Breathing Lessons
Anne Tyler
Folks, this is the first novel I’ve read since leaving for Madison.
It’s kind of a sad thought.
My life in Madison is constricted in many ways.
For some reason, once I started the program, I stopped doing all the things that I enjoyed, whether that be reading fiction, writing, watching movies, or practicing the bass.
I don’t know why this was the case.
I’m hoping to enjoy myself more during the upcoming semester.
Anne Tyler’s Breathing Lessons follows middle-aged couple Maggie and Ira Moran as they drive from Baltimore to a small town in Pennsylvania to attend a wedding. On their way back, Maggie attempts to reconcile their son and daughter-and-law. The entire novel takes place over the course of a day.
Breathing Lessons is about many things, but most of all it is about the ordinary satisfactions and frustrations of married life. Maggie is expansive, spontaneous, talkative, and meddling. Ira is aloof, judgmental, uncommunicative, and logical. Maggie is the kind of person to divulge her entire life story to a stranger while Ira paces impatiently at the door.
On paper, it would be difficult to find a more incompatible couple.
And indeed, the two are, in a sense, deeply incompatible. They constantly squabble and can’t seem to agree on anything. Their attitudes toward people and life are almost diametrically opposed. After one argument on the way to the funeral, Maggie insists that Ira stop the car and hops out of the passenger seat as Ira drives off.
They were not a match made in Heaven. They are barely a match made on Earth.
Yet Tyler masterfully writes the Morans in such a way that captures the bond that exists between them, a bond that was formed over countless differences, disagreements, and the simple passage of time. Maggie and Ira are incompatible, yes, but they are also strangely complementary. If Maggie is fire, Ira is ice, and they come together to produce a marital dynamic that is at once engrossing and deeply recognizable.
You quickly get the feeling that the Morans are nothing special. They have their fair share of regrets, disappointments, and annoyances, but they are partners above all else. They are nothing more, nothing less than a typical middle-aged couple.
The novel is very dialogue-heavy, and almost all of it is written well. Maggie’s and Ira’s interchanges give you an embodied sense of who they are as people, and although the Morans have some arguably exaggerated characteristics, they are also unmistakably human. It’s excellent character writing.
All in all, although Breathing Lessons is far from my favorite novel, it definitely left an impression on me. I have the feeling I will remember the character of Maggie for a long time. I can recommend it without reservation.