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mamalemma 's review for:
The Aviator's Wife
by Melanie Benjamin
I don’t know what I expected from this book, but I wasn’t expecting this! The Aviator’s Wife is only tangentially about the historical figures of Charles and Anne Lindbergh; rather, it is about a marriage of a complicated and difficult man and the subjugation of and subsequent freedom of his beleaguered wife. The fact that it is based in historical truth about a couple with a uniquely challenging life provides even more drama.
The Lindberghs were a young power couple of the 1920s; their celebrity reminded me of Princess Diana. Reporters camped out at their doors, followed them too closely in cars, shoved cameras into closed spaces for a photo of their children — even after that type of behavior led to the subsequent kidnapping and death of their oldest child. Being that harassed and famous certainly put a strain on their marriage.
And yet, as controlling as Charles became, it was a trait he already had — in fact, was what made him successful in his attempt to be the first solo transAtlantic flight. But to have had to live under that thumb would have been excruciating. It was for Anne, and it was for their children. And Anne had to do that in a world where women were expected to fall in line and do what they were told — and she had to continue to be compliant with everything Charles asked, whether it was traditional household duties, or writing a book he demanded (or worse yet, a defense of his Nazi support) — while suffering the greatest loss of all, a child. I don’t know how she did it. She had family money and could have left. I hope I would have. Her story is one of perseverance.
The book is a terrific one. As it is said, no one really knows what goes on in a marriage but the two people in it, but this comes pretty darn close. Excellent read.
The Lindberghs were a young power couple of the 1920s; their celebrity reminded me of Princess Diana. Reporters camped out at their doors, followed them too closely in cars, shoved cameras into closed spaces for a photo of their children — even after that type of behavior led to the subsequent kidnapping and death of their oldest child. Being that harassed and famous certainly put a strain on their marriage.
And yet, as controlling as Charles became, it was a trait he already had — in fact, was what made him successful in his attempt to be the first solo transAtlantic flight. But to have had to live under that thumb would have been excruciating. It was for Anne, and it was for their children. And Anne had to do that in a world where women were expected to fall in line and do what they were told — and she had to continue to be compliant with everything Charles asked, whether it was traditional household duties, or writing a book he demanded (or worse yet, a defense of his Nazi support) — while suffering the greatest loss of all, a child. I don’t know how she did it. She had family money and could have left. I hope I would have. Her story is one of perseverance.
The book is a terrific one. As it is said, no one really knows what goes on in a marriage but the two people in it, but this comes pretty darn close. Excellent read.