Too poor to own more than one typewriter at the start, Hyman naturally commandeered that shared resource; and even when Jackson was earning so much more than Hyman that her income alone paid for their house, Hyman would move Jackson’s own typewriter from their study to the attic because he found her too distractingly messy. (How much Jackson’s admittedly bad housekeeping habits were a reaction to her mother or passive aggressiveness toward Stanley, it’s difficult to tell.) Jackson nonetheless took on the full brunt of housework and childcare, so that, at the time of her death, Hyman still didn’t know how to make a cup of coffee. Franklin muses at one point just how much more Jackson might have been able to do, or write, if she had been relieved of some of these domestic and emotional labors.

Jackson was surprisingly productive and consistent in her output, despite all her personal and professional obstacles. Hyman, on the other hand, struggled to complete his own work, even while being released of child rearing and having all his meals provided for him.

Oh, man