The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock: An Anatomy of the Master of Suspense by Edward White

Alfred Hitchcock. His name alone can brings chills, fond spooky memories, discomfort, and nostalgia. 

I was still ten years old in 1963 when I saw The Birds from the back seat of the family car, parked at the local drive-in movie theater. My parents thought I would fall asleep.

 

I didn't. The scene of a man missing his eye balls gave me nightmares for years. 

The next year, in 1964, I was nearly twelve when I saw Marnie. I am sure my folks did not expect me to be asleep that time. I did not understand it, I had no concept of sexual dysfunction, so of course watched it every time it came on television, trying to puzzle out the feelings it raised in me. 

Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955-1962) was a childhood staple. I learned the theme song, The Funeral March of the Marionette, on piano. It impressed the neighbor boy who was also a Hitchcock fan. I had story collections like Alfred Hitchcock's Ghostly Gallery: Eleven Spooky Stories for Young People.

Over the years, watching the classic films I had seen in the movie theater with my folks, including Vertigo. Rear Window, and North By Northwest, and those I only saw later on television, like Psycho, I understood things I could not as a girl.

And I wondered why in the world did Mom take me to see those films! Today, scenes of rape, obsession, murder, and suicide would not be considered proper fare for the under-13-year-old child.

As far as I can tell, the only harm these movies did me, other than nightmares about eyeless men, was a penchant for stylish suspense stories.  I knew that birds would not flock and attack me in reality, or crop dusters chase me. 

"He was a child, you know, a very black-comedy child" screenwriter Arthur Laurents said of Hitch. Perhaps that was his appeal to children. Raised on Dick and Jane while undergoing 'duck and cover' drills and watching adults glued to the news during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, we were ready for the safety of theatrical horror.  War became daily television fodder and political assassinations punctuated our teen years and watching Hitchcock movies on television were not as shocking any more.

I had never explored the man behind the persona. The nine-line sketch Hitch walked into on his show was all I needed to know. The sketch, I learned in The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock, Hitch himself drew and propagated as part of his image.

Edward White's biography considers the man through the lens of twelve aspects of his personality, each fully explored through Hitchcock's life and art. 

On the one hand, the book is hugely informative and gave me a full picture of the man and the artist.

On the other hand, Hitchcock remains a mystery. He carefully controlled his persona, as deliberately and thoughtfully controlling our image of him as his films controlled our responses.

Was his marriage to Alma platonic? Did he remain a virgin expect for once, resulting in the birth of his daughter? Did he lunge at actresses and ask his secretary to 'erotically entertain' him? I saw Tippi Hendren talk about her experience. Can we tell the difference between the persona Hitch offered and truth?

He grew up with WWI air raids, the 1918 flu pandemic,  in a rough part of town, with a Catholic Education. There is a lot of horror to draw from with that background. 

And yet, Hitch was averse to conflict and could not deal with "complex emotions."  He would not use animal cruelty in his films and preferred to have his victims thrown off a building than shot as in American films. 

Still,  he was fascinated by violence and cruelty, grew up reading classic British crime fiction including G. K. Chesterton and John Buchan. He once expressed his belief that he would have made a great criminal lawyer.

I learned about his  middle class, Catholic childhood, his struggle with his appearance, the art and film and stories that inspired him.

The book is always fascinating, always interesting, and often disturbing. Especially when I ask myself what kind of person is a Hitchcock fan, as perhaps it reveals things about myself I would rather not consider.

I received a free galley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock: An Anatomy of the Master of Suspense
by Edward White
W. W. Norton & Company
Pub Date: April 13, 2021 
ISBN: 9781324002390
hardcover $28.95 (USD)

from the publisher

A fresh, innovative biography of the twentieth century’s most iconic filmmaker.

In The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock, Edward White explores the Hitchcock phenomenon—what defines it, how it was invented, what it reveals about the man at its core, and how its legacy continues to shape our cultural world.

The book’s twelve chapters illuminate different aspects of Hitchcock’s life and work: “The Boy Who Couldn’t Grow Up”; “The Murderer”; “The Auteur”; “The Womanizer”; “The Fat Man”; “The Dandy”; “The Family Man”; “The Voyeur”; “The Entertainer”; “The Pioneer”; “The Londoner”; “The Man of God.” 

Each of these angles reveals something fundamental about the man he was and the mythological creature he has become, presenting not just the life Hitchcock lived but also the various versions of himself that he projected, and those projected on his behalf.

From Hitchcock’s early work in England to his most celebrated films, White astutely analyzes Hitchcock’s oeuvre and provides new interpretations. He also delves into Hitchcock’s ideas about gender; his complicated relationships with “his women”—not only Grace Kelly and Tippi Hedren but also his female audiences—as well as leading men such as Cary Grant, and writes movingly of Hitchcock’s devotion to his wife and lifelong companion, Alma, who made vital contributions to numerous classic Hitchcock films, and burnished his mythology. And White is trenchant in his assessment of the Hitchcock persona, so carefully created that Hitchcock became not only a figurehead for his own industry but nothing less than a cultural icon.

Ultimately, White’s portrayal illuminates a vital truth: Hitchcock was more than a Hollywood titan; he was the definitive modern artist, and his significance reaches far beyond the confines of cinema.

Book Club Reads: French Exit by Patrick deWitt and The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

 

Patrick DeWitt's novel French Exit was the Clawson public library book club selection. I listened to the audiobook. The narrator was fantastic, giving the characters distinctive voices. 

Stick to the story--the characters are not very likeable when you first met them. Frances seems to be a vacuous and unfeeling socialite and her son Malcolm a pampered and unemotional slug. When I learned their backstories, I was moved. I realized that in the beginning, we saw them as the world perceived them. Learning how damaged they were by their deceased husband and father, I had sympathy. There is a bit of magic, a heavy dose of comedy of manners, droll humor, and a nice twist of sentimentalism.

