ct on the writing industries. Her ability to portray family situations, and interactions between people accurately as well,as naturally, makes her books profound and appealing to readers. Criticisms of her workring out revolutionary, true to life, and excellent.
I thought that Ordinary People bookwas one of the more thought provoking books that I have read. Judith Guest is just a run of the mill average, everyday person. Guest was bornon March 29, 1936, in Detriot, Michigan. She married Larry Guest on August 22, 1958. She also has three children: Larry, John, and Richard.
A quick glance at Judith GuestsBiography will show her as an astute teacher and moreover, a dynamic person. She taughtin public school from 1964 to 1975. Her first book was published in 1976. OrdinaryPeople was Guests first novel, as well as her first published novel.
While liveing inIllionous Guest wrote for two newspapers: Palatine Press and Arlington Heights Herald. Guest states that: I learned a lot doing that; I learned about the disipline of writing -having to meet a deadline and haveing to conform to the limits of a certain space. () Guest also expressed sentiments that many people share with her: I also learned that idont like to do either one of those things! ()Guest spent a great deal of time on her first novel. Unlike many other writersGuest did not start her novel until she was in her thirties. Most writers begin their firsteffort in their twenties.
If anyone were to consider that an advantage or disadvantage; shestates plainly in an interview that she felt that she encountered all of the same problemsthat any aspiring writer or noble prize winner faces. Guests qutoe:No, I dont think so. Theres a certain process that has to be gonethrough, it doesnt matter when you start it. I know that there are peoplelike John Updike, who published his first novel at age twenty-eight. Butits hard for me to belive that most people have lived long enough andgarnered enough experence and have known what to do with thatexperence.
You have a lot more to write about when you get to ageforty. ()Judith Guests work for the most part has been well received. First by readers, hernovel was widely accepted and hailed as true to form. The Washington Post Book Worldsaid: Rejoice! A novel for all ages and all seasons.
The New York Times stated: Admirable. . . touching. .
. full of anxiety, despair, and joy that is common to every humanexperience of suffering and growth. Though some criticisms were less positive the novelwas widely hailed as truly unique and a good work. Another review given by a nationallyrenowned publisher, the Detroit Free Press: A writers novel.
A readers novel. Acritics novel. A very important novel. The novel has appeal to a wide audience andwithout a doubt sets a certain precedent for Guest to follow up on. Critics found Guestreal and genuine.
This is shown by Brad Hoopers critque: Guest is perfectly realistic inher depictions of family situations; her chracters act and react and react with absoultecreditablilty. () Her appeal is parlty derived from this creditability. Her ablity to putevery day life ,that we all experence, on paper sets her above and beyond other authors. The satisfaction that readers experence with Guests work is well experssed again by BradHooper. Hooper writes: Expect not only readership demand and satisfaction.
() Guests other works Second Heaven, Killing Time in St. Cloud, and most recentlyErrands. When I read Guests work I found it very true to life. Her ability to make hernovel so true to life from cover to cover allowed me to read the novel more openly. Byreading the novel so openly I did not need to scrutinize her work at all.
Her work,Ordinary People, read more as short story, some how entertaining and inticiting at thesame time. Ordinary People also dealt with a subject, or rather subjects that hit close tohome: suicide and growing up and maturing in adolescence. Suicide is all too commonand as sad as the fact is, I doubt anyone below the age of twenty has been fortunateenough not to have been some how enveloped in an attempted Suicide. In my life I haveknown two people that killed themselves and three that have tried, and thankfully failed. Once a person has done such a horrible thing, just as in the novel, their act enters a roomwith them, and leaves a room only when the peoples concern for that person leaves theroom as well.
Con, the main character in Ordinary People has to deal with peoplesoverwhelming concern for him in every circumstance. I found Guests description ofCons family and friends surpassingly accurate. As a friend on the outside looking in on abad situation Con and his family interacted true to life. At the same time Con wasrecovering form the reproductions of his attempted suicide, he was also going though avery difficult time in his life. I found that Guest depicted Cons adolescence as well asanyone could.
Writing frustration down on paper in only the tip of the iceberg, maturingat that age encompasses so much more than getting older and finding new responsibilities. The novel Ordinary People is true to life and with out a doubt is truly unique. Guest has written four works to date. Her work is a very unique blend of true tolife drama and a look in to the lives of those effected by a tragedy.
Guest has set a newstandard for me and the literature that I read. Dean, Jessie. Ordinary People. Online. Boone Online.
World Wide Web-Internet. 12November 1998 Available:http://www. ced. appstate. edu/whs/ordinary.
htm#Review1McGuire, Megan. 5 Stars. Online. Boone Online. World Wide Web-Internet. 12November 1998 Available:http://www.
ced. appstate. edu/whs/ordinary. htm#Review2Kinsman, Clare D. ed.
Judith Guest Volume 15 (p 171) Contemporary Authors,Detroit, 1976Mooney, Martha T. Judith Guest, Ordinary People 1997 edition, Book Review Digest,New York 1997
