Sir, - In her article on divorce (Features, October 6th), Kathryn Holmquist quotes Judith Wallerstein in support of the idea that children are better off with a good divorce than a bad marriage.
This is completely at odds with the thrust of Ms Wallerstein's book Second Chances (Bantam Press, 1989), which I would strongly recommend to any student of the subject.
Second Chances is an account of research carried out in California in the 1970s and 1980s where Ms Wallerstein and her colleagues interviewed divorcees and their children in depth five, 10 and 15 years after the divorce. Their main conclusion was that the effects of divorce on children are frequently devastating and continue to be so many years later. This was contrary to popular belief at the time, which held that children got over the effects after a year or two. - Yours, etc.,
Ciaran O'Connell, Oakpark, Tralee, Co Kerry.