My book clubbers were not excited by this novel. It was described as 'fluffy', easy to read, and they did not like the characters. They did not like the ending.

French Exit
Harper Audio
by Patrick deWitt, Lorna Raver (Narrator)
ISBN0062871927 (ISBN 13: 9780062871923)

from the publisher

Brimming with pathos, French Exit is a one-of-a-kind 'tragedy of manners,' a send-up of high society, as well as a moving mother/son caper which only Patrick deWitt could conceive and execute.

 Frances Price – tart widow, possessive mother, and Upper East Side force of nature – is in dire straits, beset by scandal and impending bankruptcy. Her adult son Malcolm is no help, mired in a permanent state of arrested development. And then there’s the Price’s aging cat, Small Frank, who Frances believes houses the spirit of her late husband, an infamously immoral litigator and world-class cad whose gruesome tabloid death rendered Frances and Malcolm social outcasts.

Putting penury and pariahdom behind them, the family decides to cut their losses and head for the exit. One ocean voyage later, the curious trio land in their beloved Paris, the City of Light serving as a backdrop not for love or romance, but self destruction and economical ruin – to riotous effect. A number of singular characters serve to round out the cast: a bashful private investigator, an aimless psychic proposing a seance, and a doctor who makes house calls with his wine merchant in tow, to name a few.

Brimming with pathos, French Exit is a one-of-a-kind 'tragedy of manners,' a send-up of high society, as well as a moving mother/son caper which only Patrick deWitt could conceive and execute.

*****

The book club at the Royal Oak Public library read Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles this month. I had purchased it on Kindle well before I read Miller's novel Circe, which I loved. I was eager to read Achilles.

Miller chooses to view the story of the Trojan War through the Greek character of Patroclus, bosom friend of the warrior Achilles. We see them as boys growing up together and watch their friendship blossom into romantic love. The emphasis on their deep love made me categorize the novel a love story. 

Achilles is fated to be a great warrior so when he is called to be a leader in the Trojan War he accepts, pacifist Patroclus tagging along. There are some gruesome scenes during the war. This part felt felt more like the original Iliad.

I found myself comparing this to Country by Michael Hughes, which I read earlier in the year. I felt the drive and violence and passion in Hughes novel.

Overall, I did not care for this as much as I did Circe, but the book clubbers who had never read Home or Greek literature found it a revelation. And for that I am very glad! I was the only one who had read Homer and Greek literature and Greek myths. They found it easy to read and enjoyed Miller's updating of the story and found themes that were relevant to today. 

The Song of Achilles

by Madeline Miller

Eco

ISBN-10 : 0062060619
ISBN-13 : 978-0062060617

from the publisher

Greece in the age of Heroes. Patroclus, an awkward young prince, has been exiled to the kingdom of Phthia. Here he is nobody, just another unwanted boy living in the shadow of King Peleus and his golden son, Achilles.

Achilles, “best of all the Greeks,” is everything Patroclus is not—strong, beautiful, the child of a goddess—and by all rights their paths should never cross. Yet one day, Achilles takes the shamed prince under his wing and soon their tentative connection gives way to a steadfast friendship. As they grow into young men skilled in the arts of war and medicine, their bond blossoms into something far deeper—despite the displeasure of Achilles’ mother Thetis, a cruel sea goddess with a hatred of mortals.

Fate is never far from the heels of Achilles. When word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, the men of Greece are called upon to lay siege to Troy in her name. Seduced by the promise of a glorious destiny, Achilles joins their cause. Torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus follows Achilles into war, little knowing that the years that follow will test everything they have learned, everything they hold dear. And that, before he is ready, he will be forced to surrender his friend to the hands of Fate.

Profoundly moving and breathtakingly original, this rendering of the epic Trojan War is a dazzling feat of the imagination, a devastating love story, and an almighty battle between gods and kings, peace and glory, immortal fame and the human heart.

The Writer's Library: The Authors You Love on the Books that Changed their Lives by Nancy Pearl & Jeff Schwager

Nancy Pearl and Jeff Schwager's book The Writer's Library lets readers in on their favorite authors' reading history, what they keep on their bookshelf, and how those books impacted their lives and their craft.

Pearl writes, "Our consciousness is a soaring shelf of thoughts and recollections, facts and fantasies, and of course, the scores of books we've read that have become an almost cellular part of who we are." I found myself thinking about the books that were on my shelves across my lifetime.

I was happy to see books I have read mentioned but there were also many books new to me that I will add to my TBR list.

Certain books were mentioned by more than one writer.

Jonathan Lethem talked of "the poetic, dreamy, surreal stuff like Bradbury" and his favorite TV show The Twilight Zone. He said that Butcher's Crossing by John Williams is better than Stoner, so I have to move it up higher on my TBR shelf.

Susan Choi also mentions Bradbury, as well as F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and J. D. Salinger's "A Perfect Day for Bananafish."

Michael Chabon also lists Bradbury, and my childhood favorites Homer Price by Robert McCloskey and Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes. He calls The World According to Garp by John Irving a bombshell; I do remember reading it when it came out. He is another fan of Watership Down. Also on his list are Saul Bellow's Herzog.

One more Bradbury fan, Dave Eggers was in the Great Books program in school, just like me. He also loves Herzog. As does Richard Ford.

Amor Towles begins with Bradbury and adds poetry including Prufrock, Whitman and Dickinson, and a long list of classics.

Another Dickinson fan, Louise Erdrich also loves Sylvia Plath and Tommy Orange's There There.

Jennifer Egen loved Salinger's Nine Stories. As a teen loved Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier and The Magus by John Fowles. "Then Richard Adams' Watership Down took over me life," and she got a rabbit. Oh, my! My husband and I also loved that book when it came out and WE got a pet rabbit--house trained to a liter box. I share a love for many of her mentions including Anthony Trollope.

