Schine, Cathleen 1953-

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Schine, Cathleen 1953-

PERSONAL:

Born 1953, in Westport, CT; married David Denby (a film critic), 1981 (divorced, 2000); children: Max, Thomas. Education: Attended Sarah Lawrence College, Barnard University, and University of Chicago.

ADDRESSES:

Home—New York, NY. Agent—Molly Friedrich, The Friedrich Agency, 136 E. 57th St., 19th Fl., New York, NY 10022.

CAREER:

Writer.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Rameau's Niece was named one of the best books of 1993 by both the New York Times and the Voice Literary Supplement, and was a finalist for the 1992-93 Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Alice in Bed, Knopf/Random House (New York, NY), 1983.

To the Birdhouse, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1990.

Rameau's Niece, Ticknor & Fields (New York, NY), 1993.

The Love Letter, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1995.

The Evolution of Jane, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1998.

She Is Me, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 2003.

The New Yorkers, Farrar (New York, NY), 2007.

Contributor of articles, reviews, and columns to periodicals, including the New York Times Magazine, New York Times Book Review, Village Voice, and Vogue.

SIDELIGHTS:

The novels of Cathleen Schine are often cited for their combination of droll humor and sharp insight, a writing style that is apparent in her semi-regular columns for the New York Times Magazine. Schine's first book, Alice in Bed, appeared in 1983 to enthusiastic reviews. For the next seven years Schine devoted time to raising her children, then, beginning in 1990, she completed three more novels, To the Birdhouse, Rameau's Niece, and The Love Letter, all of which have demonstrated her talent for humor and pathos.

Alice in Bed chronicles the hospital stay of Alice Brody, a Jewish college student from Connecticut. Her uneventful middle-class life is interrupted when her legs suddenly cease to function, and she ends up in a Manhattan teaching hospital at the mercy of a battery of doctors, nurses, orderlies, and visitors. The medical professionals subject her to endless tests to no avail—no one seems to be able to explain just why her legs no longer work. Alice's paralysis is compounded by the dissolution of her family: her father has run off to Vancouver, and she believes her mother is having an affair with an Israeli hypnotist.

Despite the somber premise of the novel, Schine chronicles the bedridden days of Alice's world with dry humor. Alice relieves the boredom of her hospital stay through the small sexual liaisons she begins with two of her male visitors. One is the hypnotist, and the other a distinguished eye surgeon old enough to be her father. Eventually Alice undergoes an operation and moves on to a rehabilitation center, where she tries out her new able-bodiedness with two more men. In the New York Times Book Review, Caroline Seebohm observed that "the success of this novel depends entirely on the writing, in particular the quirky and often brilliant humor that runs through the book. Miss Schine's wit plays an essential counterpoint to the inevitable pain, confusion, incompetence, and hopelessness that Alice endures lying immobile in a bed that becomes her only landscape." A critic writing in the Antioch Review noted, on the basis of Alice in Bed, that Schine is "a formidably talented young writer."

Alice reappears in Schine's second novel, 1990's To the Birdhouse. The book opens seven years later at Alice's wedding to the amiable Peter Eiger, a freelance baseball statistician. Alice has found her niche as the art director and photographer for a bird-watchers' magazine; the extraordinarily solitary nature of her work is compounded by the size of the magazine's staff: there is only one other employee. Her new life takes second stage, however, to the drama of the rather dotty Brody clan: her father, after running off to Vancouver when she was in college, has begun a second family with another woman. Her brother Willie refuses to be swayed by Alice's zealous advocation of the bliss of marriage and commitment and instead dates an assortment of women from other countries. A grandmother harbors a pessimistic view of everything and eats nothing but cake and ice cream.

It is Alice's mother, however, who occupies the focal point of To the Birdhouse. Brenda Brody is a child psychologist without an office—she uses other people's homes to administer her self-devised tests that use words like "yik" and "vom." Hopelessly optimistic, her naivete has led her into the arms of Louie Scifo, an opportunistic and unbalanced building contractor and erstwhile art dealer. "To Alice, he seemed shifty and mean, a noisy, snarling cur," Schine writes. "To Alice's mother, he was man's best friend, abandoned and injured on the highway. Of course, she had to pull over." Louie's scams and obnoxious behavior continue until finally Brenda summons the courage to rid her life of him. Here the trouble commences for real: at first Louie refuses to leave Brenda's apartment. He then terrorizes her and the other Brodies using every known technique: calling their homes at all hours, vandalizing their cars, following Alice on her photography treks through Central Park, and finally taking a gardener's job at the estate next door to the Brody summer home in Connecticut. Alice, as the truly sane individual in the family, finally comes up with a solution that rids them of Louie.

