‘Heartburn’

Comparing the Characters in “Heartburn” and ”Super Sad True Love Tale”

This essay contrasts the characters in Nora Ephron’s novel ”Heartburn” and Gary Shteyngart’s novel ”Super Sad True Love Tale.” Characterization is the literary feature chosen for this comparative essay. In the story of ’heartburn,’ Rachel Samsat is a food blogger. She is the preferred character to explore, explain, and equate to Lenny Abramov, a Russian-American in ’Super Sad True Love Story.’

Rachel Samsat: Heartburn

Rachel Samsat is the main character in the Heartburn story. She is a well-known TV personality and food blogger. She has a two-year-old son and is seven months pregnant with her second child. The starting of this book narrates Rachel as a kind-hearted and blessed individual. She has a career, is happily married and belongs to an upper-middle-class where finances are not an issue for her family. She has been described as an easy-going person where her life is going smooth and there are no troubles. She absolutely loves her work and her family and is frequently thankful for all the blessing in her life. It has been narrated that she moved from New York to Washington for her husband’s career and to marry him. Mark is her husband, and he has been foretold as a troublesome character in the whole story.

Rachel’s Journey and Dependence

Rachel worked in New York and fell in love with Mark when she met him at a party. Mark was from Washington. She eventually moved to Washington and married him. She was married for eight years when she came to know that Mark had an affair with someone she knew in her social circle.

Since Rachel was a cookbook writer, she relayed her experiences in the form of a recipe. Rachel narrated her life as a recipe that needs constant change so that there is development in her relationship with Mark.

Rachel’s discussion of her life’s troubles with her therapist and her friends shows her constant fear of failed marriage. She had fears because this was her second marriage, and she did not desire this one to fail as well.

Rachel’s character is of a dependent personality. Her narration is all about her constant discussion of her situations with her friends and therapist. Moreover, even though she is the main character of the story, Rachel was just following the advice that her associates told her. One instance is when she also made a hurried decision to leave for New York. Another point from the character’s dependence for love is relayed from the hurtful words that she frequently endured from Mark.

Her character had been subject to dynamism as well. Even though she was happy with her present life, Rachel had to change due to her husband’s affair with another woman. Rachel discussed her situation with other women. Some women were her very close acquaintances, and some were happily married to their spouses. She had to realize that her case was different from the women she sought help from, and for that matter, she has to decide for herself. She eventually makes a decision at the end of the book when she realized that her husband has not given up adultery. The situations that she came across in her life were new to her, and in the whole story, she did as she was told to do by others. Some of the women gave an opinion that her husband will grow tired of his new love with Thelma Rice, while some said that she needs to give some space to her husband. In the last part of the book, she becomes a mature and practical person and accepts her reality. She makes a final decision without anyone’s input and goes back to New York from where she came eight years ago.

Leonard ”Lenny” Abramov: Super Sad True Love Story

Leonard ”Lenny” Abramov is the 39-year-old boyfriend of Eunice and the Life Lovers Outreach Coordinator of the Post-Human Services division of Staatling-Wapachung Corporation, dealing with Indefinite Life Extension. Lenny Abramov has been described as Russian-American and a protagonist. He is middle-aged, middle class, and an unremarkable man who is still living in the past century.

Lenny’s Struggles and Change

Even in this century, the book has shown immense dependence on new technologies and scientific advancements. Lenny used his old diary to narrate his forbidden love story that he got from his girlfriend, Eunice. Eunice Park is a young Korean-American struggling with materialism and the pressures of her traditional Korean family.

Lenny Abramov was an individual who wanted to live long in this world. According to him, life was not a journey, as a journey meant that it was to end sometime. He worked in a company that was working on increasing the life years of humans. So he wanted to pursue the same for his life as well.

Lenny recounted his feelings in his old diary, stating mostly how he can be ambitious and strong with love on his side and discussed the life of immortality. But he was also in decline, though graying hair, balding and failing, Lenny believes his fortunes are reversible if he can just persuade Eunice Park, a 24-year-old Korean-American, to fall in love with him.

Lenny is the first one who meets Eunice at a party in Rome. Lenny is instantly head over heels in love with her and romantically pursues her until she agrees to come and stay with him. Lenny gains greater confidence in himself and his abilities as he falls in love with Eunice. Later he was devastated by Eunice’s affair with Joshie and breaks up with her as a result.

In the case of Lenny Abramov, he too was subject to cheating from his girlfriend. Initially, Lenny had a fixated mindset to live longer in his life. His confidence in himself grew stronger when Eunice moved into his apartment, and they started their relationship. When his girlfriend met his boss, she was even more overwhelmed by him, as Lenny lacked looks and wealth compared to his boss, who was older than Lenny. Eunice Park had been described as materialistic, where under the pressure from her Korean family, she hops on the second opportunity she gets to satisfy her materialistic desires. Here, compared to Rachel, Lenny had to change as he was subjected to forces that were not under his control. He was distressed to know that his girlfriend was meeting his boss behind his back. Eventually, he gives up his goal to live a life of mortality and wait for death to take him over. As for the company he worked for, it also diminished because their experiment to extend human life failed.

So the character in Super Sad True Love story became worse off. Whereas, in Heartburn, Rachel is worse off emotionally, but she has her kids, career, and whole life in front of her in New York. Thereby, her situation is better off as she doesn’t have to listen to the hurting words and witness the actions of her husband. She is free from cheating and moves on as a result.

Conclusion

Rachel’s character can be seen from the perspective of a static character that did not want to change as he thought her life was just perfect. But as she came closer to reality, her fears grew as sought to hold on to her beautiful feelings she had for her husband. She seldom realized that her husband had changed too and because of that, she had to amend as well. But not everyone accepts change. She had her myths and decided to counsel herself with her friends so that her marriage could be saved. She wanted an answer, but there were no reconciliations or guilt from her husband for his adultery. Therefore, it was known that only she was working on her relationship with Mark, while Mark pursued to give a gift to Thelma even when Rachel was recovering from her delivery. Since the two parties had different ambitions, they had to part ways. The author of Heartburn has written this book as this has been her life-story as well. In one of her articles, Nora admitted that Heartburn was an autobiographical recount of her life.

Lenny Abramov’s character can be seen in the similar light. He, too, was holding on to his older way of life. For instance, he used a diary to write his experiences while his girlfriend used e-mails to narrate her story to her friends and family. Lenny’s personal background has been told as Russian, which was similar to the author’s background. In this story, Lenny too had been emotionally devastated when his relationship ended with his girlfriend. His narrations from the books tell that he strongly supported the idea of immortality. But as his love story came to an end, he gave up on his goal for life. His character had to go through the same lifecycle as Rachel. He was satisfied with his goals, career, and lifestyle, and when the external force hit him hard, he had to accept the reality and change himself.

Works Cited

”Heartburn Review”. Redonline.Co.Uk, 2017, http://www.redonline.co.uk/reviews/book-reviews/heartburn-review.

”’Super Sad’ And Satiric, Two Stories Of Doomed Love”. NPR.Org, 2017, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128797767.