Powell, Dawn 1896(?)-1965

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POWELL, Dawn 1896(?)-1965

PERSONAL: Born August 24, 1896 (some sources say November 28, 1897), in Mount Gilead, OH; died November 15, 1965, in NY; daughter of Roy K. and Hattie B. (Sherman) Powell; married Joseph Roebuck Gousha (in advertising), November 20, 1920 (deceased); children: Joseph Roebuck, Jr. Education: Lake Erie College, B.A., 1918. Hobbies and other interests: The theater, art galleries, delving into history of New York City and environs.

CAREER: Professional writer who began her career in New York, NY, working in publicity. Military service: U.S. Naval Reserve, Communications Service, 1918.

MEMBER: PEN.

AWARDS, HONORS: D.Litt., Lake Erie College, 1960; Marjorie Peabody Award, National Institute of Arts and Letters, 1964.

WRITINGS:

Whither, Small, Maynard (Boston, MA), 1925.

She Walks in Beauty, Brentano's (New York, NY), 1928.

The Bride's House, Brentano's (New York, NY), 1929, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1998.

Dance Night (also see below), Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1930, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1999.

The Tenth Moon, Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1932, published as Come Back to Sorrento (also see below), introduction by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1997.

Jig Saw: A Comedy, Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1934.

The Story of a Country Boy, Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1934, published with foreword by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 2001.

Turn, Magic Wheel (also see below), Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1936, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1999.

The Happy Island, Farrar & Rinehart (New York, NY), 1938, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1998.

Angels on Toast (also see below), Scribner (New York, NY), 1940, revised edition published as A Man's Affair, Fawcett (New York, NY), 1956, published as Angels on Toast, introduction by Gore Vidal, Vintage Books (New York, NY), 1989.

A Time to Be Born (also see below), Scribner (New York, NY), 1942, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1995.

My Home Is Far Away (also see below), Scribner (New York, NY), 1944, published with introduction by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1995.

The Locusts Have No King (also see below), Scribner (New York, NY), 1948, published with introduction by John Guare, Yarrow Press (New York, NY), 1990.

Sunday, Monday and Always (short stories), Houghton (Boston, MA), 1952, published with introduction and further selection by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1999.

The Wicked Pavilion (also see below), Houghton (Boston, MA), 1954, published with introduction by Gore Vidal, Vintage Books (New York, NY), 1990.

A Cage for Lovers, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1957.

The Golden Spur (also see below), Viking (New York, NY), 1962, published with introduction by Gore Vidal, Vintage Books (New York, NY), 1990.

Dawn Powell at Her Best, edited and with an introduction by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1994.

The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, edited and with an introduction by Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1995.

Selected Letters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, edited and with an introduction by Tim Page, Holt (New York, NY), 1999.

Novels, 1930-1942 (includes Dance Night, Come Back to Sorrento, Angels on Toast, A Time to Be Born, and Turn, Magic Wheel), Library of America (New York, NY), 2001.

Novels, 1944-1962 (includes My Home Is Far Away,The Locusts Have No King, The Wicked Pavilion, and The Golden Spur), Library of America (New York, NY), 2001.

PLAYS

Big Night, produced by Group Theatre, 1933.

Jig Saw (comedy), produced by Theatre Guild, 1934.

Lady Comes Across (musical comedy), produced 1941.

Four Plays, edited and with an introduction by Michael Sexton and Tim Page, Steerforth Press (South Royalton, VT), 1999.

OTHER

Also author of radio scripts for WOR show "Music and Manners," 1939-40; author of television scripts and film scripts; author of libretto "I'll Marry You Sunday," 1943. Contributor of short stories to periodicals, including the New Yorker, Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, Story, Collier's, Today's Woman, and Mademoiselle. Book critic, Mademoiselle, 1943-44; contributor of other reviews and articles to Harper's Bazaar, New York Evening Post, Nation, and Life.