Critics admired Schine's skill at humor and characterization in To the Birdhouse. In Tribune Books, Meg Wolitzer found the book to be "full of terrific moments and sly surprises. A novel that manages to be this funny is an achievement; one that also possesses grace and depth is a rare bird indeed." Lee Smith, writing in the New York Times, commented: "One of the primary joys in this funny, light, entertaining novel is Cathleen Schine's graceful prose style."

Schine branched out somewhat into eighteenth-century philosophy with her third novel, 1993's Rameau's Niece. The plot revolves around Margaret Nathan, twenty-eight and happily married to an erudite, handsome, and altogether wonderful English husband. He teaches at Columbia University, and she is a writer. Her dissertation, a biography of an obscure eighteenth-century French anatomist, Madame de Montigny, catapulted her into minor literary success when it became a best seller. Margaret and Edward appear blissfully happy, teaching, writing, reading, attending dinner parties and in general leading lives of modern-day intellectual New Yorkers. As the novel opens Margaret has begun work on a second book, a translation of a manuscript she discovered while researching the Madame de Montigny treatise.

This tract, also entitled "Rameau's Niece," appears to be a literary reply to an actual tome—entitled Rameau's Nephew—written by the French Enlightenment philosopher Denis Diderot around 1761 but not published until 1805. The sentences that she is translating are a salacious dialogue between a learned but lecherous older man and a sexually frank and keenly intelligent young woman. Schine fabricates this secondary text of "Rameau's Niece" and inserts parts of it into the actual novel Rameau's Niece. At the same time, Margaret also becomes involved in exploring an obscure literary movement she terms the Satin Underground. She theorizes that the great philosophers of the Enlightenment—Diderot, Voltaire, and Locke, for instance—often wrote near-pornographic underground titles cleverly disguised as learned philosophical discussions.

Margaret travels to Prague to deliver a paper on this subject and finds herself more and more entranced by the idea of lust and literary scholarship. She sees a strange relationship between the two—the desire to learn seems to manifest itself as basic fleshly desire, and vice-versa. Troubled by the nagging suspicion that her husband has cheated on her, she embarks on a series of real and imagined affairs. She leaves Edward and their home, camping out in her publisher's apartment, but eventually returns to him when she realizes that he has never been unfaithful but appears willing to forgive her transgression. At the close of Rameau's Niece, Margaret's own Rameau's Niece is published, but a small oversight on her part, pointed out by critics, effectively dismisses her entire thesis about Diderot, Rameau's Niece, and the Satin Underground.

New York Times Book Review contributor Angeline Goreau summed up Rameau's Niece as "a literary hybrid of a distinctly different stripe: it sets out to parody the post-modern form it imitates—with howlingly funny results—but at the same time offers up an essentially moral tale whose literary sympathies lie somewhere between Jane Austen's Emma and Fielding's Tom Jones." Washington Post Book World critic Carolyn See compared it to some other acclaimed novels of seduction among the intelligentsia, noting that "these are all novels of manners in which the characters are severely impinged upon, indeed, seduced by literature, learning, the life of the mind." Gabriele Annan, writing in the New York Review of Books praised Schine's creation of Margaret, asserting that "the novel rides on her charm, and her charm comes from her engaging turn of mind and phrase, whether she's speaking or just thinking." Annan also liked the conclusion of Rameau's Niece, calling it "a nice postmodern ending to a very amusing novel, which is demurely antimodern all the way through."

Schine's 1995 work, The Love Letter, concerns the romantic life of Helen, a controlling and manipulative bookshop owner. Helen discovers her well-ordered world coming apart after receiving an anonymous love letter. Coinciding with this mystery is Helen's developing relationship with Johnny, a twenty-year-old university student. "As Helen tries to cope with the ludicrous complications of this romance (like hiding from Johnny's parents …), her irritatingly cheerful and self-satisfied demeanor begins to crack, and we begin to see her as a sympathetic, even vulnerable human creature," observed Michiko Kakutani in the New York Times. Helen realizes that her tryst with Johnny is doomed to end, and by the novel's conclusion the two seem no wiser for their shared experience.

Kakutani assessed The Love Letter as "a delightful exercise in literary wit," noting that Schine writes "with such deftness and good-natured humor that the reader can't help but be enchanted." In the Los Angeles Times Book Review James Wilcox commented: "Throughout this elegant novel Schine's celebration of the vagaries and quiet pleasures of everyday life is an incomparable delight." New York Times Book Review contributor Carol Shields pointed out the pathos that colors much of The Love Letter: "Schine has written a comic novel, but it is one that leaves the reader saddened by love's desperation and by its failure—at least in Helen's case—to amaze and rescue."