Andrew Sean Greer included Rebecca and also loves Muriel Spark.

Madeline Miller also notes Watership Down as one of the "great favorites of my entire life." She is a fan of King Lear, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot, and Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. 

Laila Lalami mentioned Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee as a favorite.

I would not have guessed that Luis Alberto Urrea had fallen hard for Becky Thatcher (from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer) or that he fell in love with Stephen Crane's poetry.

At college I read The Sot Weed Factor by John Barth; it is  one of T.C. Boyle's favorite historical novels. He calls Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro "one of the greatest books ever." And he brings up John Gardner, whose novels I read as they came out.

Charles Johnson also studied under John Gardner whose book On Moral Fiction appears on his shelf along with Ivan Doig.

Viet Thanh Nguyen was blown away by sci-fi writers like Isaac Asimov and fantasy writers like J. R. R. Tolkien. He liked Michael Ondaatje's Warlight.

Jane Hirshfield was "undone" by Charlotte's Web by E. B. White and loved Water de la Mare's poem "The Listeners" and reads poetry including Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, W. H. Auden, and Gerard Manley Hopkins. Philip Levine is a poet on my TBR shelf that she mentions.

Siri Hustvedt read Dickinson and the canonical English poetry early. Flannery O'Connor shows up on her shelf, also found on shelves of T. C. Boyle, Erdrich, Ford, and Tartt.

Vendela Vida is "indebted to Forster," including A Passage to India. Also on her shelf is Coetzee's Disgrace.

Donna Tartt read Bedknobs and Broomsticks by Mary Norton, James Barrie's Peter Pan, and other classic children's literature. Oliver Twist particularly moved her and it also appears on Urrea's shelf.

Russell Banks loved Toby Tyler by James Otis and loves to read the classics.

Laurie Frankl's books are not ones I have read. Along with all the other books on these author's shelves, I can extend my reading list past my natural lifespan!

Readers will enjoy these interviews, comparing book shelves, and learning the books that influenced these writers.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Writer's Library: The Authors You Love on the Books That Changed Their Lives
by Nancy Pearl and Jeff Schwager
HarperCollins Publishers/HarperOne
Pub Date September 8, 2020
ISBN: 9780062968500
hardcover $27.99 (USD)

from the publisher:

With a Foreword by Susan Orlean, twenty-three of today's living literary legends, including Donna Tartt, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Andrew Sean Greer, Laila Lalami, and Michael Chabon, reveal the books that made them think, brought them joy, and changed their lives in this intimate, moving, and insightful collection from "American's Librarian" Nancy Pearl and noted playwright Jeff Schwager that celebrates the power of literature and reading to connect us all.

Before Jennifer Egan, Louise Erdrich, Luis Alberto Urrea, and Jonathan Lethem became revered authors, they were readers. In this ebullient book, America’s favorite librarian Nancy Pearl and noted-playwright Jeff Schwager interview a diverse range of America's most notable and influential writers about the books that shaped them and inspired them to leave their own literary mark. 

Illustrated with beautiful line drawings, The Writer’s Library is a revelatory exploration of the studies, libraries, and bookstores of today’s favorite authors—the creative artists whose imagination and sublime talent make America's literary scene the wonderful, dynamic world it is. A love letter to books and a celebration of wordsmiths, The Writer’s Library is a treasure for anyone who has been moved by the written word. 

The authors in The Writer’s Library are:

Russell BanksT.C. BoyleMichael ChabonSusan ChoiJennifer EganDave EggersLouise ErdrichRichard FordLaurie FrankelAndrew Sean GreerJane HirshfieldSiri HustvedtCharles JohnsonLaila LalamiJonathan LethemDonna TarttMadeline MillerViet Thanh NguyenLuis Alberto UrreaVendela VidaAyelet WaldmanMaaza MengisteAmor Towles

The Fourteenth of September by Rita Dragonette

The Fourteenth of September by Rita Dragonette is rooted in Dragonette's personal experience in 1969 and 1970 when daily body counts from Vietnam and the looming Draft Lottery was met by youth anti-war protests, culminating in the horror of the Kent State massacre.

The protagonist is a young woman on a WRAIN scholarship to become an army nurse, her meal ticket out of her dead-end town. But Judy decides she must understand the war and her values first by becoming involved with the campus Freaks in the anti-war movement.

circa 1968-9 art by teenage me

For Boomers like me, the novel covers familiar territory, rife with personal associations, from the long hair and the rock music to the political and social events.

The approach is fresh--the story of a young woman grappling with her future, her attitude toward the Vietnam War, pushing herself to determine what she believes.

May 7 student protest against the escalation of war and Kent State
in the Herald, Kimball  student newspaper

I got Judy's motivation.

In 1969 as a high school junior, I wrote anti-war poetry for the school paper but dated a boy in the Civil Air Patrol, the armed service in his future. He needed the structure and discipline CAP offered him, his home life dysfunctional.

1969 Herald with my poem

In 1970 at a small college campus divided into Greeks, Freaks, and GDIs (God Damed Independents) I found myself friends with a Freak with long hair and long fringed coats, kids who smoked pot, clean-cut Vietnam Vets returned to finish their education, long-haired Vietnam Viets with jaded stories, Sorority girls, and everyone in between. I wanted to know all kinds of people, to be nonjudgmental, but stay true to my values.

But Judy was grappling with more than me; I knew I would not be drafted, while I knew the boys were worried. I felt guilty. But I was 'safe.'

The post-war generation was not the first or the last to question the judgment and decisions of those in authority. Each generation must find their moral compass, and chose how to respond. Today's young heroes stand up for gun control and women's rights and inclusion.

Kimball High School, Royal Oak MI newspaper photograph
of October 15, 1969 Moratorium demonstration in Memorial Park

I asked Dragonette questions about her motivation for writing the novel, if it was cathartic to have written the events in fiction, and how her story relates to the current youth-led protests.

