats, frightened maids at the hotel, the young Ibsen-character doctor, who may well have provided him with a physical description of Joe in his last moments: the slack mouth, the powerlessness of an old man with a fragile heart.

Nathaniel Bone would be all right, I saw; he’d go on and on, rarely at a loss, always being slipped information, treated specially, given access, allowed to roam the world. He didn’t really need anything further from me now, after all, and yet here we were together, and for some reason I felt I ought to think of something else to say before I went back to my seat.

“Look,” I told him, “I’ll help you with the archives if you want. You can publish a couple of the letters, maybe.”

“All right, great,” he said, but his voice was neutral and he was probably already thinking about something else: about how odd and shocking this trip had been, or about resetting his watch back to New York time, or about a woman’s long, warm back pressed up against him.

“And I’ll tell you something else,” I added.

All around us, people rearranged themselves in their seats like dogs in little beds, trying again and again for comfort. Another flight attendant, this one blond, opaque, unknowable, eased past us in the narrow space, carrying a tangle of headphones down the aisle. The airplane shuddered, bounced slightly, and then lifted itself higher above the world.

“Joe was a wonderful writer,” I said. “And I will always miss him.”

A SCRIBNER READING GROUP GUIDE

1. After attempting her first short story in the library stacks at Smith College, Joan, the protagonist of
The Wife
, imagines “what it [is] like to be a writer: Even with the eyes closed, you [can] see” (
page 46
). Explain how this observation could also be made of wives. What does Joan see even when other people think her eyes are closed?

2. In Chapter 2, Joan meets the writer Elaine Mozell, who warns Joan against trying to get the attention of the literary men’s club. How might Joan’s life have been different without Elaine’s discouraging advice haunting her?

3. On a trip to Vietnam with Joe, Joan finds herself on an airstrip, in a segregated clump, with the wives. But Lee, the famous female journalist, chats with the men. Joan laments to herself
“I shouldn’t be here!
I wanted to cry.
I’m not like the rest of them!”
(
page 134
) How is Joan different from the rest of the wives who appear throughout the novel? In what ways is she similar?

4. Joe’s friend Harry Jacklin praises Joe’s work, telling him, “You’ve got that extra gene, that sensitivity toward women” (
page 25
). Indeed, we discover that Joe’s “sensitivity” is primarily thanks to his wife. How do you think Joan would have been received in the literary world if her name had been attached to the same material? Do you think she would have been as successful?

5. After Joe receives the call confirming he has won the Helsinki Prize, Joan envisions the days ahead, realizing that “I wasn’t going to handle this well; it would inflame me with the worst kind of envy” (
page 37
). Discuss envy, regret, and loss with respect to Joan’s choices regarding her writing career.

6. Over the years, many people come to admire Joan for her steely resolve in the face of blatant betrayal and infidelity. Is Joan, in fact, an admirable character? Why do you think Joan waits so long to decide to leave Joe?

7. There is a lot of talk from the women about “The Men.” Specifically, Joan describes Joe as “one of those men who own the world” (
page 10
), and Elaine Mozell harbors contempt for the men who conspire to “keep the women’s voices hushed and tiny” (
page 53
). What is your opinion of Joe and the men he represents? Considering
that the reader sees him through the eyes of his wife, do you think he is presented fairly?

8. On being a wife, Joan admits: “I liked the role at first, assessed the power it contained, which for some reason many people don’t see, but it’s there” (
page 119
). Discuss the quiet power of wives, particularly during the late fifties, when Joan is initiated into wifehood. Do you think the power wives wield is more visible today?

9. Toward the end of the novel, Joan reveals the secret that she and Joe long shared about his career. Joan acknowledges that, among others, her “children, each in their own separate ways, had suspicions” (
page 201
). As a reader, are you surprised by Joan’s revelation or does Joe’s sudden merit as a writer seem suspect? What clues support your hunch?

10. At one point, their children, David and Alice, go so far as to confront both Joan and Joe about their secret. Do you think the children are convinced by Joan’s staunch denial? If Joan were your mother, would you be disappointed or proud of her?

Look for more Simon & Schuster reading group guides online and download them for free at
www.bookclubreader.com
.

M
EG
W
OLITZER
is the author of five previous novels, including
Surrender, Dorothy
and
This Is Your Life.
Her short fiction has appeared in
Best American Short Stories
and
The Pushcart Prize.
She lives in New York City with her husband and sons.

A
LSO BY
M
EG
W
OLITZER

Surrender, Dorothy

Friends for Life

This Is Your Life

Hidden Pictures

Sleepwalking

SCRIBNER

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2003 by Meg Wolitzer

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

First Scribner trade paperback edition 2004

SCRIBNER and design are trademarks of Macmillan Library Reference USA, Inc., used under license by Simon & Schuster, the publisher of this work.

Designed by Kyoko Watanabe

Text set in Aldus

The Library of Congress has cataloged the Scribner edition as follows:

Wolitzer, Meg.

The wife: a novel/Meg Wolitzer.

p. cm.

1. Authors’ spouses—Fiction. 2. Authorship—Collaboration—Fiction.

3. Fiction—Authorship—Fiction. 4. Married women—Fiction.

5. Novelists—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3573.O564 W5 2003

813'.54—dc21   2002036660

ISBN-13: 978-0-684-86940-7

ISBN-10:   0-684-86940-3

ISBN-13: 978-0-7434-5666-1 (Pbk)

ISBN-10:   0-7434-5666-1 (Pbk)

ISBN-13: 978-1-4165-8488-9 (eBook)

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Reading Group Guide

About the Author