In The Evolution of Jane, protagonist Jane Barlow goes on vacation to the Galapagos Islands to recover after her recent divorce. She is surprised to discover that her tour guide is none other than Martha Barlow, a distant cousin and her best friend from childhood, who had broken off their relationship years earlier without explaining why. Jane begins to ponder what she calls this "transmutation of friendship," using Darwinian thinking to structure her ideas about how human relationships evolve. She also discovers the truth about the Barlow family feud that provoked the cousins' estrangement. Critics found the novel intelligent and highly amusing. A Publishers Weekly contributor observed that Schine balances "the intellectual curiosity of a philosopher with a lively sense of the absurd," giving The Evolution of Jane sophistication, playfulness, and "poignant insights about the ways girls and women bond." Library Journal contributor Michele Leher expressed similar enthusiasm, deeming the book a "literary treat."

Schine looks to Flaubert's Madame Bovary in the well-received She Is Me, a novel in which love and passion arise unexpectedly amidst family tensions. Elizabeth, the protagonist, is an academic who has been lured to Hollywood to write a screen adaptation of Flaubert's novel. Things become complicated, however, when her grandmother Lotte's skin cancer grows more aggressive and Elizabeth's mother, Greta, finds herself unable to cope with Lotte's demanding care. It turns out that Greta, too, has cancer—a fact she wishes to keep from the ailing Lotte. Elizabeth finds herself burdened with the care of both women, while also navigating her changing feelings toward Brett, the father of her child. "Grim as this may sound," wrote Janet Maslin in a New York Times review, "Ms. Schine sees beyond the mortality and fear. She has written a sweetly disarming testament to the unpredictability of romantic impulse."

As Schine explained in an interview posted on her home page, She Is Me was an especially rewarding book to write. "I like to look at the ways in which people take the unforeseen and incorporate it into their daily lives," she stated. "To me, there is nothing more comic, more touching, more human.… She Is Me is about what happens when passion blooms not, say, in the secluded moment of a summer romance, but in the chaos and tension of a family crisis, like a flower pushing up through a crack in the pavement." While a writer for Kirkus Reviews felt that the novel lacked edge, many reviewers heaped praise on the book. In People Weekly, Melanie Danburg observed that the novel "shines with lyric sensuality and insight," while a contributor to Publishers Weekly described the book as a "refreshing and often very funny look at love, aging and loyalty."

The New Yorkers, described in a Publishers Weekly review as a "love letter to New Yorkers and the dogs who own them," follows the romantic entanglements that develop when various residents of Manhattan's Upper West Side encounter each other through their pets. The characters include Jody, a lonely music teacher who adopts a pit bull from the ASPCA; Everett, a 50-ish divorced chemist; Polly and George, siblings who inherit a dog left behind by the former tenant of their apartment; Simon, a shy social worker with a passion for foxhunting; and Doris, a cynical guidance counselor. New York Times Book Review contributor Liesl Schillinger commented that a passage describing Everett's affection for Polly's hound is "one of the tenderest, least self-interested love scenes to have graced a page in a decade or so." Praising the novel's insight and sensitivity, Schillinger called it "a redemptive fairy tale of urban loneliness."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Schine, Cathleen, Alice in Bed, Knopf/Random House (New York, NY), 1983.

Schine, Cathleen, To the Birdhouse, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1990.

PERIODICALS

Antioch Review, fall, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 509; spring, 1994, Suzanne Bick, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 366.

Belles Lettres, summer, 1993, Valerie Jablow, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 17.

Best Sellers, August 1, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 167.

Booklist, May 15, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 1189; May 1, 1993, Martha Schoolman, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 1572; May 1, 1995, Donna Seaman, review of The Love Letter, p. 1553; July 1, 1998, Grace Fill, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 1831; April 15, 1999, GraceAnne A. DeCandido, review of The Love Letter, p. 1461.

Books, June 2, 2007, Kristin Kloberdanz, review of The New Yorkers, p. 9.

Bookwatch, July 1, 1995, review of The Love Letter, p. 7.

Entertainment Weekly, May 26, 1995, Rebecca Ascher-Walsh, review of The Love Letter, p. 76; November 13, 1998, Daneet Steffens, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 70.

Hudson Review, autumn, 1993, John Van Kirk, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 603; winter, 1996, Gary Krist, review of The Love Letter, p. 679.

Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 335; March 1, 1990, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 303; February 1, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 92; February 1, 1995, review of The Love Letter, p. 99; August 1, 2003, review of She Is Me, p. 990; April 1, 2007, review of The New Yorkers.

