Gertrude Atherton
Encyclopedia
Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton (October 30, 1857 – June 14, 1948) was an American
writer
.
and a relative of Benjamin Franklin
. Grandfather Franklin insisted she be well read, and this influenced her greatly. She eloped with George H.B. Atherton, son of Faxon Atherton
, on February 14, 1876. She was only 19 at the time, and later had two children with him. Two tragedies changed her life dramatically: Her son George died of diphtheria
, and her husband died at sea. She was left alone with her daughter Muriel and needed to support herself.
, eventually writing 60 books and numerous articles and short stories. She first submitted "The Randolphs of Redwood: A Romance" (March 31, 1883 – May 5, 1883) to The Argonaut
under the pseudonym Asmodeus. When she revealed to her family that she was the author, it caused her to be ostracized. In 1888, she left for New York, leaving Muriel with her grandmother. She traveled to London, and eventually returned to California. Atherton's first novel, What Dreams May Come, was published in 1888 under the pseudonym Frank Lin.
In 1889, she went to Paris at the invitation of her sister-in-law Alejandra Rathbone (married to Major Jared Lawrence Rathbone). That year, she heard from British publisher G. Routledge and Sons, that they would publish her first two books. William Sharp
wrote in The Spectator
that he praised her fiction and would later invite Atherton to stay with him and his wife, Elizabeth, in South Hampstead
.
In London, she had the opportunity through Jane Wilde
to meet Oscar Wilde
, her son. She recalled in her memoir Adventures of a Novelist (1932), that she made an excuse to avoid the meeting because she thought he was physically repulsive. In a 1899 article for London's Bookman
, Atherton wrote of Wilde's style and associated it with "the decadence, the loss of virility that must follow over-civilization."
She returned to California in 1890 at the death of her grandfather Franklin and her mother-in-law Dominga Atherton, and she resumed taking care of Muriel. In 1891, she wrote for The San Francisco Examiner
where she met Ambrose Bierce
, with whom she carried on a taunting, almost love-hate friendship.
When Kate Field
remarked on California writers' neglect of the picturesque and romantic old Spanish life of the state, Atherton explored the history and culture of Spanish California in Monterey
, San Juan Bautista
, Los Angeles
, San Luis Obispo
, and Santa Barbara
. From these experiences came Before the Gringo Came (1894).
She wrote Doomswoman in 1892, and it was published in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine
before being published in book form in 1893. The story focuses on Chonita Moncada y Iturbi and her love of Diego Estenega (modeled after Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo
), as he dreams of modernizing California, retaining its Mexican character without sacrificing American economic vigor. Chonita is Catholic, and her faith stands in the way of Diego's political ambitions. The dramatic climax peaks when Diego kills Chonita's brother, Reynaldo, and she is forced to choose between her cultural loyalty or the love of her life. This story closely resembles Romeo and Juliet
.
The book was successful with critics, some comparing it to Helen Hunt Jackson
's Ramona
. Atherton was not pleased with this because Jackson was not from California. However, she was satisfied when Bierce said it was "as in its class . . . superior to any that any Californian has done".
In 1892, Atherton left for New York. There she wrote for the New York World
. She also wrote letters to Bierce, confiding her loneliness, her dismay at the necessity to do freelance writing (in particular the New York World), and even how much she disliked eastern literary circles. Her distaste came from their belittlement of the West and their authors, and the fact they did not accept Bierce's work.
She next wrote Patience Sparhawk and Her Times, A Novel (1897), but it proved to be too controversial. This rejection encouraged her to leave for London. It was 1895 and John Lane
of The Bodley Head
agreed to publish it, but not for two years. She continued to write, writing book reviews for Oliver Fry's Vanity Fair and even completed The Randolphs of Redwoods, (retitled A Daughter of the Vine, 1899) while staying in Haworth
.
Max Pemberton
asked her to write a 10,000 word for a series he was editing for Cassells Pocket Library
, which she wrote A Whirl Asunder (1895).
