Judith Viorst Books and Media
-
Suddenly Sixty And Other Shocks Of Later Life
Among the poems in this charmingly illustrated collection are those exploring the joys -- and strains -- of children and grandchildren, and the intimacy of old friends who've "known each other so long/We knew each other back when we were virgins." There are poems that tip their hat to mortality, wrestle with a husband's retirement -- "He's coming with me when I shop at the supermarket/So I won't have to shop alone. I like alone." -- and acknowledge the fact that at this stage of life we'd "give up a night of wild rapture with Denzel Washington for a nice report on my next bone density test." Offering plenty of laughs, a few tears, and cover-to-cover truths, these are poems for everyone who would "rather say never say die than enough is enough." Every woman who has reached this decade will -- rueful and smiling -- find herself in the pages of this book.
-
Imperfect Control: Our Lifelong Struggles with Power and Surrender
Judith Viorst shows us how our sense of self and all our important relationships are colored by our struggles over control: over wanting it and taking it, loving it and fearing it, and figuring out when the time has come to surrender it. Drawing on the work of biological and social scientists, psychoanalysis, and philosophers, and interweaving fiction and poetry and personal stories, including some of her own, Viorst compellingly argues that we are constantly dealing with issues of control: As children and parents. As lovers and workers. As victims and survivors. As moral - and mortal - human beings. Viorst again provides a fresh way of thinking about a familiar concept, showing how issues of control explain why we remain in hopeless relationships, how an offer of help can be a power play, when compliance is a virtue and when it's an evil, how easily we will quit and how hard we will try. Writing with compassion, acute psychological insight, and a touch of her trademark humor, Viorst invites us to contemplate the limits and possibilities of our control. She shows us how our lives can be shaped by our actions and our choices. She reminds us, too, that we sometimes should choose to let go. And she encourages us to find our own best balance between power and surrender.
-
Necessary Losses: The Loves, Illusions, Dependencies, and Impossible Expectations That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Grow
In Necessary Losses, Judith Viorst turns her considerable talents to a serious and far-reaching subject: how we grow and change through the losses that are an inevitable and necessary part of life. She argues persuasively that through the loss of our mothers' protection, the loss of the impossible expectations we bring to relationships, the loss of our younger selves, and the loss of our loved ones through separation and death, we gain deeper perspective, true maturity, and fuller wisdom about life. She has written a book that is both life affirming and life changing.