I lived through many of the incidents of the time period and, probably because I was always the participant-observer writer, I knew that there were things that happened that absolutely had to be recorded and remembered. I waited years to see if they would be by other novelists, but no. 

I had a friend (he's on my acknowledgments page) who sent me a letter after graduation telling me that there was a story to be told and I was the one to tell it.  Well, if you tell someone like me--who is ridiculously responsible something like THAT---it's quite the monkey on your back.

I've always been very interested in the role of women in war. My mother was a nurse in WWII who did really amazing things (i.e. she was in Patton's Army doing meatball surgery on the front in a tent, helping to liberate Stalag 11 in Germany) and saw far more action than my father, but was undervalued because she was "only a nurse," versus my father whose life was on the line.

When I heard the stories they didn't make sense. I had two parents, both of whom were doing something equally patriotic, important, and dangerous, and it didn't seem logical to value their specific experiences differently.

When it came to the war of my generation I saw the same issues--[women told that] you can't possibly understand what we men are going through-- and I wanted to present a case to make it clear that we are in wars as a generation, a country---not as a gender.

I wanted to pose a female dilemma that was every bit as fraught and intense as the decision that had to be faced by the men of the time (1969-70).

There are two articles in the Featured Articles section of the Media tab in my web site that also talk about this at www.ritadragonette.com. Specifically, there is a highly-fictionalized version of an actual incident in the book where a vet is dissed in an anti-war meeting. I remember that, and how I felt that someone needed to stop it but it couldn't be me because I was a girl and no one would listen to me. It was the only time in my life I ever felt like a coward---and yes, writing about it--and the whole book--was cathartic--did help me understand it better as an adult and dissect the impulse.  I never let myself feel that way again.

I think we write--which is arduous  and why would we choose to do that?--because we have stories that must be told to bear witness, to instruct. When we write we share our personal experience and point of view on an issue we feel is significant and not yet explored.

It's not therapy (though I'm sure that helps), but it gives value to experience and feelings. I feel that we learn our history from facts and nonfiction but we understand it through narrative.

My story is based on some of the things that happened in my life and some of it was easier to write about than other parts. The mother scenes were excruciating. She wasn't exactly my mother, but any time you write about a parent real life comes through. I still cry over the fate of certain characters--one was real and another was made up whole-cloth.

I also don't feel this time in history has been sufficiently covered. Vietnam is the Voldemort of wars--we feel bad because we lost, there were atrocities, we treated our vets badly. So we don't teach or talk about it. But there are important lessons to be learned.

Thank God for the time frame (it's been 50 years), Ken Burns, and the availability of unclassified information. Now we can look at it dispassionately, more like WWII.

I'm glad that part of the legacy of Vietnam is that we've been extra cautious about getting involved in other conflicts (not totally, but we don't rush in to save the world) and so far there has never been a draft; we've learned that we owe vets the world, etc.

WRAIN was like ROTC but I'm not sure the guys had to enlist before graduation; WRAIN members did. They were told it was an unbreakable commitment unless they got pregnant. Part of the absurdity is that you see it really wasn't. Later I found out more than a few guys got out of ROTC. I also learned that you could get out of WRAIN if you just told them you didn't want to be a nurse--they didn't want to be shafted for all that tuition without payback. Lots of Catch 22 stuff still goes on in the military but Judy took it seriously, her dilemma is dead serious--she believed more than they did. Just like the war. Just like young people do and should. What's the parallel?  Guys were drafted and went because they were told they had too. Yet many bought their way out...

See my MS. magazine story (click here to read) about how the activists of my time were similar to the Parkland kids. It says it all. Social media beats the streets. Our issue was the war--there was death (no draft means no marches), and civil rights, early feminism. I love how [today's young adults] care about climate change (we could barely get Earth Day going in l970), LGBT, etc. As far as women's rights--it's an ongoing battle. We should go to war over men trying to control women's bodies--we are re-litigating issues settled long ago. It's the hamster wheel of history. We need to go forward not backward.

Progress is hard-won but fragile. If that's true, we are doomed to the hamster wheel of history and we're capable of more than that. We can STILL change the world.

Rita Dragonette

*****

The novel has won six awards including the National Indie Excellence Award for new fiction and book cover design.

Visit Dragonette's website to learn more about The Fourteenth of September. You will find excerpts, the song playlist, the trailer, an more.

I received a free book through a giveaway on the Facebook group American Historical Novels. My review is unbiased.

The Fourteenth of September (Paperback)
By Rita Dragonette
She Writes Press
ISBN: 9781631524530
Publication Date: September 18, 2018
Paperback $16.95, Kindle $8.69

*****

Further Reading:
Read my review of 67 Shots: Kent State and the End of American Innocence
by Howard Means here
The Given World by Maria Palaia tells about a woman whose brother is MIA in Vietnam, my review here

Songs of America by Jon Meacham and Tim McGraw

Oh, I so enjoyed reading this book! From the beginning with the beautiful and inspirational Overture on The History of Music by Jon Meacham, I did not want to stop reading this history of America through music.

Music brings a deep association with the events and places I have experienced. When I hear a song I can place myself in a specific place and point in time. The Green Berets by Barry Sadler came out when I was fourteen. It had pride of country and was an appealing march. I bought a ceramic green beret pin at a drug store counter.

But the patriotic support of the war was short-lived and the backdrop of my teenage years was filled with anti-war music including Turn, Turn Turn, Where Have All the Flowers Gone? and Give Peace a Chance. 

The music of my life tracked the social changes going on. The songs about women waiting for men became feminist anthems. Love of country was replaced by calls for justice and equity. Love songs were still popular, but cooler were the protest songs for social change with messages of universal love, peace, inclusion, anti-authority, and dropping out of the system.

