And he was afraid she might be taking this much too seriously, so he reached out to stroke or tousle her hair, but that didn't work because she'd jus… - Richard Yates

Revolutionary Road, no matter how accessible on the surface, rewards a lifetime of rereading and reflection.

Charlie was Charlie: possessed of "an uncannily keen and very articulate insight into other people's weaknesses," as Yates put it. Footnote by Blake Bailey: The quote is taken from the 1972 Ploughshares interview. Yates was explaining how his brother-in-law's personality was similar to that of John Givings in "Revolutionary Road".

There would probably always be kids like Grove in prep schools: you would find only irritation in trying to help them, or to like them, and you could probably never bring yourself to call them by their first names until ten years later, when they came back to visit the school with their wives.