Remember Me

Rating:
Summary: A memorable book and love affair
Review: It's hard to imagine how people kept a long-distance relationship going before Internet telephony and other forms of instant communication. Liz Byrski wonders the same in her new book: "How did people manage before telephones, before email, before reasonably efficient postal services?" Somehow, they did - Liz certainly did. Remember Me is a memoir of her experience of first love. In 1962, aged seventeen and living in England, she met a thirty-one year old German. It was love at first sight, and the moment was to influence the rest of her life. "...there was the sound of footsteps on the stairs. I turned around and you were there. In that moment everything froze. I put my hand on the back of the couch to steady myself." Despite the instant and profound attraction between Liz and Karl - and, nearly forty years later, Liz recalls it with a powerful blend of clarity and emotion - it was doomed to fail. He was divorced, foreign, older; she was young, innocent and powerless. Few around them approved of the relationship and they all thought they knew what was best for the seventeen year-old. Her parents ("generous, warm-hearted conservative people, hanging grimly on to what they had created,") met Karl and liked him but forbade Liz from going to America with him. How could the relationship not end in disaster? Yet, in the first surprise of this book, it's ended by an unexpected twist, instead of the pressure of social convention - and Liz is heartbroken. Thirty-seven years later, Liz Byrski is a successful writer and broadcaster living in Australia. She has two sons and is a grandmother. She has worked hard and reaped the rewards - she knows and is known. But something isn't right: "Sadness is so exhausting and a lifetime of it seems suddenly to have crept up on me and taken me by surprise," she writes. Her family and friends think she needs an adventure - she'll settle for two weeks in England. She gets both. At her childhood home an envelope is waiting for her. "...I stare at the handwriting. Something strange happens to my heartbeat...everything is a blur, I can see nothing but the words on the card, hear nothing but the ringing in my head..." The envelope is from Karl - and Liz's life is turned on its head. Soon afterwards they speak on the phone: `Remember me?' he asks. They arrange to meet - and again, people close to Liz wonder if it's the right thing to do. The reunion is a success...but, nearly forty years on, can either of them adjust to life with their first love again? There are as many challenges and obstacles as there are attractions. Only the flintiest heart will be unmoved by this tale of love lost and then regained. It's an epic love story, and recalled - and told - with great skill and an almost unbearable honesty. But Remember Me also transcends the romance genre. Early on in her tale, Liz wonders what effect her first love has had on her life. She longed for a great romantic love, but never found it again - did her need for love become a need for work? If so, how does Liz Byrski, outspoken and prominent feminist, reconcile her awakened feelings and the uncertainties that accompany them with the received wisdom of ideology? There are other compelling contrasts. One is the gulf between the emotional and the intellectual. It's represented by Liz's father and Karl colluding on the boundaries of her sexual freedom in 1962 - when she learns of it nearly forty years on, she is angry. But could it have been any different? Can the past and present be separated? In this memorable book, which is so much more than a simple memoir, Liz Byrski has written an extraordinary narrative that is wrenching and profoundly affecting. Remember Me will find a place in Australian literature and in the hearts of thousands.

Rating:
Summary: A memorable book and love affair
Review: It's hard to imagine how people kept a long-distance relationship going before Internet telephony and other forms of instant communication. Liz Byrski wonders the same in her new book: "How did people manage before telephones, before email, before reasonably efficient postal services?" Somehow, they did - Liz certainly did. Remember Me is a memoir of her experience of first love. In 1962, aged seventeen and living in England, she met a thirty-one year old German. It was love at first sight, and the moment was to influence the rest of her life. "...there was the sound of footsteps on the stairs. I turned around and you were there. In that moment everything froze. I put my hand on the back of the couch to steady myself." Despite the instant and profound attraction between Liz and Karl - and, nearly forty years later, Liz recalls it with a powerful blend of clarity and emotion - it was doomed to fail. He was divorced, foreign, older; she was young, innocent and powerless. Few around them approved of the relationship and they all thought they knew what was best for the seventeen year-old. Her parents ("generous, warm-hearted conservative people, hanging grimly on to what they had created,") met Karl and liked him but forbade Liz from going to America with him. How could the relationship not end in disaster? Yet, in the first surprise of this book, it's ended by an unexpected twist, instead of the pressure of social convention - and Liz is heartbroken. Thirty-seven years later, Liz Byrski is a successful writer and broadcaster living in Australia. She has two sons and is a grandmother. She has worked hard and reaped the rewards - she knows and is known. But something isn't right: "Sadness is so exhausting and a lifetime of it seems suddenly to have crept up on me and taken me by surprise," she writes. Her family and friends think she needs an adventure - she'll settle for two weeks in England. She gets both. At her childhood home an envelope is waiting for her. "...I stare at the handwriting. Something strange happens to my heartbeat...everything is a blur, I can see nothing but the words on the card, hear nothing but the ringing in my head..." The envelope is from Karl - and Liz's life is turned on its head. Soon afterwards they speak on the phone: 'Remember me?' he asks. They arrange to meet - and again, people close to Liz wonder if it's the right thing to do. The reunion is a success...but, nearly forty years on, can either of them adjust to life with their first love again? There are as many challenges and obstacles as there are attractions. Only the flintiest heart will be unmoved by this tale of love lost and then regained. It's an epic love story, and recalled - and told - with great skill and an almost unbearable honesty. But Remember Me also transcends the romance genre. Early on in her tale, Liz wonders what effect her first love has had on her life. She longed for a great romantic love, but never found it again - did her need for love become a need for work? If so, how does Liz Byrski, outspoken and prominent feminist, reconcile her awakened feelings and the uncertainties that accompany them with the received wisdom of ideology? There are other compelling contrasts. One is the gulf between the emotional and the intellectual. It's represented by Liz's father and Karl colluding on the boundaries of her sexual freedom in 1962 - when she learns of it nearly forty years on, she is angry. But could it have been any different? Can the past and present be separated? In this memorable book, which is so much more than a simple memoir, Liz Byrski has written an extraordinary narrative that is wrenching and profoundly affecting. Remember Me will find a place in Australian literature and in the hearts of thousands.