Meg Wolitzer's Novel "The Wife" is Soon to be Seen on the Screen with Glenn Close and Jonathan Price

Meg Politzer (b US 1959) is a prolific novelist and gifted writer of short stories.  Her novel "The Wife" published in 2003 is being made into a film opening soon starring Glenn Close star of screen, stage & TV as the overshadowed wife and the British actor of screen, stage & TV ("Game of Thrones") Jonathan Pryce as her overbearing, self-absorbed husband. The two are a long time married couple who've grown apart yet remained together.  They first met when was Joan (Close) was a co-ed in his writing seminar at Smith and immediately she was smitten.  Joe (Pryce) enters the all female classroom setting hearts a flutter despite (or incensed) by his announcement that his wife just had their first child.  The part of the young Joan will be portrayed in the upcoming film by Close's own daughter, Annie Maude Starke.  The story begins in the 1950s with Joan somewhat aloof from her classmates and convinced there's more to her sheltered, wealthy upbringing.  In the novel, Joan's mother is appalled not so much by the adulterous affair but that it is with a Jew. The anti-Semitic undercurrent is relative to the times.  Joe's student/teacher conferences flatter Joan's writing & boosts her confidence.  When the conferences become carnal knowledge & common knowledge, both Joe & Joan flee the Univ. taking refuge in NYC in a squalid apartment.  The two become a team where it would seem Joan is the one behind the scene doing the lion's share of household wifely/motherly chores and the heavy lifting when it comes to writing.  Joe's "writing" brings him notoriety, literary prizes and the much coveted Finlandia Literary Prize.  Joan is the narrator which is recounted mostly in flashbacks.  Perhaps piqued by years of Joe's infidelity, faltering parenting and mostly due to the unrewarding years of yielding herself to benefitting Joe.  She has the opportunity to tell all to Joe's unofficial biographer.  Joe & Joan have a heated (literally) altercation in the sauna of their lush hotel on the night Joe received his literary prize with mounds of alcohol & accolades.  Joe concedes "Every marriage is just two people striking a bargain.  I traded, you traded, so maybe it wasn't even."  Joan mulls over her role as the wife.  "I liked the role at first, assessed the power it contained which for some reason many people don't see, but it's there."  Joan having raised 2 daughters and a son is cognizant of the changes in lifestyles over the decades for women since the 50s.  These women were always confronting boundaries & negotiations.  Today, women have more opportunities and choices to be the type of wife, mother and career person of their own volition.  Wolitzer's writing is cunning & poetic.  "Wives are meant to be sources of comfort, showering it like wedding rice."  Wolitzer's works make great picks for women's book clubs but it doesn't broach the level of Pulitzer Prize worthy - yet.