Once Patience Sparhawk and Her Times, A Novel was published, William Robertson Nicoll
gave a review of it in the April 12, 1897 edition of The Bookman
and said it was "crude" in its portrayal of a clever young woman with burning interest in life and identified it as a protest against the tame American novel. In a May 15 issue of The New York Times
, the reviewer said that Atherton had "incontestable" ability and a "very original talent" while noting that the book offered a series of "fleshy" episodes in Patience's life that must have scared a sensitive reader.
It was banned from the San Francisco Mechanics' Institute
, and the San Francisco Call
review said it represented Atherton's departure from her proper literary goal of treating early California themes romantically
The year 1898 saw her complete The Californians, her first novel in the post-Spanish era. Critics received this much more than Patience and a review in the The Spectator
in the October 1, 1898 issue said it "was by far more convincing and attractive in delineating California manners and morals. . . . The novel fairly establishes her claim to be considered as one of the most vivid and entertaining interpreters of the complex characters of emancipated American womanhood." The November 8 Bookman
said it was her "most ambitious work," which has "a feeling of surety that only the consciousness of knowing one's ground can convey";
She traveled to Rouen
and wrote American Wives and English Husbands (1898), set in contemporary time. In this novel, she contrasts English and American men, American and English civilizations, and the relationships between men and women. She also completed The Valiant Runaways (1898), an adventure novel for boys that dealt with the Spanish Mexican attempt to civilize California. 1899 saw her return to the United States.
Her novel Senator North (1900), was based on Maine
's senator Eugene Hale
.
In a May 1904 article Why Is American Literature Bourgeois? in the North American Review
, Atherton critiqued William Dean Howells
"the littleism" or "thin" realism of his fiction.
She is best remembered for her "California Series", several novels and short stories dealing with the social history of California. The series includes The Splendid, Idle Forties (1902); The Conqueror (1902), which is a fictionalized biography of Alexander Hamilton
; and her sensational, semi-autobiographical novel Black Oxen (1923), about a upper middle-age woman, who miraculously becomes young again after glandular therapy. The latter was adopted into the film Black Oxen
in 1923.
Her novels often feature strong heroines who pursue independent lives, undoubtedly a reaction to her stifling married life. "The Foghorn," written in 1933, is a psychological horror story that has been compared to The Yellow Wallpaper
. W. Somerset Maugham
called it a powerful story in a 1943 publication of his, Great Modern Reading.
In 2009, The Library of America selected Atherton’s story "The Striding Place" for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American Fantastic Tales.
and Edith Wharton
. James assessed Atherton's work and he found the author had reduced the typical man/woman relationship to a personality clash.
Atherton was a founding member of the Writer's League of America, besides a strong advocate of social reform, and, as the grande dame of California literature, a leader in promoting a California cultural identity. She was a personal friend of Senator James Phelan and his nephew the philanthropist Noel Sullivan, and often was a guest at their estate, the Villa Montalvo. Among her celebrity friends was travel writer Richard Halliburton
who shared her interest in artists' rights, and whose disappearance at sea she lamented. Though she could be offensively assertive with her acerbic wit, notes Gerry Max, she valorously embraced many of the key intellectual freedom issues of her day, especially those involved with women's rights, and remained, throughout a long creative life, a true friend to writers.
An early feminist well acquainted with the plight of women, Atherton was ultimately an egalitarian. She knew "the pain of sexual repression, knew the cost of strength required to escape it (strength some women do not have to spend), knew its scars—the scars that made her wary of emotional commitment and relegated her, despite her splendid professional triumphs and her surpassing benefit to women, to largely an observer role in human relations. She knew the full cost of the destructive battle of the sexes, and urged that it end at last with true sexual equality."
essay said she (Atherton): "redefined women's potential and presented a psychological drama of a woman's quest for identity and for a life purpose and happiness within and beyond her procreative function, " She also said that Patience Sparhawk was Atherton's "first significant novel."
