Married or... merry? The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - edition by Kate Papas. Humor & Entertainment eBooks @ .
Download As PDF : Married or... merry? The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - edition by Kate Papas. Humor & Entertainment eBooks @ .
What are the ingredients of a marriage? Pure love? Free sex? Nice home cooked food? Children playing around? Then, what about mother- in- laws, divorce, hatred and alimony? In my opinion, in Greece and all over the world, marriage is a mystery and -even worse- “the secret to a happy marriage remains a secret…”
THE NEW YORK TIES
This open-minded little book will leave you open-mouthed!
HERBAL TRIBUTE
The best –Greek- remedy for an international, diachronic problem. (Tax free!)
WASHING THE POST
Marriage comes out in the wash!
Married or... merry? The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - edition by Kate Papas. Humor & Entertainment eBooks @ .
Product details
|
Tags : Married or... merry?: The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - Kindle edition by Kate Papas. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Married or... merry?: The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married!.,ebook,Kate Papas,Married or... merry?: The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married!,GHE,HUMOR Topic Marriage & Family,HUMOR Topic Relationships
Married or... merry? The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - edition by Kate Papas. Humor & Entertainment eBooks @ . Reviews
This was just a fun and funny read. It was short, sweet and helped along in tone by quotes from well know American (and international) satirists. Each point is backed up with it's own series of facts. Oddly, even with the title, tone and purpose of the book, the author doesn't come off as much anti-marriage as anti-immature douchebags getting married.
Kate Papa's first language is not English which makes it a pleasant surprise that she manages a Dave Barry-like tone in her style of humor. The tone of the work is knowledgeable of world-wide generalizations and uses them to advantage. Papa's clearly did a great deal of cultural research in preparation for writing this book.
In some senses, Papa's principles are outdated. In the forward the author acknowledges growing up in a much more traditional society than the US. Women do certain things and men do certain things. That the principles are outdated does not make them any less funny.
Kate Pappas virtually opens Married or...merry The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40 + 1 Reasons Not to Get Marrried with the following rather unhappy declaration "Ιt is legal and acceptable for everyone to have his own personal preferences--his own tastes, beliefs and personal needs. Agreed? Sure. Only consider this from the moment you get married, the whole idea becomes an impossible dream--an illusion."
Had enough already? Hell, we're just getting started!
There's fear, adultery, children, divorce (not to mention all of its lovely tendrils) and general suffering to contend with in her treatise, and Ms. Pappas introduces us to each of these considerations while performing a verbal pirouette. Moreover--and to enliven her dance (as if that dance needed any more vim, vigor and vitality!--she spices it all up with any number of scintillating quotes from other authorities on the matter(s) at hand. Among my personal favorites are these two "Alimony is like buying oats for a dead horse" (Arthur Baer, American humorist, 1886-1969); and then, this anonymously-penned kicker "Marriage changes passion--suddenly you're in bed with a relative."
These two quotes of more contemporary vintage notwithstanding, Ms. Pappas recognizes--and freely admits--that a lot of the world's wisdom about marriage comes from her fellow Greeks, albeit from Hellenic antiquity. In case you thought--or at least wanted to believe--that our current take on marriage is somehow a product of our more cynical modern times, rest assured that such philosophical luminaries as Socrates (through Plato) reached many of the same conclusions over 2,000 years ago.
(I do have to take issue, however, with the source of one proverb--namely, "Beat your wife at least once a day. You may not know the reason, but she does"--which she quotes as a Chinese proverb. I, on the other hand, once saw it written on the wall of a restaurant in the heart (sic!) of Madrid, Spain--and saw it attributed to the Arabs. It could well be a universal sentiment. However, if a given Western people know Arabic wisdom, Spaniards do. They've lived just across a rather narrow channel from Araby for centuries--and are anything but ignorant where Arabic proverbs are concerned.)
I'll close with one last quote (that Ms. Pappas shares with her readers) from the venerable François de La Rochefoucauld, who--if not exactly the Father of the Maxim, was certainly one of its most gifted purveyors "Marriage is the only war in which you sleep with the enemy."
What can I say about this nifty little tome other than caveat lector!--in other words, read it at your own risk. If you've never had a single doubt about the sanctity and sanity of marriage, the worst Married or...merry can do is amuse you. If you've been nagged by some of the same doubts it raises and explains, however, this little tome will at least give you the comfort of knowing you're not alone.
Greek wisdom has extended to contemporary times and, revenging the poor Xantipa and honoring Diotima, Kate Papas reviews marriages and all the good reasons one has to not get married. With more attention on what women go through than on what men have to cope with in the same legal prison of love, Ms. Papas explains in detail, quotes included, why singles would better stay that way and divorcees should refrain to persist. As someone living in a Mediterranean society beyond the ocean--Argentina, a mixed crowd of Spaniards and Italians--I recognize the cultural roots of such a philosophical position. Macho societies have never been good to women and, in the end, haven't benefit men either. Besides the serious point of departure, all is laughter, from beginning to end, gently coaxing women into the right way to deal with a well-deserved freedom and providing men with a faithful mirror of what they can look like, if very traditional and conservative in what refers to marriage. A short, extremely amusing and funny book which will please audiences well beyond Greece and the Mediterranean countries Latin America has also a lot to ponder---and laugh--on the subject of marriage.
Seeing that this book is built around sayings, mottos and proverbs, I thought I'd start my review the same way.
In the introduction, the author states "The outcome of these pages may seem funny, but it's never absurd. On the contrary, it's very serious ..." She has certainly achieved that.
I smiled throughout the book, but deep inside of me, there was a dull ache at times, realizing the bitter truths that were being expounded. The book is certainly an eye opener describing how and why certain situations in marriage develop, end exposing the different agendas of the partners.
While reading, I wondered who the target audience for this book would be. (As an author, my head works that way -) )
I was divorced after 20 years of marriage, and am happily re-married. I could certainly apply situations to my own life in both situations. So, in short, everyone will find value in this book - whether you are not yet married (but hoping to do so one day, married or divorced.
Why only 4 instead of 5 stars? I don't rightly know, and suspect it has more to do with the inner turmoil generated by the book, rather than any deficiencies in the writing or content.
I'll end off this review with another saying
(Wo)men - you can't live with them, and you can't live without them.
0 Response to "[BUE]≫ [PDF] Free Married or... merry? The International(?) Greek Book of Marriage, or 40+1 Reasons Not to Get Married! - edition by Kate Papas. Humor & Entertainment eBooks @ ."
Post a Comment