A Widows Story by Joyce Carol Oates

A Widows Story Reviews

• 
  odile

  Ce qui aurait pu être l'étalage de la misère morale de l'auteur, confrontée à un veuvage brutal, devient une étude remarquable de son propre comportement et de la façon très personnelle, mais étonnamment aboutie , dont elle fait front et gère ce moment effroyable de sa
• 
  C. Zimmermann

  Elle a écrit ce que j'aurai écrit si j'avais été écrivain. Mon mari est décédé le 9 Novembre 2012.Les sentiments, émotions, malaises décrits par Joyce Carol Oats sont les miens.
• 
  Pamela Scott

  A Widow’s Story is very sad and touching. JCO’s portrayal of grief, sorrow and confusion following her husband’s sudden and unexpected death is very real and very harrowing. In the week’s following Ray’s death JCO seems to exist on auto pilot. There are various tasks she needs to do so doesn’t have time to accept her own grief. She needs to make numerous copies of the death certificate, probate the will, pay the bills, deal with the flood of sympathy cards and gifts, makes her first public appearance and trying decide whether to keep the Ontario Review, her husband’s magazine and the small press going. These moments are written with a brutal, almost painful honesty. One of the saddest parts of the memoir is how alone JCO is despite her many friends. She didn’t have any children with Ray to comfort her. There is no reference to close family members. Friends try to support her but they don’t know what she needs and she’s too grief stricken to convey what she needs. JCO is very much alone for most of A Widow’s Story and contemplates suicide. I felt she could have reached out to friends a bit . Towards the end of the book, JCO reads Black Mass, the novel Ray never finished and learns some dark secrets from his past including his strict upbringing by a devout Irish Roman Catholic family and his rebellious sister being lobotomised and institutionalized when he was a child. I found it very sad – and odd – that JCO never knew this even though she was married to Ray for 47 years. I also found it odd that she never shared her fiction writing with Ray and vice versa. A Widow’s Story is incredibly sad and unbearably real at times.
• 
  Zandra

  Had to admire the raw honesty of JCO's account of the shockingly sudden loss of her husband. The account of their marriage was very touching, and its aftermath most eloquently described I love her characteristic and adventurous style of writing. I found though some things she said very puzzling, in particular her insistence that she and her husband never told each other 'upsetting' things as that would mean 'trying to hurt each other'. Was there no place for mutual support and comfort in an otherwise devoted marriage? And strange that the content of her novels is extremely upsetting! I was also struck by the self hatred and self contempt with which she treated herself during this terrible time, as though bereavement was a 'punishment' and subsequent trials 'what she deserved'. I agree with other reviewers that it went on a bit, but I'm grateful to the author for writing it and sharing so much of her internal world.
• 
  MST

  The novels of Joyce Carol Oates are so varied in theme, subject and, it has to be said, quality, that you may not know what to expect of this work of non fiction. It tells what happens to Mrs Raymond Smith when her husband dies, the extremes of deep grief, the effects of alienation from her professional alter ego, the writer Joyce Carol Oates. Although fascinating, it is extremely hard going, particularly if it will lead you to draw comparisons with grief you or those dear to you have travelled through. It is raw in every way, including structurally and stylistically, and it feels churlish to say that it lacks the beauty and lyricism of Joan Didion's Year of Magical Thinking as a study of grief. This is just brutal, not least in the reactions it provokes in the reader.If you are a 'fan' you will be interested in this book, but be aware that you may struggle.
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  brendonhuish

  I found this account amazingly well written and well described. Joyce's physical and emotional responses in the days immediately following the unexpected death of her husband and soul mate are minutely examined but not self consciously or melodramatically. The bureacracy of death and all that this entails for the one left behind is invaluable reading to anyone who has yet had to deal with the practical arrangements requiring action after a death, from registration & probate to pension and property. She is also very insightful about the grieving process and how other people respond to 'the bereaved', the good connections and the bad. The second half of the book is perhaps less compelling than the first, but overall, I thorougly recommend this story to anyone who wishes to explore the emotive questions surrounding death, loss and the process of grieving.
• 
  Sergan

  As I am a recent widow, I longed for recognition of my anguish and distress over the loss of my husband. In writing that sentence lies the core of my 'middle of the road' rating for this book, inasmuch as perhaps it is impossible for anyone to totally identify with MY grief.For a few brief encounters, JCO connects with me. Not for long as she is soon consumed with almost unidentifiable philosophical conundrums. Perhaps it is her natural ability to write fiction that takes her into these realms. I do not know.I would be interested to read the opinions of women who have not been widowed.I was not looking for a 'Handbook for Widows', but I did want to feel an understood empathy and, in a way, recognition of the several very testing areas of widowhood. Unfortunately, this book reflects someone going through a different experience from mine as she obviously was.This brings me full circle. It will rarely happen.