In a 1898 essay in Bookman
, a critic stated:
Carl van Vechten
said of Atherton in a Nation
article: "Usually (not always, to be sure), the work of Mrs. Wharton seems to me to be scrupulous, clever and uninspiring, while that of Mrs. Atherton is often careless, sprawling, but inspired. Mrs. Wharton, with some difficulty, it would appear, has learned to write; Mrs. Atherton was born with a facility for telling stories."
In an essay for Bookman
, Frederic Taber Cooper
stated that in Senator North, the character Harriet "is practically a white woman but for a scarcely perceptible blueness at the base of her fingernails, this character of Harriet is perhaps the best bit of feminine analysis that Mrs. Atherton ever did."
Atherton's autobiography Adventures of a Novelist (New York: Horace Liveright, 1932) is a lively, often quotable, account of both her own tempestuous life and the many remarkable people, including Ambrose Bierce
and Senator James Duval Phelan, who filled it. It is also features engaging historical reminiscences of San Francisco in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
, the last Mexican governor of California. Pio Pico suffered from severe facial disfigurement that may have been due to acromegaly
caused by a pituitary tumor. In 1902 Atherton ridiculed Pio Pico's facial disfigurement as follows:
Her apparent shallow and superficial tendencies to revile and disrespect those people whom she considered physically flawed were consistent with an admission she made in her memoir Adventures of a Novelist (1932), where she reveals that she made an excuse to avoid meeting Oscar Wilde because she thought he was physically repulsive.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
.
Early Childhood
Gertrude Franklin Horn was born on October 30, 1857 in San Francisco to Thomas Ludovich Horn and his wife, the former Gertrude Franklin. At the age of two, her parents separated and she was raised by her maternal grandfather, Stephen Franklin, a devout PresbyterianPresbyterianism
Presbyterianism refers to a number of Christian churches adhering to the Calvinist theological tradition within Protestantism, which are organized according to a characteristic Presbyterian polity. Presbyterian theology typically emphasizes the sovereignty of God, the authority of the Scriptures,...
and a relative of Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin
Dr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
. Grandfather Franklin insisted she be well read, and this influenced her greatly. She eloped with George H.B. Atherton, son of Faxon Atherton
Faxon Atherton
Faxon Dean Atherton was an American businessman and landowner, and was a prominent citizen of San Mateo County, California. He is the namesake of Atherton, California.-Early life:...
, on February 14, 1876. She was only 19 at the time, and later had two children with him. Two tragedies changed her life dramatically: Her son George died of diphtheria
Diphtheria
Diphtheria is an upper respiratory tract illness caused by Corynebacterium diphtheriae, a facultative anaerobic, Gram-positive bacterium. It is characterized by sore throat, low fever, and an adherent membrane on the tonsils, pharynx, and/or nasal cavity...
, and her husband died at sea. She was left alone with her daughter Muriel and needed to support herself.
Writing career
After her husband's death in 1887 she was free to pursue her writing career as a protégée of Ambrose BierceAmbrose Bierce
Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
, eventually writing 60 books and numerous articles and short stories. She first submitted "The Randolphs of Redwood: A Romance" (March 31, 1883 – May 5, 1883) to The Argonaut
The Argonaut
The Argonaut was a literary journal based in San Francisco, California that ran from 1877 to 1893, founded and published by Frank M. Pixley. The magazine was known for containing strong political Americanism combined with art and literature...
under the pseudonym Asmodeus. When she revealed to her family that she was the author, it caused her to be ostracized. In 1888, she left for New York, leaving Muriel with her grandmother. She traveled to London, and eventually returned to California. Atherton's first novel, What Dreams May Come, was published in 1888 under the pseudonym Frank Lin.
