Boekverslag : Erich Segal - Love Story
De taal ervan is Engels en het aantal woorden bedraagt 1340 woorden.

THE MOST IMPORTANT THINGS OF THE BOOK.

The title of the book is: Love Story

The author of the book is: Erich Segal

This book was first published in: 1970

This book is published by: Hudder and Stoughton Limited.

In Holland this book was published by: Walva-Boek, Apeldoorn, in 1986.



SORT OF BOOK

Love Story is a romance novel with a lot of drama's at the end.



THE THEME

The theme is: Terrible things can happen, when you least expect it.

Oliver and Jennifer were finally happy with each other, even though the circumstance weren't always god. And then suddenly she turns out to be sick.

I think the title is a good one, although the title looks like the book has a happy ending. So that was the surprise, when I read the book.



THE CHARACTERS

The main characters are: Oliver Barret the 4th and Jennifer Calvilleri.

Oliver (also called Ollie by his friends and Jennifer) is a lawstudent at Harvard. I don't know exactly how old he is, but I think, when the story begins, he's about twenty or twenty-one years old. Oliver has very rich parents, who have a lot of influence at Harvard and are very famous there.

Jennifer (also called Jenny by her friends, Oliver and her father) is a music student at Radcliffe University. She'll probably be around the same age as Oliver. She's half-Italian and she's always making sarcastic remarks, but she means it in a funny way. She doesn't have much money and status.

Oliver Barret the 3rd, Oliver's father. They also call him: Old Stoneyface, because he doesn't show any feelings in his face. He's a real businessman that hardly has time for his son and only asks how his grades are and how his sport is doing. I find him a man who's not been a real father to his son.

Phil Calvilleri, Jenny's father. He's Italian and catholic. That's why he finds it strange when Oliver and Jenny don't want to keep their wedding in a church. Above that I think he's a real nice man, who loves his daughter very much and that explains why he's devastated when Jenny has died.

Ray Stratton. He's Oliver's former roommate. At first he finds it strange that Oliver's getting married, because Oliver used to be a boy who dated every girl in the school. He's also best man at their wedding.



THE SETTING

The story takes place in the 1960's. Oliver studies at Harvard and Jeny at radcliffe. Both of the university's are in Cambridge, a town near Boston. later they move to NewYork. Most of the time the atmosphere is very loving, but sometimes they have a lot of discussions. Later on, when they've found out that jenny's sick, the atmosphere becomes very sad.



THE AUTHOR

The author is Erich Segal. Regal is an American professor of Greek and Latin Literature and used to be a marathon runner. He acted in movies and was a television commentator for the Olympic Games. Besides Love Story he has written: airy Tale, Yellow Submarine and Oliver's Story, a sequel to Love Story.



CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

The story is told in chronological order and has no flashbacks. The story is telling about three to five years of Ollie and Jenny's life.



POINT OF VIEW

The story is written in the I-form. You see things happen through the eyes of Oliver. You read haw he thinkr and reacts and read how others think and react according to his ideas.



THE OUTLINE

The story begins when Oliver wants to borrow a book in Radcliffe Library, where Jenny works. Oliver likes her immediately and asks her for coffee. They're both in their senior year at university. Jenny's a music student and Oliver's a law student. When they're having coffee, Oliver invites Jenny to a hockey-game. She doesn't like hockey, but she goes anyway.

At that game, Oliver's sent of the ice for two minutes, because he's too rough. Jenny teases him with that and says she's leaving. After the match, Jenny's waiting outside for him. They kiss and later on the telephone Oliver tells her, he loves her.

When Oliver goes to meet Jenny at Briggs hal, where she lives, he hears she's having a telephone conversation with someone named Phil. She tells him she loves him and hangs up. Later on Phil turns out to be Jenny's father. She has a very good relationship with him.

There hasn't been a lot of physical contact between Oliver and Jenny, but suddenly in a afternoon they start making love to each other. From that time they;re a lot in Ollie's room. ray, his roommate doesn't understand why Oliver's not telling him anymore about his love life.

After one of Jenny's concerts , Jenny says she has the chance to study music in Paris. Oliver doesn't want her to go and asks her to marry him. She says yes.

When they;re going to tell Oliver's parents, the atmosphere is very formal and stiff, because everybody feels a bit uncomfortable. A couple of days later Oliver and his father argue about Jenny. He says that if he marries Jenny, he won't give Oliver any financial support anymore. Oliver gets angry and walks away.

The next day they;re going to visit Jenny's father. He's very nice and wants Oliver to call him Phil. After their graduation, they marry. They spend their honeymoon at a boatclub working. They live in a chaep apartment in Cambridge and have very little money. They live like this for about three years, when they get an invitation for Oliver's father's sixtieth birthday. Jenny wants to go, but Oliver refuses. Jenny calls his father to say they;re not coming. She asks Oliver to come to the telephone, but he doesn't and jenny walks away. Olever can't find her anywhere and when he gets home, she's in the frontdoor, because she forgot to bring her key. Oliver wants to apoligise, but Jennt says:"Love means not always having to say you're sorry".

Oliver has finished Law School and gets a good job in New York. They move to New York and decide they want to have kids. But no matter howey try, Jenny doesn't get pregnant.

They go to a doctor and it turns out that Jenny has a deadly form of leukemia. The doctor only tells Oliver and because he doesn't Jenny, she thinks he's having an affair. After she found out, everything goes fast and jenny's getting in the hospital. Because they don't have insurance, oliver goes to his father to aks for 5,000 dollars. Oliver doesn't say anything about Jenny, but he gets the money from his father. When Oliver gets back he and Jenny order to him and her father to comfort each other. They do and Oliver stays behind in the room. When he goes he sqeezes her hand, but she asks him to hold her tight. He does it and she says:"Thank you". Those wre her last words.

He goes out of the room, tells Jenny's father the news and tries not to cry, because he promised Jenny that. As he walks down the hall, he sees his father. He tells him Jenny's dead and his father says he's sorry. Oliver repeats Jenny's words then:"Love means not always having to say you're sorry". He falls in his father's arms and cries.



MY OPINION

I find the book very beautiful. It looks a bit like Romeo and Juliet. It's good the story doesn't have a happy ending, it makes the story better. The book is very well written, although there are a lot of 'popular' English words in it. I saw they call it: student language. It's also a very sad book, because they were finally so happy with each other and then she suddenly dies. When Oliver fell into his father's arms I almost had to cry. I like the book very much. The movie is also very good. They use lyrics from the book.
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