The music of patriotism is inevitably the music of protest, Meacham writes, adding that history is not just read, but is something we also hear. And he notes that history is a continual process. He holds hope that we "can overcome fear, that light can triumph over darkness, that we can open our arms rather than clench our fists." Music reminds the nation of where we have been and points to what we can become.

The authors begin with pre-Revolutionary songs such as John Dickinson's 1768 The Liberty Song which rallied the colonies to unite in a righteous cause and move through history to Bruce Springsteen's protest anthem Born in the U. S. A. Each song placed in its historical and cultural setting.  

Over There was George Cohen's "bugle call" 

evoking the American Revolution's Yanke Doodle in its patriotism.
"Johnny get your gun...show the "Hun" you're a son-of-a-gun"
"And we won't come back till it's over, over there."

The music discussed by Meacham and commented on by McGraw includes the well-known and well-beloved but also lesser-known songs that were influential in their day. They all represent America at a specific historical era: The Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, slavery and abolition, the Civil War, minstrel shows and racism, WWI and WWII, the social movements of Civil Rights and equal rights and voting rights, the reactive rise of the Klan and Jim Crow, the cultural division of the 1970s, and the political divisions of the last fifty years.

WWI saw patriotic music like America, Here's My Boy 

with a mother offering her 'boy' to the cause... 

and anti-war protest music like I Didn't Raise My Boy to be a Soldier.

McGraw's contributions are inserted in text boxes. He addresses the songs from a musician's viewpoint and from a personal, emotional response.

Sinatra was one of McGraw's idols

Songs of America is a book of history, filled with stories that trace the complicated American experiment in democracy.

In 1938 Irving Berlin's God Bless America was debuted on Kate Smith's CBS radio show. Woody Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land was originally titled God Blessed America and questioned the inequality behind the American promise.

History is an argument without end, Meacham shares. Americans have argued and fought, and dissent and protest continue, but this book offers the promise that "America is not finished, the last notes have not yet been played," and calls us to lift every voice and sing in the continuing great national conversation.

I received an ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Songs of America: Patriotism, Protest, and the Music That Made a Nation
by Jon Meacham; Tim McGraw
Random House Publishing Group - Random House
Pub Date 11 Jun 2019
ISBN 9780593132951
PRICE $30.00 (USD)

All sheet music photographed are from my personal collection.

Native American's Lost Children

The removal of children from their native families is heinous. Heartbreakingly, it is also a well-established method for destroying communities. Today refugees at our borders are cruelly separated; for over a hundred years First People's children were forcibly removed to residential schools where they were reeducated as a way of breaking native culture.

Colonization broke native groups with deadly results: high suicide rates, addictions, and psychological disorders.

Recently I have read several books that reflect on this history. Suzanne Methot's book is a sociological, psychological, and personal history on the issue; Linda LeGarde Grover's novelization offers readers an accessible understanding and emotional connection through her fictional characters.

 *****

She sways, and then she is dancing in the style of the Objibwe traditional women, hands on hips and feet kneading the fire escape floor, its board softened with age and weather, pivoting half-circles left to right, right to left, lifting the invisible eagle feather fan in her left hand to return the song of prayer that is the Creator given gift of Waawaateg. from In the Night of Memory by Linda LeGarde Grover

Azure Sky was the storyteller who kept the visual memory alive for her elder sister Rainfall Dawn. Their mother Loretta had roused them from their bed on the couch, and wrapping them in a blanket, took them outside to see the northern lights flashing in the night sky. Loretta folded her blanket and drew it across her shoulders, chanting and dancing in the old way. The next morning Loretta left the girls at the county, unable to care for them, hoping that rehab would change her life and reunite her family.

Azure and Rainy never saw their mother again.

They were two halves of the same sister, stronger together than apart. But the county did part them. Azure survived; Rainy was broken. When they were teens their extended Ojibwa family tracked them down and through the Indian Child Welfare act returned them to their people.

In the Night of Memory by Linda LeGarde Grover is hauntingly beautiful and achingly heartbreaking. Different voices tell the story of Loretta, Azure, and Rainy, which is the story of a community broken by colonialism and the removal of native children. And how, having lost Loretta, they determine not to lose Loretta's children but bring them back home.

It was a long, hard, road to the Indian Child Act, and though it's not perfect, it's what we got. from In the Night of Memory by  Linda LeGarde Grover

I received a book from the University of Minnesota Press through Bookish First in exchange for a fair and unbiased review. Find a book discussion guide by clicking here.

I read Legacy: Story, Trauma, and Indigenous Healing by Suzanne Methot which addresses Chronic Post Traumatic Stress Disorder caused by the destruction of First People communities when their children were taken from them and sent to residential schools.

Legacy: Trauma, Story and Indigenous Healing by Suzanne Methot
The book combines Methot's personal story with history and psychology to create an understanding of the consequences of colonization. She demonstrates how abuse and CPTSD creates a cycle that impacts generations. On the personal level, she documents her own legacy of abuse and dysfunction and how a return to traditional ways brought healing. On the universal, she explains the psychological damage of trauma through story, with summary charts at chapter ends.

Methot's book is perhaps more suited for the indigenous population or educators and those in the helping professions who work with indigenous people. But I found her insights applicable in many ways. I found myself thinking about women I have known who demonstrated the characteristics she describes. And I even found myself applying her insights to characters in novels I have read!

I thank ECW Press for a free ebook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

*****

Other books on Native Americans I have  reviewed:

Clyde Bellencourt's memoir The Thunder Before the Storm 

https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/clyde-bellecourt-tells-his-story-as.html

The Quiet Before the Thaw, a novel by Alexandra Fuller
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2017/06/quiet-until-thaw-by-alexandra-fuller.html
The Right to Be Cold by Sheila Watt-Cloutier is the activist's memoir
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-right-to-be-cold-one-womans-fight.html
There There, a novel by Tommy Orange
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2018/08/there-there-by-tommy-orange.html
Massacre at Sand Creek by Gary L. Roberts, commissioned by the United Methodist Church as part of their repentance
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-methodist-episcopal-church-and-sand.html
And the horrifying history Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann

The Falconer by Dana Czapnik

Sometimes a book finds me that I would not have found by myself. That is how The Falconer by Dana Czapnik came into my life--as an unexpected package from the publisher.