In 1889, she went to Paris at the invitation of her sister-in-law Alejandra Rathbone (married to Major Jared Lawrence Rathbone). That year, she heard from British publisher G. Routledge and Sons, that they would publish her first two books. William Sharp
William Sharp (writer)
William Sharp was a Scottish writer, of poetry and literary biography in particular, who from 1893 wrote also as Fiona MacLeod, a pseudonym kept almost secret during his lifetime...
wrote in The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
that he praised her fiction and would later invite Atherton to stay with him and his wife, Elizabeth, in South Hampstead
South Hampstead
South Hampstead is a district of northwest London, part of the London Borough of Camden. It could be defined as the area between West End Lane, Belsize Road, Finchley Road and Broadhurst Gardens, although the area is largely indistinguishable from the nearby Swiss Cottage.-Nearby places:* Hampstead...
.
In London, she had the opportunity through Jane Wilde
Jane Wilde
Jane Francesca Agnes, Lady Wilde was an Irish poet under the pen name "Speranza" and supporter of the nationalist movement; had a special interest on Irish Fairy Tales, which she helped to gather...
to meet Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
, her son. She recalled in her memoir Adventures of a Novelist (1932), that she made an excuse to avoid the meeting because she thought he was physically repulsive. In a 1899 article for London's Bookman
The Bookman (London)
The Bookman was a monthly magazine published in London from 1891 until 1934 by Hodder & Stoughton. It was a catalogue of their current publications that also contained reviews, advertising and illustrations....
, Atherton wrote of Wilde's style and associated it with "the decadence, the loss of virility that must follow over-civilization."
She returned to California in 1890 at the death of her grandfather Franklin and her mother-in-law Dominga Atherton, and she resumed taking care of Muriel. In 1891, she wrote for The San Francisco Examiner
The San Francisco Examiner
The San Francisco Examiner is a U.S. daily newspaper. It has been published continuously in San Francisco, California, since the late 19th century.-19th century:...
where she met Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
, with whom she carried on a taunting, almost love-hate friendship.
When Kate Field
Kate Field
Kate Field , born Mary Katherine Keemle Field, was an American journalist, lecturer, and actress, of eccentric talent.- Biography :She was born in St. Louis, Mo., the daughter of Joseph M...
remarked on California writers' neglect of the picturesque and romantic old Spanish life of the state, Atherton explored the history and culture of Spanish California in Monterey
Monterey, California
The City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 27,810. Monterey is of historical importance because it was the capital of...
, San Juan Bautista
San Juan Bautista, California
San Juan Bautista is a city in San Benito County, California, United States. The population was 1,862 at the 2010 census, up from 1,549 at the 2000 census. The city of San Juan Bautista was named after Mission San Juan Bautista...
, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, San Luis Obispo
San Luis Obispo, California
San Luis Obispo is a city in California, located roughly midway between San Francisco and Los Angeles on the Central Coast. Founded in 1772 by Spanish Fr. Junipero Serra, San Luis Obispo is one of California’s oldest communities...
, and Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California
Santa Barbara is the county seat of Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Situated on an east-west trending section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States, the city lies between the steeply-rising Santa Ynez Mountains and the Pacific Ocean...
. From these experiences came Before the Gringo Came (1894).
She wrote Doomswoman in 1892, and it was published in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine
Lippincott's Monthly Magazine
Lippincott's Monthly Magazine was a 19th century literary magazine published in Philadelphia from 1868 to 1915, when it relocated to New York to become McBride's Magazine. It merged with Scribner's Magazine in 1916....
before being published in book form in 1893. The story focuses on Chonita Moncada y Iturbi and her love of Diego Estenega (modeled after Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo
Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo
Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo was a Californian military commander, politician, and rancher. He was born a subject of Spain, performed his military duties as an officer of Mexico, and shaped the transition of California from a Mexican district to an American state...
), as he dreams of modernizing California, retaining its Mexican character without sacrificing American economic vigor. Chonita is Catholic, and her faith stands in the way of Diego's political ambitions. The dramatic climax peaks when Diego kills Chonita's brother, Reynaldo, and she is forced to choose between her cultural loyalty or the love of her life. This story closely resembles Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
.
The book was successful with critics, some comparing it to Helen Hunt Jackson
Helen Hunt Jackson
Helen Maria Hunt Jackson, born Helen Fiske , was a United States writer who became an activist on behalf of improved treatment of Native Americans by the U.S. government. She detailed the adverse effects of government actions in her history A Century of Dishonor...
