Revolutionary Road: Part 2, Chapter 1 Summary & Analysis

The next few weeks are a blur of planning and excitement for Frank and April. Looking back later, Frank can only remember the next day at the office. Feeling extremely powerful, he speaks kindly to Maureen, telling her there is nothing to regret and he hopes that they can be friends. She agrees. Then Frank tackles the problem of the branch manager in Toledo who needs a new pamphlet, dictating a straightforward sales message about the advantages of using a computer. He takes care of several other orders of business, too. He thinks the reason he is working so hard is because April said the previous night that he had slaved away for years at Knox, while he knows he has never worked hard there. Then he rebukes himself for worrying what April thinks of his job, which he will leave forever soon. At the end of the day, Frank dumps a large pile of paperwork into the trash.

For the next few blurry weeks, Frank thinks of little besides his time at home with April. They spend their time talking confidentially about their plans. April is charming and graceful, not angry or tense. Frank feels also that he has begun to speak more confidently and eloquently. Jennifer and Michael are puzzled by their parents’ announcement that the family will be moving to France. Their parents act strangely and pay little attention to them, but at least they no longer wake their children up by fighting late into the night. One night, Frank paces the living room, denouncing the sentimentality of their neighbors. Another night he tells April that he feels alive in the same way he did when he was preparing to go into battle during the war. April replies by saying she felt that alive the first time he made love to her.

A few weeks later, the perfect fantasy begins to crack for Frank. When Frank asks April why she seems set on moving to Paris instead of elsewhere in Europe, April explains that his knowledge of the language and the neighborhoods will be helpful to them. Frank feels shaken, wondering if he really gave her the impression that he knows French. He tries to reassure himself, but he hardly knows French, and only knows the city from wandering around it as a soldier and visiting prostitutes, feeling excluded from the sophisticated life of real Parisians. Frank is even more surprised one night to hear that April went into New York City that day and applied at an overseas employment agency, made arrangements for their passports and bought several books in French, including a French grammar for him that is much too advanced. Sensing Frank’s discomfort, April apologizes for doing these things, saying that he would have been better at handling them.

The next night, April tells Frank that she has bad news. Helen Givings invited them to dinner the next day. April declined, but then, realizing they needed to speak to Helen about selling the house, agreed that Helen should come visit them after dinner instead. Hopefully, she says, they can deal with Helen only as a realtor from then on. But after settling this with Helen, April remembered prior plans with the Campbells. Milly sounded so hurt when April tried to cancel that April agreed they would visit the Campbells that night instead. April apologizes for scheduling such a boring weekend, but Frank secretly feels excited to tell the Campbells about moving to Europe. He asks April not to tell Mrs. Givings their plan for Europe, and April replies that they don’t need to tell the Campbells either. Frank is about to object that the Campbells are their friends and he wants to tell them, but stops himself.