The Corrections (review) (2002)

Eastern and Central European authors , including Miroslav Holub, Vasko Popa and János Pilinszky. A long-time friend of Hughes, Feinstein tries to resist taking sides, yet in the end, as with Plath biographers , her stance of fair-mindedness slackens. The biography's underlying argument is that Hughes has been misrepresented. The Hughes she knew for thirty years was a magnetic , large-spirited man who gave generously to his children, friends and fellow poets. Not only does her biography give another perspective; it also reveals the richness of detail in his papers left to the University of Emory's Robert Woodruff Library and the power of his poetry as he grapples with the pain and brutality of the twentieth century. (KS) The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2001, 568 pp., $26 Jonathan Franzen's third novel maps the world of the Lambert family —their complex and strained relationships with each other and their inner struggles to deal with life on their own terms. At the heart of the novel is the question of how one might "correct" oneself or others. Personal action? Designer drugs? The biotech industry means vast investment opportunities for entrepreneurs in a boom-time capitalistic market, but how long can the boom go on, and what about the implications for humans? In a richly textured novel that plumbs the intricacies of human weakness, need and desire, Franzen espouses a humanistic belief in the essential dignity of humankind, in opposition to the materialistic one that envisions a chemical Brave New World. In delineating the twists and turns of the Lambert marriage, Franzen shows rare insight into the nature of marital conflict and incompatibility —for the Lamberts surely are incompatible from the get-go. Having made a careful study of Schopenhauer , Alfred Lambert views the world in grim, deterministic terms; his framework for life combines a disdain for the herd and a decidedly male-centered perspective, emphasizing the submission of women. Altogether humorless as well as tyrannical, he is also exceedingly private and formal in bearing. Enid, alienated from her husband's affections , adrift to deal with the world on her own, responds in part by putting a bubbly face on everything, fashioning her own world: "a miracle of niceness" in provincial, Midwestern St. Jude. When Alfred succumbs to Parkinson's disease and dementia, Enid's world becomes significantly more restricted, as she's now saddled with the physical and mental woes of a man she has never reaUy loved. A long-dreamed-of Nordic Pleasurelines cruise is no real solution, not with Alfred as unwanted baggage, but Enid feels new hope when the ship's psychologist convinces her to take a "personality optimizer" drug. Afterward she feels basically indifferent to Al's complaints and demands . Back home, she's set to continue her cruising on pills, but she decides she wants "the real thing": one last family Christmas, à la Norman RockweU. One cannot help but be amused by the dysfunctional family Franzen The Missouri Review · 179 musters up for this wished-for occasion . A Christmas gathering of the Lamberts would seem to be anything but the traditional holiday celebration Enid imagines. Her children are aU failures of one order or another. Enid's professor son, Chip, was fired over a sexual liaison with a student, accrued significant debt (borrowing over $20,000 from his sister, Denise), engaged in common theft and has lately been fleeing a political upheaval in Lithuania, where he was involved in a fraudulent scheme to fleece American investors. The older brother, Gary, married with three children, a bank vice president, meets Enid's criteria for St. Jude social acceptance, but on the personal side he is a total pragmatist, materialist and buUy like his father (though for aU his bullying he is unable to get his wife and three children to come to St. Jude for one last Christmas). Denise, also successful but divorced, is a disappointment as a daughter. Enid was revolted by Denise's ex-husband (an older man, plus a Jew), but she doesn't know about Denise's other side, her confusion over her sexual preference. If Enid knew everything about her three children, she would surely be...