Reading it was about a seventeen-year-old girl in 1993 New York City whose passion was basketball and who has a crush on her best friend Percy, I wondered if I would care for the book. Sure, there was advance praise from Column McCann, Salmon Rushdie, Chloe Benjamin--but could I relate to the story?

I opened the book and started reading. The opening scene finds the protagonist, "pizza bagel" Lucy, playing basketball with Percy. I've seen basketball games. Only when the tickets were free. But the writing was so good, I found myself drawn into the scene, turning pages. There was something about this book, about Lucy's voice.

On the surface, I had nothing in common with Lucy. And yet Lucy felt familiar, her concerns and fears universal.

In telling the story of one particular girl from a particular place and time, the author probes the eternal challenges of growing up female: conformity and acceptance by one's peer group while staying true to oneself; crushes on boys who don't see you; concerns about our attractiveness; what we give up for love; is the world is chaotic and without order, or can we find joy and hope?

There was a multitude of lines and paragraphs that I noted for their wisdom, beauty, and insight. I reread sections, scenes that elicited emotion or thoughtfulness.

I felt Lucy was channeling Holden Caulfield, who I met as a fourteen-year-old in Freshman English class in 1967. The Catcher in the Rye was life-changing for me, a voice unlike any I had encountered in a novel. The New York City setting, the wandering across the city, the characters met, the rejection of the parental values and lifestyle, Lucy's misunderstanding of a song line--Lucy is a female Holden, updated to the 1990s.

Lucy tells us that in Central Park is a statue of a boy releasing a falcon. She loves this statue but resents that only boys are portrayed in the way of the statue, that girls are shown nude or as children like the Alice in Wonderland statue. She sees in the joy and hope in The Falconer.

The Falconer, Central Park

Lucy experiences many things in the novel, including some pretty bad stuff. But she is resilient, holding to the joy and beauty she finds around her, the "the perfect jump shot" moments. She will inspire young readers and offer those of us whose choices were made long ago a journey of recollection and the affirmation of mutually shared experience.

I received a free ARC from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Falconer
by Dana Czapnik
Atria Books
Publication: January 29, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-9322
$25 hardbound

Tin Pan Alley Sheet Music: Men, Women, and Courtship

My collection of sheet music includes many early 20th c songs that were sung on Vaudeville stages.  Many were written in Tin Pan Alley.

One can learn so much about society in those days from these songs. Let's start what they reveal about men's attitudes toward women. These date from 1909 to 1919.

My Wife's Gone to the Country Hurrah! Hurrah! was written by George Whiting, Ted Snyder and Irving Berlin, published in 1909.

According to an interview with Irving Berlin, the song came to him in a barbershop. George Whiting, a vaudeville actor, was a few chairs down from Berlin who asked him when he needed to be home. Whiting replied, "I don't have to go home, my wife is in the country." Berlin walked out of the shop with those words in his head and soon found them a melody and the chorus worked out. In a few hours the song was completed and two days later it was heard all over the land.

When Missus Brown told hubby, "I just can't stand the heat
Please send me to the country, dear, I know 'twould be a treat"
Next day his wife and fam'ly were seated on a train
And when the train had started, Brownie shouted this refrain:

My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need a rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
I don't care what becomes of me, my wife's gone away

He kept the 'phone a-going, told ev'ryone he knew
"It's Mister Brown, come on downtown, I have some news for you"
He told a friend reporter just why he felt so gay
Next day an advertisement in the papers read this way:

[2nd refrain:]
My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need a rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
I don't care what becomes of me, my wife's gone away

He sang his joyful story into a phonograph
He made a dozen records and I say it was to laugh
For when his friends had vanished and Brown was all alone
His neighbors heard the same old tune on Brownie's graphophone

My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need the rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
Like Eva Tanguay, I don't care, my wife's gone away

He went into the parlor and tore down from the wall
A sign that read "God Bless Our Home" and threw it in the hall
Another sign he painted and hung it up instead
Next day the servant nearly fainted when these words she read:

My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need the rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
Now I'm with you if you're with me, my wife's gone away

He called on pretty Molly, a girl he used to know
The servant said "She left the house about an hour ago
But if you leave your name, sir, or write a little note
I'll give it to her when she comes" and this is what he wrote:

My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need the rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
I love my wife, but oh! you kid, my wife's gone away

He went and bought a parrot, a very clever bird
The kind that always would repeat most anything she heard
So when his voice grew husky and Brownie couldn't talk
While he'd be taking cough-drops, he would have the parrot squawk:

My wife's gone to the country, hurrah, hurrah!
She thought it best, I need the rest, that's why she went away
She took the children with her, hurrah, hurrah!
I knew my book, she left the cook, my wife's gone away

The song was sung by Stuart Barnes, a successful English Music Hall performer whose songs and monologues were usually about marriage and women. He often sang Irving Berlin songs after his monologues. He earned $400 a week in 1909. (Source found here.) He was openly gay.

***

Some men wanted freedom from their women, while others were worried about being thrown over.

 Keep Your Eye on the Girlie You Love by Howard Johnson and Alex Gerber, music by Ira Schuster, was performed by Tin Pan Alley and Vaudeville star Moe Thompson. The March 2, 1917 issue of The Saturday Evening Post has an advertisement for the sheet music and the Pathe recording.

