Overview

“Tender, unsparing, poignant. . . . [A] love story that braids together intimate self-revelation with a rich meditation on the literature of aging.”¯ Stephen Greenblatt On Susan Gubar’s seventieth birthday, she receives a beautiful ring from her husband, a gift that startles her into an appreciation of their luck. As she contemplates their sustaining relationship, Susan considers how older lovers differ from their youthful counterparts¯and from ageist stereotypes. When her husband encounters age-related disabilities, Susan procrastinates over moving from their burdensome house in the country to a more manageable town apartment by searching out literature on the longevity of desire by authors from Ovid and Shakespeare to Toni Morrison and Marilynne Robinson. During subsequent months of care-giving, her own ongoing cancer treatments, and apartment-hunting, Susan studies the obstacles many older couples overcome and marvels at the passion that buoys her own relationship. A memoir proving that love and desire have no expiration date, Late-Life Love is a resounding retort to negative valuations of old age and a celebration of second chances.

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9780393357639

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[A] winning, intelligent mix of candid personal history and reflections on relevant fiction, poetry and movies... [An] impressive, often heartening addition to the literature of aging. -- The Wall Street Journal Age in love loves not to have years told,' Shakespeare wrote, explaining the elaborate game of lies that enabled him to pretend that he was still young. But what if one loves and stops pretending? Susan Gubar's Late-Life Love is a tender, unsparing, poignant answer to this question, a love story that braids together intimate self-revelation with a rich meditation on the literature of aging. -- Stephen Greenblatt Gubar turns her fertile, critical mind and vast bibliographic knowledge to 'the physical and psychological, the sexual and familial challenges of later-life love. -- The Boston Globe Late-Life Love is a realistic but tender-hearted account of the ways in which an amorous relationship can thrive even after the bloom is off the rose. -- Times Literary Supplement

Gubar turns her fertile, critical mind and vast bibliographic knowledge to 'the physical and psychological, the sexual and familial challenges of later-life love. -- The Boston Globe Age in love loves not to have years told,' Shakespeare wrote, explaining the elaborate game of lies that enabled him to pretend that he was still young. But what if one loves and stops pretending? Susan Gubar's Late-Life Love is a tender, unsparing, poignant answer to this question, a love story that braids together intimate self-revelation with a rich meditation on the literature of aging. -- Stephen Greenblatt [A] winning, intelligent mix of candid personal history and reflections on relevant fiction, poetry and movies... [An] impressive, often heartening addition to the literature of aging. -- The Wall Street Journal

Author Information

Susan Gubar is an acclaimed memoirist and literary critic. Together with Sandra M. Gilbert, she was awarded the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award from the NBCC. She lives in Bloomington, Indiana.

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