's Ramona
Ramona
Ramona is a 1884 United States historical novel written by Helen Hunt Jackson. It is the story of a Scots-Native American orphan girl in Southern California, who suffers racial discrimination and hardship. Originally serialized in the Christian Union on a weekly basis, the novel became immensely...
. Atherton was not pleased with this because Jackson was not from California. However, she was satisfied when Bierce said it was "as in its class . . . superior to any that any Californian has done".
In 1892, Atherton left for New York. There she wrote for the New York World
New York World
The New York World was a newspaper published in New York City from 1860 until 1931. The paper played a major role in the history of American newspapers...
. She also wrote letters to Bierce, confiding her loneliness, her dismay at the necessity to do freelance writing (in particular the New York World), and even how much she disliked eastern literary circles. Her distaste came from their belittlement of the West and their authors, and the fact they did not accept Bierce's work.
She next wrote Patience Sparhawk and Her Times, A Novel (1897), but it proved to be too controversial. This rejection encouraged her to leave for London. It was 1895 and John Lane
John Lane (publisher)
-Biography:Originally from Devon, where he was born into a farming family, Lane moved to London already in his teens. While working as a clerk at the Railway Clearing House, he acquired knowledge as an autodidact....
of The Bodley Head
The Bodley Head
The Bodley Head is an English publishing house, founded in 1887 and existing as an independent entity until the 1970s. The name has been used as an imprint of Random House Children's Books since 1987...
agreed to publish it, but not for two years. She continued to write, writing book reviews for Oliver Fry's Vanity Fair and even completed The Randolphs of Redwoods, (retitled A Daughter of the Vine, 1899) while staying in Haworth
Haworth
Haworth is a rural village in the City of Bradford metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England. It is located amongst the Pennines, southwest of Keighley and west of Bradford. The surrounding areas include Oakworth and Oxenhope...
.
Max Pemberton
Max Pemberton
Sir Max Pemberton was a popular British novelist, working mainly in the adventure and mystery genres. He was educated at St Albans School, Merchant Taylors' School, and Caius College, Cambridge...
asked her to write a 10,000 word for a series he was editing for Cassells Pocket Library
Cassell's national library
Cassell's National Library was a series issued by Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co. in London consisting of edited versions of English literature. The series was edited by Henry Morley, and between 1886 and 1890 it issued 209 weekly volumes. These were sold for 3d or 6d ....
, which she wrote A Whirl Asunder (1895).
Once Patience Sparhawk and Her Times, A Novel was published, William Robertson Nicoll
William Robertson Nicoll
Sir William Robertson Nicoll CH was a Scottish Free Church minister, journalist, editor, and man of letters.Nicoll was born in Lumsden, Aberdeenshire, the son of a Free Church minister...
gave a review of it in the April 12, 1897 edition of The Bookman
The Bookman (London)
The Bookman was a monthly magazine published in London from 1891 until 1934 by Hodder & Stoughton. It was a catalogue of their current publications that also contained reviews, advertising and illustrations....
and said it was "crude" in its portrayal of a clever young woman with burning interest in life and identified it as a protest against the tame American novel. In a May 15 issue of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, the reviewer said that Atherton had "incontestable" ability and a "very original talent" while noting that the book offered a series of "fleshy" episodes in Patience's life that must have scared a sensitive reader.
It was banned from the San Francisco Mechanics' Institute
San Francisco Mechanics' Institute
The Mechanics' Institute Library and Chess Room is a historic membership library, cultural event center, and chess club located in the Financial District of San Francisco, California at 57 Post Street...