SIDELIGHTS: Dawn Powell was born and raised in Ohio, but spent most of her life in Greenwich Village—a major setting for her novels. She "devoted nearly all her energies to chronicling the fauna (genus homo sapiens) of her adopted town," reported a New York Herald Tribune writer upon her death, "concentrating mainly on such sub-species as the Double-Dyed Phony, the Barshopping Lush and the Love-Nesting Roundheels. And she preached no Midwesterner's sermon about her characters and their lives. 'I don't think satire is what I do,' she told an interviewer some years ago. 'I think its realism. It's not making fun. It's just telling the truth.'" Indeed, contemporary reviewers are divided according to whether they felt Powell was making fun of her characters, and of this group, whether they thought she was funny or merely malicious, and those who felt, as Edith H. Walton wrote in a New York Times Book Review piece on Turn, Magic Wheel, that despite Powell's "somewhat overexuberant" sense of humor, her writing "rings savagely true."

The daughter of a traveling salesman, Powell was largely raised by relatives in different parts of the Midwest following the death of her mother when she was six years old. Her father later married an enormously cruel woman, whose decision to burn the young Powell's diaries and stories inspired the girl to run away from home with thirty cents in her pocket. She landed at the home of an eccentric and much loved aunt in Shelby, Ohio. There the young writer-to-be went to school, wrote for the college newspaper, and participated in the theater, all the while working to earn her keep. In 1918, Powell escaped to New York City as a member of the Red Cross. Remaining in the city following the Armistice, she worked a variety of jobs, fell in love, married, and had a child. In 1925, she published her first novel, Whither, which she later disavowed. A second novel, She Walks in Beauty, was more characteristic of her later style and earned some critical notice. Set in a small Midwestern town, She Walks in Beauty focuses on two daughters: the elder, Linda, is a narcissist who is ashamed of her impoverished life at her Aunt Jane's boardinghouse, while the younger, Dorrie, embraces her situation. Another early novel, Dance Night, set in a rough Ohio town, explores lovelessness through its depiction of Morry, the dissatisfied son of a traveling salesman, and Jen, an orphan whom he befriends. The bleakness of the characters' lives is emphasized in the conclusion, when Morry's mother kills his father after years of tolerating false accusations of adultery.

Beginning with Turn, Magic Wheel in 1936, Powell initiated a series of novels set in and around Manhattan and Greenwich Village that some critics have designated her New York cycle. Turn, Magic Wheel revolves around the Manhattan world of publishers and writers, of the wealthy and the famous, and of those who aspire to wealth and fame. Effie, a charming, middle-aged woman, has organized her life around the seemingly futile belief that her husband, Andrew Callingham, a famous novelist presumably based on Ernest Hemingway, will return to her after a fifteen years' absence. Dennis Orphen, an inventive young novelist and recurring character in Powell's narratives whom Gore Vidal called "a male surrogate for Powell herself," believes he has treated her pathetic situation realistically in an unauthorized roman a clef. As is typical in Powell's works, however, expectations are defeated, and Callingham returns to Effie. Powell's next novel, The Happy Island, centers on Prudence Bly, an intelligent, witty young woman who is prompted by her lover's infidelity to reassess her lifestyle. After becoming involved with an unassuming young playwright from her home town in Ohio, Prudence rejects the pressures of urban life and moves with him to the countryside. She soon tires of rural life, however, and returns to New York City after realizing that she has adapted better to urban values.

Powell's next novel, Angels on Toast, focuses on two philandering businessmen who travel to Chicago and become involved in secret love affairs that end in farces of cross-purposes. The machinations of urban society are the subject of A Time to Be Born, in which a beautiful and opportunistic young woman becomes the celebrated wife of a powerful publisher by exploiting the abilities and ideas of others. Rose Feld, writing in the New York Herald Tribune Books at the time of the book's publication, remarked: "To say it's brilliant, it's witty, it's penetrating, it's mature isn't enough.... Because there is something more in this volume than the exercise of a mind that is as daring as it is keen; there is emotional flavor and pungency which make it greater than an intellectual tour de force." On the occasion of its 1991 reprint, a contributor to Publishers Weekly contended, "Powell's spoof of the high and mighty still sizzles half a century after it was written."

