RED TOPIC 1BENCHMARK PAPER 1"I will defeat all obstacles that dare enter my path", shouts Love. "I will endureforever" it resounds. Erich Segal, author of the infamous novel, "Love Story",made his intended theme loud and clear. In this novel we as readers are bathedin the notion that "Love conquers all." While love is a powerful tool in motivatingmany of us, and often the drive behind our determinations to face bumps in theroad, it rarely does so without cost or compromise. Segal's overall theme, "Loveconquers all", should be read as "Love conquers all with a little help fromreinforcements". Segal addresses many significant messages throughout thebook that touch on Gender bias, Race, and Class. Without the assistance fromthese troops and others, "Love" wouldn't even be at the front lines.One of Segal's hidden messages falls under Gender bias. In this novel we find onesex giving up much in order to have the other. In writing this novel, although theintended audience was largely female, Segal asks us as women to recognize thefact that if we want the man and therefore a better life, we must denyourselves. The two main characters in 'Love Story" are Oliver Barrett IV andJenny Cavilleri. Oliver Barrett IV is a student at Harvard and Jenny a student atRadcliffe. Oliver and Jenny meet at the Radcliffe library where Jenny works.Oliver is in search of books in less demand than at his school and makes such arequest of Jenny. In their first meeting Jenny makes reference to hisappearance, "You look stupid and rich". He attempts to deny that statementand she references that she is smart and poor. She then continues the repartee2with an enticement to get him to ask her out. "What the hell makes you sosmart9?" asks Oliver. "I wouldn't go for coffee with you," she answers. "Listen-Iwouldn't ask you." "That," she replies, 'Ys what makes you stupid." Within thenext paragraph the two are out to coffee. Soon they are dating and what followsis a denouncement of those things important to her. We hear of her going to hishockey game, and he forgetting that she was out side waiting for him after thegame. Oliver ponders, "Any way I was alone again. I let my whole pleasantlyaching body slide into the whirlpool, closed my eyes and just sat there, up to myneck in warmth. Ahhhh." The thought finally occurs to him that Jenny is waitingoutside in the freezing cold (hopefully) and rushes to get dressed. Who iswaiting but Jenny. The girl waits in the freezing cold for the guy while he sits ina hot tub. Oliver views Jenny's friends as losers. He calls them "wonky" and theyare painted as wimps, "those that neither threw nor received punches". There isbarely a reference of Jenny ever hanging out with her friends. Oliver, the male, istouted as more important because of his jock status and Jenny as simplebecause she lives to hear the stories of his conquests over his opponents duringthe games.Segal notes that Oliver thinks highly of himself and less of Jenny. We see thatOliver is appalled that Jenny would make him wait for their date while she is onthe phone and sets out to 'put a stop to this usurpation of his time." Jennyspends all her time at his place and not until the 6th chapter is there even areference from the author that Oliver has any interest in Jenny's life outside ofhimself. In their conversations Jenny down plays her abilities to Oliver's statingthat she plays music just "okay", not "All-Ivy" like him. One major act of self-denial comes when Jenny mentions to Oliver that she has received a scholarshipto study music in Paris. Oliver pleads for Jenny to not leave him. She makes onelast attempt to get him to recognize her dream. He basically responds with3"blah, blah, what about our marriage", something that he had not mentioneduntil there was a possibility that she wouldn't be around. The ultimate denialcomes when Oliver is angry with Jenny for intruding in the feud between he andhis father. He yanks the phone from her hand and the socket and screams at herto, "get the hell out of his life". In all of his anger he doesn't even realize shehas run out the door. After a search of the town, he later finds her sitting on thesteps of the apartment waiting for him. "Jenny, I'm sorry---" "Stop!" She cutshim off and very quietly says, "Love means not ever having to say you're sorry."The female not only gives up her friends, her interests, and her dreams to getthe man, but also her self respect and need for safety and security. In otherwords, get ready ladies to "just be". Expect your dreams to stay buried, yourfriends to disappear, and your worth to go down the drain, because according t oSegal, those are the costs that accompany Love.Being female is not the only military ranking for Jenny. She also belongs to thetroop, "Financial Loser". From the beginning of the novel, Segal lets us knowthat Jenny is poor and Oliver is filthy rich. She, after all, is the poor girl attendingRadcliffe, chasing after the rich boy at Harvard. It would be socially unacceptablefor the rich male to go after the poor female. The author makes constantreference to their statuses. Love is not the self- standing warrior that the authorwants us to believe it is. We see that for Jenny it is a privilege for her to bereceived by Oliver Barrett IV. The two contrasts of social class are portrayedthroughout the novel. Within the first chapter we see that Oliver's family hasdonated a hall to Harvard, a colossal monument to his family's money, vanity,and flagrant Harvardism. Jenny comes from a humble background. Her father,"some sort of baker guy" as Oliver refers to him, lives in Cranston, Rhode Island.His only contribution to society is Jenny and some Italian pastries. Jenny callsherself a social zero when talking with Oliver about her plans to go to Paris. The4difference in classes is illustrated when Oliver and Jenny plan to meet hisparents. On approaching the grand estate, Jenny comments that there are nohouses only trees. Oliver replies that the houses are behind the trees. It was atleast a half a mile from the entrance to the property with other buildings liningthe way. This is contrasted when Oliver goes to meet Jenny's dad. Jenny is saidto have lived on a street called Hamilton Avenue, a long line of wooden houseswith many children in front of them, and a few scraggly trees. Merely drivingdown it, Oliver felt like he was in another country.
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