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The Joys of Love
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The Joys of Love
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The Joys of Love
Ebook249 pages3 hours

The Joys of Love

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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About this ebook

Moving and romantic, this coming-of-age story was written during the 1940s. As revealed in an introduction by the author's granddaughter Léna Roy, the protagonist Elizabeth is close to an autobiographical portrait of L'Engle herself as a young woman—"vibrant, vulnerable, and yearning for love and all that life has to offer."

During the summer of 1946, twenty-year-old Elizabeth is doing what she has dreamed of since she was a little girl: working in the theatre. Elizabeth is passionate about her work and determined to learn all she can at the summer theatre company on the sea where she is an apprentice actress. She's never felt so alive. And soon she finds another passion: Kurt Canitz, the dashing young director of the company, and the first man Elizabeth's ever kissed who has really meant something to her. Then Elizabeth's perfect summer is profoundly shaken when Kurt turns out not to be the kind of man she thought he was.

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The Joys of Love

LanguageEnglish
Release dateApr 29, 2008
ISBN9781429965125
Unavailable
The Joys of Love
Author

Madeleine L'Engle

Madeleine L’Engle (1918–2007) was an American author of more than sixty books, including novels for children and adults, poetry, and religious meditations. Her best-known work, A Wrinkle in Time, one of the most beloved young adult books of the twentieth century and a Newbery Medal winner, has sold more than fourteen million copies since its publication in 1962. Her other novels include A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, and A Ring of Endless Light. Born in New York City, L’Engle graduated from Smith College and worked in theater, where she met her husband, actor Hugh Franklin. L’Engle documented her marriage and family life in the four-book autobiographical series, the Crosswicks Journals. She also served as librarian and writer-in-residence at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in Manhattan for more than thirty years.

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Reviews for The Joys of Love

Rating: 3.3636363636363638 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I'll tell you right now, this one is no [book:Ring of Endless Light]. That said, it is really a four-and-a-half-star book - the extra half-star because it's Madeleine L'Engle, who herself holds a special place in my heart.