Library Journal, May 1, 1983, Judith Sutton, review of Alice in Bed, p. 921; May 15, 1990, Elizabeth Guiney, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 96; March 15, 1993, Harriet Gottfried, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 108; April 1, 1995, Patricia C. Heaney, review of The Love Letter, p. 126; August 1, 1998, Michele Leher, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 134; February 15, 1999, Catherine Swenson, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 198; August 1, 2003, Jo Manning, review of She Is Me, p. 136; May 1, 2007, Joanna M. Burkhardt, review of The New Yorkers, p. 75.

Los Angeles Times, June 1, 1983, Art Siedenbaum, review of Alice in Bed, p. 8; September 5, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 6; September 21, 2003, review of She Is Me, p. 2.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, May 7, 1995, James Wilcox, review of The Love Letter, pp. 3, 16; October 4, 1998, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 2.

Mademoiselle, September 1, 1983, Jane Howard, review of Alice in Bed, p. 80.

Ms., July 1, 1983, Joan Philpott, review of Alice in Bed, p. 22.

New Statesman and Society, February 2, 1996, Victoria Radin, review of The Love Letter, p. 38.

Newsweek, June 13, 1983, Ray Anello, review of Alice in Bed, p. 74.

New Yorker, August 1, 1983, John Updike, review of Alice in Bed, p. 87; June 4, 1990, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 103; April 5, 1993, Verlyn Klinkenborg, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 108; November 9, 1998, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 103.

New York Review of Books, August 16, 1990, Patricia Storace, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 23; April 22, 1993, Gabriele Annan, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 29; October 19, 1995, Claire Messud, review of The Love Letter, p. 43; February 18, 1999, Michael Wood, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 7; May 31, 2007, "Doggy Affections," p. 29.

New York Times, July 4, 1983, Michiko Kakutani, review of Alice in Bed, p. 13; May 1, 1990, Michiko Kakutani, review of To the Birdhouse, p. C17; May 16, 1995, Michiko Kakutani, review of The Love Letter; October 12, 1998, Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. E7; September 18, 2003, Janet Maslin, "Awfully Serious Genre Gets a Little Playtime," p. 9.

New York Times Book Review, June 5, 1983, Caroline Seebohm, review of Alice in Bed, p. 14; May 20, 1990, Lee Smith, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 15; March 21, 1993, Angeline Gorea, review of Rameau's Niece, pp. 13-14; May 28, 1995, Carol Shields, review of The Love Letter, p. 6; October 11, 1998, Barbara Kingsolver, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 13; December 7, 2003, review of She Is Me, p. 70; May 13, 2007, Liesl Schillinger, "The Year of the Dog," p. 25.

People Weekly, June 11, 1990, Leah Rozen, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 33; April 5, 1993, Joseph Olshan, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 27; April 11, 1994, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 62; May 22, 1995, Sara Nelson, review of The Love Letter, p. 35; December 8, 2003, review of She Is Me, p. 56.

Publishers Weekly, March 18, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 53; August 17, 1984, review of Alice in Bed, p. 58; February 23, 1990, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 203; January 25, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 78; July 13, 1998, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 59; November 2, 1998, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 42; August 25, 2003, review of She Is Me, p. 40; February 26, 2007, review of The New Yorkers, p. 53.

Rolling Stone, July 21, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 118.

San Francisco Review of Books, November, 1, 1996, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 48.

Spectator, January 20, 1996, Paul Busman, review of The Love Letter, p. 35.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), April 22, 1990, Meg Wolitzer, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 6; June 2, 2007, Kristin Kloberdanz, review of The New Yorkers.

Vanity Fair, February, 2004, "An Expensive Divorce; in Early 2000, with His 18-year Marriage to Novelist Cathleen Schine Breaking up and the Internet Bubble Bursting, Critic David Denby Announced in the New Yorker That He Intended to Make a Million Dollars in the Stock Market," p. 76.

Village Voice Literary Supplement, June 1, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 14; December 1, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 16.

Virginia Quarterly Review, summer, 1993, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 95; winter, 1999, review of The Evolution of Jane.

Wall Street Journal Western Edition, October 2, 1998, Erica Schacter, review of The Evolution of Jane, p. 14.

Washington Post, July 16, 1983, Beverly Lawry, review of Alice in Bed, p. C3.

Washington Post Book World, September 30, 1984, review of Alice in Bed, p. 12; May 20, 1990, review of To the Birdhouse, p. 5; May 9, 1993, Carolyn See, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 5; May 15, 1994, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 12; February 7, 1999, review of The Love Letter, p. 5.

West Coast Review of Books, September 1, 1983, review of Alice in Bed, p. 42.

Women's Review of Books, July 1, 1993, Julie Phillips, review of Rameau's Niece, p. 21.