Marriage is nothing but a declaration of war that we celebrate with music, a sumptuous meal, perfumes, incense, elegant clothes, promises, and songs... "Marital Happiness," the ironic title of this novel, presents a picture of a marital relationship that begins with love and ends with disappointment, misunderstanding, and sometimes hatred. Tahar Ben Jelloun tells us, in an engaging style, two contrasting points of view of the same marriage story: one from the husband, the other from the wife. We thus have two parts, two stories, and two narratives. The husband, after he has grown old, tells us his feelings about his marital relationship and the path of its slow collapse by rereading his diaries. As for the disgruntled and jealous wife who has been betrayed, she presents us with a completely different version of events. Who is wrong and who is right? As if he were a friend of the couple, the reader listens to each of them separately, lives as a judge between them, and ends up asking himself contemporary questions about marriage: Can two people from two different social classes agree? To what extent? Can we continue pretending after love has faded? Can one spouse change the other? In this novel, Tahar Ben Jelloun leads us into the most private secrets of married life, and, in a touching and intelligent manner, prompts us to reflect on the essential issues of life, such as marriage, disagreement, betrayal, ambition, and jealousy.