, and the San Francisco Call
San Francisco Call
The San Francisco Call was a newspaper that served San Francisco, California. Because of a succession of mergers with other newspapers, the paper variously came to be called The San Francisco Call & Post, the San Francisco Call-Bulletin, San Francisco News-Call Bulletin, and the News-Call Bulletin...
review said it represented Atherton's departure from her proper literary goal of treating early California themes romantically
The year 1898 saw her complete The Californians, her first novel in the post-Spanish era. Critics received this much more than Patience and a review in the The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
in the October 1, 1898 issue said it "was by far more convincing and attractive in delineating California manners and morals. . . . The novel fairly establishes her claim to be considered as one of the most vivid and entertaining interpreters of the complex characters of emancipated American womanhood." The November 8 Bookman
The Bookman
The Bookman may refer to:*The Bookman *The Bookman...
said it was her "most ambitious work," which has "a feeling of surety that only the consciousness of knowing one's ground can convey";
She traveled to Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
and wrote American Wives and English Husbands (1898), set in contemporary time. In this novel, she contrasts English and American men, American and English civilizations, and the relationships between men and women. She also completed The Valiant Runaways (1898), an adventure novel for boys that dealt with the Spanish Mexican attempt to civilize California. 1899 saw her return to the United States.
Her novel Senator North (1900), was based on Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
's senator Eugene Hale
Eugene Hale
Eugene Hale was a Republican United States Senator from Maine.Born at Turner, Maine, he was educated in local schools and at Maine's Hebron Academy. He was admitted to the bar in 1857 and served for nine years as prosecuting attorney for Hancock County, Maine. He was elected to the Maine...
.
In a May 1904 article Why Is American Literature Bourgeois? in the North American Review
North American Review
The North American Review was the first literary magazine in the United States. Founded in Boston in 1815 by journalist Nathan Hale and others, it was published continuously until 1940, when publication was suspended due to J. H. Smyth, who had purchased the magazine, being unmasked as a Japanese...
, Atherton critiqued William Dean Howells
William Dean Howells
William Dean Howells was an American realist author and literary critic. Nicknamed "The Dean of American Letters", he was particularly known for his tenure as editor of the Atlantic Monthly as well as his own writings, including the Christmas story "Christmas Every Day" and the novel The Rise of...
"the littleism" or "thin" realism of his fiction.
She is best remembered for her "California Series", several novels and short stories dealing with the social history of California. The series includes The Splendid, Idle Forties (1902); The Conqueror (1902), which is a fictionalized biography of Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...
; and her sensational, semi-autobiographical novel Black Oxen (1923), about a upper middle-age woman, who miraculously becomes young again after glandular therapy. The latter was adopted into the film Black Oxen
Black Oxen
Black Oxen is an American silent film released in December 1923, starring Corinne Griffith, Conway Tearle and Clara Bow and based on the novel by Gertrude Atherton...
in 1923.
Her novels often feature strong heroines who pursue independent lives, undoubtedly a reaction to her stifling married life. "The Foghorn," written in 1933, is a psychological horror story that has been compared to The Yellow Wallpaper
The Yellow Wallpaper
"The Yellow Wallpaper" is a short story by the American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman, first published in January 1892 in The New England Magazine. It is regarded as an important early work of American feminist literature, illustrating attitudes in the nineteenth century toward women's physical...
. W. Somerset Maugham
W. Somerset Maugham
William Somerset Maugham , CH was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and, reputedly, the highest paid author during the 1930s.-Childhood and education:...
called it a powerful story in a 1943 publication of his, Great Modern Reading.
In 2009, The Library of America selected Atherton’s story "The Striding Place" for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American Fantastic Tales.
Legacy
Atherton was often compared to counterparts like Henry JamesHenry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
and Edith Wharton
Edith Wharton
Edith Wharton , was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, short story writer, and designer.- Early life and marriage:...
. James assessed Atherton's work and he found the author had reduced the typical man/woman relationship to a personality clash.
