One by one they have failed to do this, choosing to stay in an ever more meaningless life with someone who has treated them appallingly.

I feared a meaningless life, without any dignity.

It allows them to take out their anger with their sad and meaningless lives.

The rosters of writers, jazz musicians and philosophers make more sense in his novels, as they are the way in which characters try to give substance to meaningless lives.

That's when he realized that they both were living meaningless lives.