Take a tip from one who knows, all you single men, 
If you've a girl to call your own, Don't ever leave her all alone. 
If temptation comes her way, will she pass it by? 
That's a question, so my suggestion is, Watch her on the sly. 

Keep your eye on the girlie you love, 
There's a beau that you know nothing of, 
Who may be there to call, when you're out of sight, 
Of course, she may not fall, but may be she might. 
Never leave her for more than a day, 
‘Cause there's hundreds that lose ‘em that way, 
So keep your eye upon your girl, Bill, 
If you don't some other fellow will. 

It's a tough thing now-a-days, picking out a girl, 
So when you find your heart’s delight, 
Take my advice and treat her right, 
Girls are fickle as can be, change their minds each day; 
Do a rave to ‘em, be a slave to ‘em, That’s the wisest way. 

Keep your eye on the girlie you love, 
Just be sure that she’s your turtle dove, 
Don’t take a chance and introduce your best pal, 
For if she likes him best, goodbye to your gal. 
She may kiss you goodnight by mistake, 
Call you Clarence, when your name is Jake, 
So keep your eye upon your girl, Bill, 
If you don’t some other fellow will.

***

One way of 'keeping your girlie' was to make love to her at the movies. Couples sitting in a dark room raised the fear of parents who worried about the sexual freedom that might be perpetrated there. Hollywood movie stars had wild parties and scandalous sex lives--evil role models for the young. This was the new world of dating. Courtship no longer took place on front porch swings.

Take Your Girlie To the Movies (If You Can't Make Love At Home) by Edgar Leslie and Bert Kalmar with music by Pete Wendling would have been pretty scandalous in 1919.

The song begins when a boy asks love advice:

When I call to love my girl
Her folks are always there;
That's why I'm blue, 
What shall I do?

The answer is:

Take your girlie to the movies
if you can't make love at home;
There is no little brother there who always squeals
you can say an awful lot in seven reels.

Take your lessons at the movies
And have love scenes of your own;
When the picture's over and its time to leave,
Don't forget to brush the powder off your sleeve.

Pick a cozy corner where it's nice and dark,
Don't catch influenza kissing in the park,
Take your lessons at the movies,
and have love scenes of your own;
Though's she's just a simple little ribbon clerk,
Close your eyes and think you're kissing Billie Burke;
Take your girlie to the movies, if you can't make love at home.

***

Good girls, bad girls--they are all the same according to There's a Little Bit of Bad in Every Good Little Girl by Grant Clarke and Fred Fischer, performed by Brice and King, published in 1917. This sheet music shows Elizabeth Brice and Charles King, performers called some of the "cleverest" in the business. Miss Brice came from Toledo, Ohio and progressed from singing in Sunday School to the town casino.

 This is a truly horrifying song!

Nobody ever sings about the bad girls
Because the bad girls are sad
And everybody sings about the good girls
Because the good girls are glad
Till you've been around 'em once or twice

You can't tell the naughty from the nice

There's a little bit of bad in every good little girl
They're not to blame
Mother Eve was very good
But even she raised Cain
I know a preacher's daughter
Who never orders water
There's a little bit of bad in every good little girl
They're all the same

I had a dream I went to see the devil
There was the devil to pay
He said I'm awful busy on the level
I said the devil you say
Why are you so busy tell me why
He replied and winked his other eye

There's a little bit of bad in every good little girl
They're not to blame
Though they seem like angels in a dream
They're naughty just the same
They read the good book Sunday
And snappy stories Monday
There's a little bit of bad in every good little girl
They're all the same

***

They Go Wild Simply Wild Over Me by Joe McCarthy and Fred Fisher was published in 1917. The song appears in Bullets Over Broadway by Woody Allen.

There is a version for men:

I hate to talk about myself,

But here's one time I must!

Your confidence I'll trust,

I have to speak or bust!

It's funny how I get the girls,

I never try at all;

I seem to hypnotise them,

I'm bound to make them fall!

They go wild, simply wild, over me!

They go mad, just as mad as they can be!

No matter where I'm at,

All the ladies, thin or fat,

The tall ones,

The small ones,

I grab them off like that!

Every night, how they fight over me!

I don't know what it is that they can see!

The ladies look at me and sigh,

In my arms they wanna die!

They go wild, simply wild, over me!

I get so many pretty girls,

I give a few away!

They bother me each day,

They're leading me astray!

There's lots of fellows go with girls

And never get their drift;

I always get the women,

It's just a natural gift!

They go wild, simply wild, over me!

They go mad, just as mad as they can be!

No matter where I'm at,

All the ladies, thin or fat,

The tall ones,

The small ones,

Why, I grab them off like that!

Every night, how they fight over me!

I don't know what it is that they can see!

I can never be alone,

I have to choke the telephone!

They go wild, simply wild, over me!

And for the girls:

I hate to talk about myself but here's one time I must

Your confidence I'll trust, I have to speak or bust

It's funny how I get the boys, I never try at all

I seem to hypnotize them, I'm bound to make them fall

They go wild, simply wild, over me

They go mad, just as mad as they can be

No matter where I'm at, all the fellows thin or fat

The tall ones, the small ones, I grab them off like that

Every night how they fight over me

I don't know what it is that they can see

The fellows look at me and sigh, in my arms they want to die

They go wild, simply wild, over me

I meet so many funny men, no matter where I go

They're waiting in a row, they seem to love me so

There's lots of girlies go with boys but never get their drift

I seem to understand them, why, it's just a natural gift

They go wild, simply wild, over me

They go mad, just as mad as they can be

No matter where I'm at, all the fellows thin or fat

The tall ones, the small ones, why, I grab them off like that

Every night how they fight over me

I don't know what it is that they can see

Why I can never be alone, I have to choke the telephone

They go wild, simply wild, over me

They go wild, simply wild, over me

They go mad, just as mad as they can be

I meet so many kind, I leave a few behind

They love me, they kiss me, why, I guess they must be blind

Every night how they fight over me

I don't know what it is that they can see

I'm very skinny I'll admit but when I when I smile just a smidge

They go wild, simply wild, over me

***

Whatever that guy had in the last song, the man in the next song clearly lacked. To Any Girl by the hugely successful and prolific lyricist Lew Brown with music by the equally successful and prolific Albert Von Tilzer (whose most famous song was Take Me Out To The Ballgame). This song is a lament, for the young lover has no girl to write to. Any girl will do...as long as she cooks and sews and is true.