    Around the middle of the book, the main character, Elizabeth, reminds the reader about the actors' rule: Always leave the audience wanting more. L'Engle absolutely has done that with this book, & I did indeed want more. Then again, it was a lovely way to end the book, with the future beckoning from a distance. I can't tell if it is because she never had a chance to revise the book and finish it properly (unlikely, I think, given the granddaughter's introduction) or if it was just a happy accident.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Ms. L'Engle is one of my favorite authors because she seems to capture her characters in such realistic ways. Told over a period of four days, this novel explores both the loss of first love and the discovery of acting talent. Elizabeth is an appealing character, earnest in her pursuit of acting, cautious of her emotions, and struggling with being true to herself while living within the realities of being an orphan and subject to the whims of her aunt. A lovely book.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Soooooo boring, I can't even muster up the energy to berate it. Ugh.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The Joys of Love is a coming-of-age story set in the world of summer stock theatre just after the second World War.Elizabeth's Aunt Harriet does not approve of the theatre, but it's been Elizabeth's dream ever since she can remember. Elizabeth's parents are dead, and her strict aunt has seen to her upbringing, but Elizabeth made a deal with Aunt Harriet before going to college: if Elizabeth studied chemistry and graduated with honors, she would be allowed a summer working in the theatre. And, finally, that summer has arrived. Elizabeth managed to secure an unpaid apprenticeship, and Aunt Harriet begrudgingly sends a weekly check for room and board. Elizabeth is having the time of her life with her new friends... and Kurt. Kurt Canitz is the charismatic young director, and he finds Elizabeth's naivete refreshing. Elizabeth is a bit starstruck and madly in love. She knows he doesn't exactly love her, not the way that she loves him, but she turns a deaf ear to her friends' warnings about the danger Kurt poses to her heart. And of course there's plenty of other backstage drama as well. Just when it looks like both love and theatrical success are within Elizabeth's grasp, things fall apart. Will Elizabeth have to give up on her dreams?Published after L'Engle's death, this early novel of hers is a sweet and simple story drawing on her own experiences as a young woman in the theatrical world. The book's title is a reference to the song "Plaisir D'Amour" -- "The pleasure of love lasts only a moment / The grief of love lasts a lifetime." Elizabeth is full of love for both Kurt and the world of the theatre, but when Kurt disappoints her (as it's obvious he's going to do; that's hardly a spoiler, right?), she has to grow up a bit and take a look at the theatrical world that she's idealized, and decide whether it's still what she wants to do if it's not as gleaming and perfect as it seemed from Aunt Harriet's spare bedroom. I really enjoyed this book, though it's perhaps not as deep and complex as some of L'Engle's better-known books.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This was a sweet book but probably not for everyone especially in this day and age. 1940's, girl who wants to be in theatre so agrees to help out as an "apprentice" with a theatrical company which boils down to free labor for the owner and some experience for the apprentices. A chance reading of a part is seen by a famous actress and thus she may or may not be cast into the limelight. 2 boys in love with her--one who is deserving and one who is a jerk. A couple of interesting side lines but not great.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I gave this four stars for L'Engle fans. I was so happy to have something else of hers to read. It was kind of like reading her story - which she wrote when she was young and just starting out. so of course it isn't going to be polished and as well done as her later works. It was a book she wrote and never published but left it as a story for her granddaughters. I feel about this as I do when reading some of Tolkien's half-finished stories and notes that Chris Tolkien published. You can't review these like you would a regular book - you are just grateful that you are given a gift of more story from an author you love. So those who love L"Engle will probably be just happy to have a bit more from this wonderful author. Fortunately, I am young at heart enough to enjoy the simple story.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    We are fortunate that L'Engle's family gave permission for this early work to be published last year. Although L'Engle had not become a full-fledged writer at the time this was written, her prose does show much promise, even in the preachy dialogue and stilted conversations. Her descriptions of the beach, the boardwalk, the theater, and the dorm are quite on the mark, however, and are what make this book interesting. This story has both heart and genuine emotion. L'Engle was telling her own story--her passion for the theater, her early romance. The ending, which is not a neat, tidy ending by any means, is very much a true to life ending.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    What really struck me as I was reading this early L'Engle is how her recurring themes were fully formed already. Also, her love of the apt quote is very evident. The story is, in fact, a little clunky and moralistic- but it's also a L'Engle, so it transcends this slight clunkiness and pulls one into the characters. The story is nearly universal as a coming-of-age tale, and the moment when Elizabeth notices her life has begun made me well up. I marvel anew at L'Engle's skill, if this is an example of where she began- head and shoulders above so many seasoned writers. I also loved the forward from the granddaughter I remember from L'Engle's nonfiction. That said, I'll not read it again, I don't like the people well enough. The main character is a moralistic stick, the villain is a right bastard without a redeeming characteristic and the repetition of (admittedly period) gag-inducing "endearments" was nearly enough to make me long for something by Dworkin.

    Recommended for any L'Engle fan.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I thought I'd read just about everything that Madeleine L'Engle had published, so I was astonished to see this book turn up when I was searching for something else entirely (which is usually how things work for me).Madeleine L'Engle died nearly three years ago at the age of 88. The Joys of Love was published last year by her granddaughters. This is a very early novel, based on a short story she wrote in 1942 at about the age of 24. She reworked the story into a novel in the early fifties and re-set it in 1946, which was the year she met her husband the actor Hugh Franklin.As I'd read pretty nearly everything she wrote, including such early novels as The Small Rain and And Both Were Young, I was braced for a rather dated and slightly awkward book. L'Engle really hit her stride as an author in the early sixties, and The Joys of Love, being such an early novel, only gives a hint of the skilled story-teller that L'Engle later became. At this stage, she was a very good descriptive writer; her scene-setting is an effective time machine, taking us back to a New England summer sixty years gone. However, although her granddaughter Léna Roy tells us that L'Engle's dramatic training gave her "a keen knack for dialogue", this book is not a good example. Even as a lifetime fan, I found myself groaning inwardly (and sometimes out loud) at the painfully artificial conversations these characters have.If you're reading Madeleine L'Engle for the first time, please don't start with this book. Begin with her classic A Wrinkle in Time or A Ring of Endless Light, or even one of her autobiographical Crosswicks Journals. The Joys of Love is for established L'Engle aficionados only, interesting for the promise of great things to come.