Book requests for an older female reader please.

[grotto]

A friend and I were talking the other day and she is looking for some ideas on novels that speak too second chances in life, or relationships involving love between mature adults, (mature as in age). Seems most classics only speak to unrequited love, young love or dysfunctional bored rich people, having tormented destructive affair type loves. Neither one of us could come up with a deep, soul searching love between two troubled past having, sane adult people that wasn’t an over romanticized pipe dream. Come to think of it, I can't off hand think of a classic where the main characters are over 40!

No romance novel suggestions please, she would rather read tractor maintenance manuals. For those who may ask, she is 62 and single, far from dead and far from being typical. I had suggeted the post idea as a way of maybe shaking something loose.

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[kelby_lake]

Well, it's a play (longish at that) but Strange Interlude by Eugene O'Neill spans 20 years and at the end Nina settles down with the man who has always been kind to her, having had pretty terrible men troubles.

[Mariamosis]

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck is a great book about the Dust Bowl and sharecroppers migrating west. There is not a love story (unless you count love of family) and although the main character is not over 40 ... many of the other characters are. I hope this helps!

It definitely deals with second chances.

[kelby_lake]

The Old Man and The Sea. I thought it was boring but at least it's got a main character over 40...

[kiki1982]

I was just going from Jane Eyre, (nono, because too young) over Peruasion (nono, because not over 40) to The Siege of Lisbon!

It is bout an old man who fals in love after having made a mistake professionally. Saramago. Raimundo Silva is a corrector in his fifties if I'm right, lives alone has a housekeeper etc. Very nice, mixed with a story he is writing in a very ingenious manner.

[breeze]

novels that speak too second chances in life, or relationships involving love between mature adults, (mature as in age)
Maybe these two will fit. Both have woman characters in their early 40th, both are stories about love and taking second chances in life. Though I can`t say that they have happy ending as life is rather complicated, they both gain love in the end.
Mikhail Bulgakov "Master and Margarite"
John Fowles "Daniel Martin"

[stlukesguild]

There is Thomas Mann's Lotte in Wiemar in which the writer fictionally explores the relationship between the very real German poet/author Goethe and the object of his youthful infatuation, Charlotte Kestner whose marriage to another man served as the source for his novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther. In Mann's book, Charlotte returns 40 years later. You might also look into Mann's Death in Venice... which explores another form of love/lust/infatuation of the aging artist.

Henry James' Beast in the Jungle may be another example... but again it doesn't fit the stipulation of second chances in an optimistic manner.

Older protagonists are easy: Don Quixote, Tristam Shandy, etc... Getting closer to what you are looking for may take some thinking.

[grotto]

There is Thomas Mann's Lotte in Wiemar in which the writer fictionally explores the relationship between the very real German poet/author Goethe and the object of his youthful infatuation, Charlotte Kestner whose marriage to another man served as the source for his novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther. In Mann's book, Charlotte returns 40 years later.

Forgot about that one! Thank you!

We had been talking; wouldn’t it be interesting to see a sequel to “Jude the Obscure” 20 years later if Jude and Sue had somehow reunited? Well, if he hadn’t died of course! That’s what started our conversation anyways.

Thank's for the info so far. The books need not be optomistic per say, just not trivial and fake would be a plus.

[amarna]

Travels with my aunt by Graham Greene is great. It's about an anarchic and fun loving 70 year old lady, who has a faible for young men, cocktails and racketeering, and about her nephew, a white-bread bank cashier aged about 60. He gets a second chance by being contaminated by her dissolution and vitality.

[LMK]

Here are a couple she might enjoy:


The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden
~L

[Paulclem]

Come to think of it, I can't off hand think of a classic where the main characters are over 40!

Is one of the problems that 40 was aged when a number of the earlier classics were written?

I mean in the 19th century - I hope this doesn't sound offensive - I am 45.

[Helga]

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell, it has people and love of all ages and second chances when it comes to love and life.