 I found a picture postal card while on the street today.
A lovesick fellow wrote it, and here's what he had to say,
"O haven't any sweetheart, so I don't know what to do,
I wish I had a girl to send this to.
I won't put on an address, I won't put on a name,
But still I'm going to send it just the same.

To any girl who's feeling lonesome,
To any girl who's feeling blue,
I write these lines today
here's what I have to say
I've got a lot of loving that I'd like to give away,
To any girl who'll love me only
To any girl who will be true,
But if you have a beau,
Is there any girl you know
who's not as lucky as you.

He says he wanta a girl who sews and one who also cooks,
But then he doesn't mention anything about her looks
The boy is not particular,
I think that he's in wrong,
For he'll take any girl who comes along,
He can't expect an answer, 
He doesn't make it plain,
I'll have to read the postal card again. (Chorus) 

***

Harry Von Tilzer, Albert's brother, often worked with Andrew B. Sterling including on this 1915 song, Those Musical Eyes, about Ragtime sex appeal.

Stirling and Von Tilzer are my favorite pair to collect. Learn more about Von Tilzer at The Parlor Songs Academy.

Two big eyes that shine, won this heart of mine,
"Want you near me," they say and sweet is the music they play,
O those great big eyes how they harmonize, 
Even when we're apart, 
They play on the strings of my heart
Ragtime love tunes till I'm almost crazy,
Those "G sharp" eyes they seem to play for me.

Oh, those eyes, those great big musical eyes,
Such "harmony" lies, 
In those sweet "Come and kiss me" eyes
"Say you'll miss me," eyes, 
Roll them, roll them, roll them up to the skies,
Each glance at me, a "Rhapsody,"
Oh, those eyes they say "come on...and spoon!"
Oh, those eyes they play a wedding tune,
Oh, the love that lies and lies, In those musical eyes!

When I'm feeling bad, when I'm feeling sad,
Everything has gone wrong
those eyes, play the cheerfullest song,
They just look at me, strike a chord in "C"
sorrow puts on his hat, 
Those eyes soon will sing in "A Flat"
Every glance starts my heart beating "Forte," (Chorus)

No Time To Spare by Ursula K. Le Guin

Subtitled, Thinking About What Matters, Ursula K. Le Guin's newest book No Time To Spare is a collection of writing from her blog begun in 2010 when she was age 81. Le Guin addresses a variety of subjects, from her rescue cat Pard to the feminist movement and The Great American Novel.

I was struck by her strong voice and in the early sections was very drawn in, enjoying my reading. In the first essay she reacts to a questionnaire that asked what she did in her 'spare time.' She remarks that retired people have nothing but 'spare time', yet she has always been 'occupied'--by living, reading, writing, embroidering, socializing, traveling... She ends by writing,

"None of this is spare time. I can't spare it. What is Harvard thinking of? I am going to be eight-one next week. I have no time to spare."

I so related to this insight! I hate polls where I have the choice of checking 'retired' or 'housewife.' I am 'retired' because I collect Social Security, and I am a housewife because I do most, but not all of the cleaning and cooking and bill paying. But I have no spare time. I read, I write book reviews, I design and make quilts, I do research on genealogy. I am not paid for any of it, unless you call free e-books, ARCs, galleys and giveaway books 'payment.'

I was like, "You go, girl!"

The first essay I read was "Would You Please F******* Stop?" I had received the book in the mail the day of my family Christmas gathering, the Thursday before Christmas Day. I opened the book to this chapter and read it out loud. Perhaps not the best choice, but my brother laughed. Le Guin attacks the abysmal decay of American English that peppers the f-word throughout every sentence uttered. Le Guin writes that the word has taken on overtones of "dominance, of abuse, of contempt, of hatred." She ends with, "God is dead, at least as a swear word, but hate and feces keep going strong."

My favorite essay It Doesn't Have to Be the Way it Is, which concerns imaginative literature and the nature of fantasy, and why fundamentalists find it objectionable.

The later essays did not all resonate with me, perhaps showing the generation gap between Le Guin and myself. I have no WWII idealization of service uniforms, even if my Uncle Dave's Navy whites are a fond memory. She talks about the economy, politics, the feminist movement, but many times I felt dissatisfied and even bristled, while still a little unsure of what she meant. I was not comfortable with references to slapping children or her striking the cat.

In Lying it All Away Le Guin attacks political lying. In one paragraph she mentions Hitler, Nixon, Reagen, and Obama. The essay is dated October 2012, written shortly after the Obama-Romney debate. Le Guin remarks, "What was appalling to me about Obama's false figures and false promises in the first debate was they were unnecessary." I went to the Pulitzer Prize winning PoliticFact to see their fact checking of the debate claims by both Obama and Romney. Romney and Obama both made false statements and told half-truths, which tallied up come out about even. There is a bias in Le Guin's essay in that she only mentions one candidate.

That bothers me.

Le Guin is influential, a literary light and icon. But readers, I remind you to always consider that every artist and every work of art is personal, reflecting their own experience and perceptions. We must use critical thinking every time we open a book or watch a movie or listen to a song and not assume our icon's version of the world without thought.

I will say that Le Guin never shys away from saying her piece, even when she also remarks on her incompetence in an area.

The essays were entertaining, humorous, and thought provoking.

I received a free book from the publisher through a giveaway.