Powell's later novels, in which she subtly portrays the demise of New York café society, are generally regarded as more exact in subject, execution, and style than her earlier works. The Locusts Have No King, for example, depicts the frustrations of a typical group of rootless Manhattanites. This work features Frederick Olliver, a shy, indigent young writer living in Greenwich Village who appears in several of Powell's novels. In The Locusts Have No King, Frederick is driven by a failed love affair with a sensitive young playwright to become involved with a self-absorbed, promiscuous woman who serves as an appropriate target for Powell's venomous wit. Her next novel, The Wicked Pavilion, is set in and around the Café Julien, a fictional locale similar to New York City's Lafayette Café, where Powell and other bohemian figures of her circle often met for drinks and conversation. As the Café Julien is destroyed at the book's conclusion, Dennis Orphen recognizes the event as heralding the end of an era. Powell's last novel, The Golden Spur, is named for an old New York bar where Jonathan Jaimison, a provincial from Ohio, journeys after discovering that he is the illegitimate child of a famous man. Jonathan's search for his father eventually involves three men, each of whom attempts to play the prospect to his own advantage.

New York bars and literary cafés are featured as prominently in Powell's record of her own life as in her fiction. In her review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, Doris Earnshaw, writing in World Literature Today, remarked, "What a social life! Constant hard drinking at lunches, dinners, and parties; physical breakdowns, hospital stays." But the diaries were also the place where Powell recorded the insights into character that were the fodder for her satirical novels. "In this record of a writer's life, circa 1931-1965, readers of her New York novels will recognize the original or the prototypes of her major and bit players and the preliminary sketches of their habits and their habitats. Here, for the first time, we watch them perform," remarked Daniel Aaron in the New Republic. "She was the unrivaled observer of her piece of New York turf," Aaron concluded.

It is perhaps because readers did not know what to make of them that Powell's books failed to achieve the success during her lifetime that many thought they deserved, some have ventured. Others contend that Powell failed to win over large audiences because her readers saw themselves in the objects of her satire. "For decades Dawn Powell was always just on the verge of ceasing to be a cult and becoming a major religion," wrote Gore Vidal in his pivotal 1987 retrospective for the New York Review of Books. Edmund Wilson, a longtime champion of Powell's work, wrote in the New Yorker on the occasion of the publication of The Golden Spur, Powell's last novel: "Dawn Powell's novels are among the most amusing being written, and in this respect quite on a level with those of Anthony Powell, Evelyn Waugh and Muriel Spark. Miss Powell's success in England shows, I think, that she is closer to this high social comedy than to any accepted brand of American humor—and the English do not insist on having the women in their fiction made attractive. Miss Powell's books are more than merely funny; they are full of psychological insights that are at once sympathetic and cynical." But it was Vidal's essay, written twenty-five years later, that is credited with reviving interest in Powell's writings. Throughout the 1990s, new editions of Powell's best-loved novels, a selection from her diaries and letters, and a biography were published under the editorship of Tim Page, and in 2001 and 2002 the prestigious Library of America reprinted Powell's novels in two volumes. "Together with her diaries and selected letters, these volumes firmly establish Powell's contribution to American literature," observed Denise S. Sticha in Library Journal.

J. B. Priestley, in a letter to Village Voice, once wrote: "She was undervalued here [in England] and I suspect she was too on your side. Her best work represents an admirable mixture, not often found, of humour, genuine sentiment (born of compassion), and very shrewd and sharp satire. It is also entirely lacking in pretentiousness, showing off, and self-pity, which makes it a nice change from a lot of contemporary fiction.... She did not pretend to be a genius. She made the best use of a real and enjoyable talent."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Contemporary Literary Criticism, Volume 66, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1991.