Atherton was a founding member of the Writer's League of America, besides a strong advocate of social reform, and, as the grande dame of California literature, a leader in promoting a California cultural identity. She was a personal friend of Senator James Phelan and his nephew the philanthropist Noel Sullivan, and often was a guest at their estate, the Villa Montalvo. Among her celebrity friends was travel writer Richard Halliburton
Richard Halliburton
Richard Halliburton was an American traveler, adventurer, and author. Best known today for having swum the length of the Panama Canal and paying the lowest toll in its history—thirty-six cents—Halliburton was headline news for most of his brief career...
who shared her interest in artists' rights, and whose disappearance at sea she lamented. Though she could be offensively assertive with her acerbic wit, notes Gerry Max, she valorously embraced many of the key intellectual freedom issues of her day, especially those involved with women's rights, and remained, throughout a long creative life, a true friend to writers.
An early feminist well acquainted with the plight of women, Atherton was ultimately an egalitarian. She knew "the pain of sexual repression, knew the cost of strength required to escape it (strength some women do not have to spend), knew its scars—the scars that made her wary of emotional commitment and relegated her, despite her splendid professional triumphs and her surpassing benefit to women, to largely an observer role in human relations. She knew the full cost of the destructive battle of the sexes, and urged that it end at last with true sexual equality."
Quotes
Charlotte S. McClure in a Dictionary of Literary BiographyDictionary of Literary Biography
The Dictionary of Literary Biography is a specialist encyclopedia dedicated to literature. Published by Gale, the 375-volumes set covers a wide variety of literary topics, periods, and genres, with a focus on American and British literature....
essay said she (Atherton): "redefined women's potential and presented a psychological drama of a woman's quest for identity and for a life purpose and happiness within and beyond her procreative function, " She also said that Patience Sparhawk was Atherton's "first significant novel."
In a 1898 essay in Bookman
The Bookman (New York)
The Bookman was a literary journal established in 1895 by Dodd, Mead and Company. It drew its name from the phrase, "I am a Bookman," by James Russell Lowell; the phrase regularly appeared on the cover and title page of the bound edition. It was purchased in 1918 by the George H. Doran Company. In...
, a critic stated:
"the amazing and memorable Patience Sparhawk may perhaps be referred to as the first foreshadowing of the good work that [Atherton] has done since. It seems to have been also generally conceded that no matter what the subject chanced to be . . . nothing from her pen would be commonplace or dull. [But] that startling performance [in Patience Sparhawk] introduced her to a different audience, one much larger and more seriously interested than she had had before."
Carl van Vechten
Carl van Vechten
Carl Van Vechten was an American writer and photographer who was a patron of the Harlem Renaissance and the literary executor of Gertrude Stein.-Biography:...
said of Atherton in a Nation
The Nation
The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...
article: "Usually (not always, to be sure), the work of Mrs. Wharton seems to me to be scrupulous, clever and uninspiring, while that of Mrs. Atherton is often careless, sprawling, but inspired. Mrs. Wharton, with some difficulty, it would appear, has learned to write; Mrs. Atherton was born with a facility for telling stories."
In an essay for Bookman
The Bookman (New York)
The Bookman was a literary journal established in 1895 by Dodd, Mead and Company. It drew its name from the phrase, "I am a Bookman," by James Russell Lowell; the phrase regularly appeared on the cover and title page of the bound edition. It was purchased in 1918 by the George H. Doran Company. In...
, Frederic Taber Cooper
Frederic Taber Cooper
Frederic Taber Cooper, Ph.D. was an American editor and writer. He was born May 27, 1864 in New York City, graduated from Harvard University in 1886 and obtained an LL.B. from Columbia University in 1887....
stated that in Senator North, the character Harriet "is practically a white woman but for a scarcely perceptible blueness at the base of her fingernails, this character of Harriet is perhaps the best bit of feminine analysis that Mrs. Atherton ever did."
Atherton's autobiography Adventures of a Novelist (New York: Horace Liveright, 1932) is a lively, often quotable, account of both her own tempestuous life and the many remarkable people, including Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
and Senator James Duval Phelan, who filled it. It is also features engaging historical reminiscences of San Francisco in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Controversial Comments
Gertrude Atherton made some controversial comments during her career. However, amongst the most vicious and unprovoked was her shallow and cruel assault on Pio PicoPío Pico
Pío de Jesús Pico was the last Governor of Alta California under Mexican rule.-Origins:...
