Culture
Book Review: ‘The Family Dynamic,’ by Susan Dominus
Take the Murguia family: Amalia and Alfredo immigrated from a small region in central Mexico to Kansas City, and had seven children, five of whom shared three beds in one of the house’s two bedrooms. Alfred, one of the older children, excelled academically and was the first in his family to enroll in college — and, at every stage, helped guide his siblings into a variety of educational and social opportunities. As Dominus writes, “What the siblings had going for them above all else was one another.” They “pushed one another but also provided logistical support, connections and counsel,” along with “unquestionable loyalty.”
Similarly, the Chens, who immigrated from China after having violated that country’s one-child policy, settled in Virginia, where they opened a restaurant. While the parents had high standards, they had little time to guide their children. Instead, their cousin tells Dominus that “when he pictures one Chen child playing piano, a sibling is on the bench as well, refining the younger sibling’s technique; they leaned over homework together, the older teaching the younger.”
In large measure, the families Dominus portrays are not particularly well off. But what she calls “enterprising parents” go to great lengths to expose their children to music, theater, museums, libraries and, most important, mentors. One of the customers at the Chens’ restaurant was the head of a high school marching band; he volunteered to give their child lessons — and that child became a drum major.
Laurence Paulus, a producer of arts television programming and of modest means, took his children to openings at the Metropolitan Opera. Unable to afford tickets, they sat outside the theater to absorb the charged atmosphere, a transistor radio broadcasting the music. They waited in line for free performances of Shakespeare in the Park; they played music at home. One daughter became a world-famous theater director; another, the principal harpist in one of Mexico’s premier orchestras; their brother would co-found NY1, one of the nation’s first 24-hour community TV stations.
Welcome to Lit Trivia, the Book Review’s regular quiz about books, authors and literary culture. This week’s challenge tests your memory of books that made huge impacts on society after they were published — some of them even spurring changes to American laws. In the five multiple-choice questions below, tap or click on the answer you think is correct. After the last question, you’ll find links to the books if you’d like to do further reading.
Where do you turn when you need advice? A chatbot? A life coach? A wise and trusted friend?
How about a poet? Poets may not be famous for making the best life choices, but because they subject the mess of human existence to the discipline of language, they can be as helpful as any therapist or mentor.
Good poets know the rules and when to break them, which is something they can teach the rest of us.
To wit:
Giving advice is a peculiar literary undertaking. It flourishes in certain popular genres — graduation speeches, newspaper columns, country and western songs and poems like this one — but what, in these contexts, is it really for?
I’m thinking of situations when you don’t urgently need help but nonetheless enjoy reading answers to questions you may not have thought to ask. What interests you isn’t the content of the advice — you could get all the life hacks you want from A.I. — so much as the voice of the person dispensing it.
Wendy Cope is an English poet, born in 1945, who has been a fixture of her country’s literary scene since the 1980s. More recently, her short, buoyant poem “The Orange” has been widely memed online, bringing her to the attention of new readers beyond Britain.
Cope favors rhyme, meter, brisk jokes and tart aperçus. She addresses romance, friendship and the petty absurdities of modern life with disarming good humor. The last line of “The Orange” is “I love you. I’m glad I exist.” Somehow she makes it the opposite of cringe.
This isn’t the kind of poetry you would describe as “confessional.” And yet …
Question 1/7
Stop, if the car is going “clunk”
Or if the sun has made you blind.
Don’t answer e–mails when you’re drunk.
Tap a word above to fill in the highlighted blank.Want to learn this poem by heart? We’ll help.
Fill in the missing words below. You can always refer to the reading by A.O. Scott and full
text above.Let’s start with the first stanza.
A strong sense of place can deeply influence a story, and in some cases, the setting can even feel like a character itself. This week’s literary geography quiz highlights places where authors were born (or lived) that later became locations in their books. To play, just make your selection in the multiple-choice list and the correct answer will be revealed. At the end of the quiz, you’ll find links to the works if you’d like to do further reading.
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Nebraska1 minute agoFree summer meals available for Nebraska children
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Nevada6 minutes agoPrimary election June 2026 – Nevada County results
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New Hampshire13 minutes agoThe Dip | River House Restaurant Concert Series
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New Jersey16 minutes agoJustin Murphy wins New Jersey’s Republican Senate primary
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New Mexico21 minutes agoDeb Haaland Wins New Mexico Democratic Primary For Governor
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North Carolina28 minutes agoGreenville Police Department Join Effort Promoting Safe Firearm Storage
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North Dakota31 minutes agoToday in History, 1971: Rugby repeats as North Dakota sand greens golf champion
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Ohio36 minutes agoU20 World Team decided at U20 World Team Trials in Geneva, Ohio – WIN Magazine