Page, Tim, Dawn Powell: A Biography, Holt (New York, NY), 1998.

Van Gelder, Robert, Writers and Writing, Scribner (New York, NY), 1946.

PERIODICALS

American Book Review, April, 1996, review of MyHome Is Far Away and The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 4.

American Heritage, April, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 148.

American Spectator, December, 1991, review of TheWicked Pavilion, The Golden Spur, Angels on Toast, and The Locusts Have No King, p. 17.

Belles Lettres, fall, 1990, review of Angels on Toast, p. 57; winter, 1996, review of My Home Is Far Away and The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 13.

Booklist, November 1, 1995, review of The Diaries ofDawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 450; October 1, 1999, review of Four Plays by Dawn Powell, p. 338; November 15, 1999, review of Four Plays by Dawn Powell, p. 595.

Book World, March 18, 1990, Michael Dirda, "Satyricon in Manhattan," review of The Locusts Have No King, Angels on Toast, and The Golden Spur, p. 10; October 6, 1991, review of A Time to Be Born, p. 12; February 11, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 6.

Choice, March, 1996, review of The Diaries of DawnPowell, 1931-1965, p. 1136.

Christian Science Monitor, December 2, 1994, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. 10.

Commonweal, February 23, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 24.

Economist, December 14, 1991, review of A Time toBe Born, p. 96.

Globe and Mail (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), November 20, 1999, review of Selected Letters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, p. D26.

Hungry Mind Review, winter, 1999, review of SelectedLetters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, p. 10.

Kirkus Reviews, August 15, 1994, review of DawnPowell at Her Best, p. 1079; September 15, 1995, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 1334; October 15, 1995, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 62; September 1, 1999, review of Four Plays by Dawn Powell, p. 1389.

Library Journal, February 1, 1990, review of The Locusts Have No King, p. 113; May 1, 1990, review of Angels on Toast, The Wicked Pavilion, and The Golden Spur, p. 119; April 15, 1991, review of A Time to Be Born, p. 130; October 1, 1994, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. 121; January, 1995, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. 51; November 1, 1995, review of My Home Is Far Away, p. 112; February 1, 1996, review of The Locusts Have No King, p. 104; September 15, 1996, review of A Time to Be Born and Angels on Toast, p. 102; December, 1997, review of The Golden Spur and Come Back to Sorrento, p. 160; November 15, 1998, review of The Happy Island, p. 96; December, 1998, review of The Bride's House, p. 163; November 15, 1999, review of Four Plays by Dawn Powell, p. 69; February 1, 2000, Michael Rogers, review of Sunday, Monday, and Always, p. 122; December, 2000, Michael Rogers, review of Sunday, Monday, and Always, p. 198; April 1, 2001, review of The Story of a Country Boy, p. 139; September 15, 2001, Denise S. Sticha, review of Novels, 1930-1942, p. 80, and Michael Rogers, p. 118; January, 2002, Michael Rogers, review of Novels, 1944-1962, p. 160.

London Review of Books, February 22, 2001, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 19. Los Angeles Times Book Review, March 25, 1990, review of The Wicked Pavilion, p. 10.

Nation, September 19, 1942, Diana Trilling, review of A Time to Be Born, pp. 243-244; May 29, 1948, Diana Trilling, review of The Locusts Have No King, pp. 611-612.

National Review, December 23, 1996, review of TheLocusts Have No King, p. 55.

New Criterion, February, 1993, Lauren Weiner.

New Republic, May 27, 1936, Jerre Mangione, "The Almost Perfect Scream," pp. 80-81; October 28, 1940, Otis Ferguson, "Far from Main Street," p. 599; April 8, 1996, Daniel Aaron, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 37.

New Yorker, November 11, 1944, Edmund Wilson, review of My Home Is Far Away, pp. 87-88; October 16, 1954, Brendan Gill, "Rough and Smooth," review of The Wicked Pavilion, pp. 155-156, 158; November 17, 1962, Edmund Wilson, "Dawn Powell: Greenwich Village in the Fifties," pp. 233-236, 238; February 20, 1995, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. 262; December 27, 1999, review of Selected Letters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, p. 137.