, the last Mexican governor of California. Pio Pico suffered from severe facial disfigurement that may have been due to acromegaly
Acromegaly
Acromegaly is a syndrome that results when the anterior pituitary gland produces excess growth hormone after epiphyseal plate closure at puberty...
caused by a pituitary tumor. In 1902 Atherton ridiculed Pio Pico's facial disfigurement as follows:
“…an uglier man than Pio Pico rarely had entered this world. The upper lip of his enormous mouth dipped at the middle; the broad thick under lip hung down with its own weight. The nose was big and coarse, although there was a certain spirited suggestion in the cavernous nostrils…”
Her apparent shallow and superficial tendencies to revile and disrespect those people whom she considered physically flawed were consistent with an admission she made in her memoir Adventures of a Novelist (1932), where she reveals that she made an excuse to avoid meeting Oscar Wilde because she thought he was physically repulsive.
Literature
- What Dreams May Come (1888), as Frank Lin
- Hermia Suydam (1889)
- Los Cerritos (1890)
- A Questions of Time (1891)
- The Doomswoman (1893)
- Before the Gringo Came (1894), revised and enlarged as The Splendid Idle Forties: Stories of Old California (1902)
- A Whirl Asunder (1895)
- His Fortunate Grace (1897)
- Patience Sparhawk and Her Times (1897)
- American Wives and English Husbands (1898)
- The Californians (1898)
- The Valiant Runaways (1898)
- A Daughter of the Vine (1899)
- Senator North (1900)
- The Aristocrats (1901)
- The Conqueror, Being the True and Romantic Story of Alexander Hamilton (1902)
- Heart of Hyacinth (1903)
- Mrs. Pendleton's Four-in-Hand (1903)
- Rulers of Kings (1904)
- The Bell in the Fog, and Other Stories (1905)
- The Travelling Thirds (1905)
- Rezanov (1906)
- Ancestors (1907)
- The Gorgeous Isle (1908)
- Tower of Ivory (1910)
- Julia France and Her Times (1912)
- Perch of the Devil (1914)
- California, An Intimate History (1914), revised and enlarged in 1971
- Life in the War Zone (1916)
- Mrs. Belfame (1916)
- The Living Present (1917) – Book I: French Women in Wartime; Book II: Feminism in Peace and War
- The White Morning: a Novel of the Power of the German Women in Wartime (1918)
- The Avalanche: A Mystery Story (1919)
- Transplanted (1919)
- The Sisters-in-Law: A Novel of Our Times (1921)
- Sleeping Fires (1922)
- Black Oxen (1923)
- The Crystal Cup (1925)
- The Immortal Marriage (1927)
- The Jealous Gods, A Processional Novel of the Fifth Century B.C. (Concerning One Alcibiades) (1928)
- Dido: Queen of Hearts (1929)
- The Sophisticates (1931)
- Adventures of a Novelist (1932)
- The Foghorn: Stories (1934)
- California: An Intimate History (1936)
- Golden Peacock (1936)
- Rezánov and Doña Concha (1937)
- Can Women Be Gentlemen? (1938)
- The House of Lee (1940)
- The Horn of Life (1942)
- The Conqueror (1943)
- Golden Gate Country (1945)
- My San Francisco (1946)
Other Contributions
- The Spinsters' Book of Fiction (wrote: Concha Arguëllo, Sister Dominica)(1907), made to help out her friend Ina CoolbrithIna CoolbrithIna Donna Coolbrith was an American poet, writer, librarian, and a prominent figure in the San Francisco Bay Area literary community...
- What Is a Book? (1935)
Sources
- Leider, Emily Wortis, California's Daughter. Gertrude Atherton and her Times, Stanford U.P. 1991
- The Literature Network
- Preface to The Sisters-in-Law
- Laing, Alexander, ed. The Haunted Omnibus, 1965