[Pecksie]

Why not 'Persuasion'? I'm not sure how old the main characters are (I think Anne is a little under thirty and Captain Wentworth is somewhat older than her) ---- but the point is, Jane Austen wanted to depict precisely the situation in question here, i.e. love between mature adults or 'love as a second chance'. I think Anne is even referred to as a 'spinster' --- and that's what she, as a single woman in her late twenties, is by the standards of her time. Both characters have been through life-changing experiences and emerged wiser and more mature as a result of them. So 'Persuasion' would do, I think.

Another suggestion: a story that's not a novel, but is as interesting as any novel, is the story of the courtship and marriage of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning. When their relationship began, he was 32 and she was 38, and both had suffered great frustration and disappointment, albeit in different ways. They eventually found their way into a loving, supportive marriage. I think your friend could be interested in this story.

[kiki1982]

Why not 'Persuasion'? I'm not sure how old the main characters are (I think Anne is a little under thirty and Captain Wentworth is somewhat older than her) ---- but the point is, Jane Austen wanted to depict precisely the situation in question here, i.e. love between mature adults or 'love as a second chance'. I think Anne is even referred to as a 'spinster' --- and that's what she, as a single woman in her late twenties, is by the standards of her time. Both characters have been through life-changing experiences and emerged wiser and more mature as a result of them. So 'Persuasion' would do, I think.

I thought nono because it is a first time love and too romantic, although you could discuss about that... And, Anne is about 30 and Wentworth the same I think. Anne is referred to as a spinster, but that was a general term used for unmarried women and even if it was used to say 'old woman not married' then still, the normal age for girls to marry was about 20, so if she is 27, then she is seriously over due. In P&P Lydia even says Jane will soon be an old maid and the girl is only 23! Wentworth was almost Anne's age. Maybe maximum 5 year older, although I think somehow it was two. So he is also about thirty. But if Grotto's friend wants to see 'ripe love' in the early 19th century, then he can try to suggest it...

But be careful, she might like to eat you for your romantic suggestion!

[aeroport]

What a great topic for a thread.

I definitely second the Beast in the Jungle recommendation; that occurred right off the bat on reading the OP.

Another James title I would suggest is The Ambassadors. The central topic of the novel is the love (lust, whatever) between a young couple, but the aged protagonist is definitely given textual space for his own amorous concerns. Only slightly less pessimistic than the Beast.

[grotto]

Is one of the problems that 40 was aged when a number of the earlier classics were written?

I mean in the 19th century - I hope this doesn't sound offensive - I am 45.

No offence taken on my end Paulclem, I’m 48:p and it’s something that I have noticed for a while in literature, being old doesn’t seem to hold much value unless it’s a stereotype, we hurry to grow up and somewhere around 40-50, we turn around and start looking backwards in regret and our literature, society and media foster this.

This is probably the wrong place to ask this question, most of the demographic here is under 25, but I thought I would try, it is a literature forum! :rolleyes:

Thanks for the input so far folks.

[mona amon]

There aren't all that many, are there? :) How about Love in the Time of Cholera? That fiesty novel about love at all ages.

I think there are a couple of plays by George Bernard Shaw. I'll post about them after I recall the titles.

[amarna]

Not easy to find novels on mature women. I thought of Disgrace by Coetzee and The dying animal and The human stain by Roth, but these are all on males.

[breeze]

Theatre by William Maugham
Mrs Warren’s Profession by Bernard Shaw
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

[amarna]

Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg. Gorgeous novel, and Smilla is about 40.

Edit: And Muriel Barbery's Elegance of the Hedgehog, the story of a Parisian concierge who leads a double life as highly gifted and is in her fifties.

[Buh4Bee]

Snowflower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

Not high literature but a good well written story about the connection of two Chinese women in historic China.

[My name is red]

Definitely:
GOOD MORNİNG,MİDNİGHT by jean rhys

[mollie]

Grotto, has your friend ever read anything by Elizabeth Taylor? Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont is a good read, though not precisely what you have said your friend is looking for. It is published by Virago.

[grotto]

Thank you all for the suggestions, I have written them all down and will be handing her the list later this evening.

Thanks again to all.