New York Herald Tribune, November 16, 1965.

New York Herald Tribune Book Review, May 2, 1948, Florence Haxton Bullock, "Grim Round of Pleasure," review of The Locusts Have No King, p. 6; September 26, 1954.

New York Herald Tribune Books, September 11, 1938, William Soskin, "Laughing Amid Café Society," p. 3; October 6, 1940, Rose Feld, review of Angels on Toast, p. 12; September 6, 1942, Rose Feld, "Glitter Girl in the Spotlight," p. 5.

New York Review of Books, November 5, 1987, Gore Vidal, "Dawn Powell, the American Writer," pp. 52-60; March 21, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 4.

New York Times, November 16, 1965; October 19, 1994, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. C 18; October 22, 1999, review of Selected Letters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, p. E49.

New York Times Book Review, February 23, 1936, Edith H. Walton, "An Ironic Comedy of Lit'ry Manhattanites," p. 7; September 4, 1938, Edith H. Walton, "Café Society," p. 7; September 6, 1942, Beatrice Sherman, review of A Time to Be Born, p. 6; November 19, 1944, Ruth Page, "Surrey Ride, minus the Sentiment," p. 4; September 5, 1954, Frederic Morton, "And Where Went Love?," p. 5; October 14, 1962, Morris Gilbert, "In Search of a Father," p. 40; April 1, 1990, review of Angels on Toast and The Wicked Pavilion, p. 32; November 26, 1995, Terry Teachout, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell and My Home Is Far Away, p. 9; December 3, 1995, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 74; December 8, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 85; October 5, 1997, review of The Golden Spur and Come Back to Sorrento, p. 36; November 22, 1998, review of The Happy Island, The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, and The Bride's House, p. 42; December 6, 1998, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 42; February 21, 1999, review of Turn, Magic Wheel, p. 32; December 12, 1999, review of Sunday, Monday, and Always, p. 48; November 7, 1999, review of Selected Letters of Dawn Powell, 1913-1965, p. 18.

Publishers Weekly, January 19, 1990, review of TheLocusts Have No King, p. 104; August 30, 1991, review of A Time to Be Born, p. 76; November 1, 1991, review of A Time to Be Born, p. 22; September 19, 1994, review of Dawn Powell at Her Best, p. 52; September 25, 1995, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 38; October 16, 1995, review of My Home Is Far Away, p. 55; September 6, 1999, review of Four Plays by Dawn Powell, p. 83.

Review of Contemporary Fiction, summer, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 196.

San Francisco Review of Books, April, 1991, review of A Time to Be Born and The Locusts Have No King, p. 45.

Southern Review, winter, 1973, Matthew Josephson, "Dawn Powell: A Woman of Esprit," pp. 18-52.

Times Literary Supplement, October 25, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 32; February 16, 2001, review of Come Back to Sorrento, p. 21.

Tribune Books, April 22, 1990, Joseph Coates, "Forgotten No More," p. 3; January 7, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 7.

Vanity Fair, February, 1990.

Village Voice, December 9, 1965, J. B. Priestley, letter to the editor.

Village Voice Literary Supplement, April, 1990, review of The Wicked Pavilion, The Golden Spur, Angels on Toast, and The Locusts Have No King, p. 29; June, 1990, Michael Feingold, "New York Stories: Dawn Powell's Acid Texts," pp. 12-14; December, 1995, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 23.

Wilson Quarterly, spring, 1996, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 77.

Women's Review of Books, July, 1990, review of TheWicked Pavilion, The Locusts Have No King, The Golden Spur, and Angels on Toast, p. 20; January, 1996, review of My Home Is Far Away and The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 6.

World Literature Today, summer, 1996, Doris Earnshaw, review of The Diaries of Dawn Powell, 1931-1965, p. 705.