On March 12, 1993, Lillian Gish's memorial service was attended by a host of celebrities whose lives had been touched by her long and remarkable career. From her first film, An Unseen Enemy (1912), to her last, The Whales of August (1987), Lillian Gish personified film. With a theatrical career spanning nearly 100 years, Gish saw motion pictures evolve from flickers to blockbusters. Almost always playing someone who needed to be rescued or protected, her trademark delicacy and vulnerability were, however, only part of her persona. She was a strong and complex woman whose painful childhood taught her frugality, love for her mother and her sister, Dorothy, and a distrust of men. In this, her most complete biography, the author, who was her friend, chronicles the hardships, heartaches, and fierce determination that shaped her from her days as a fatherless child to those as head of her family, and on to a time when she became nearly a legend. Featuring rare photographs and intimate recollections of Lillian, Dorothy, and other important figures, the biography is helpful in understanding film history as well as one of its most beautiful and important figures.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Review
Internationally acclaimed silent film pianist Stuart Oderman lives in East Orange, New Jersey. Through his fascinating career, Oderman has met many famous people; for example, his relationship with Lillian Gish spanned four decades. --Choice
"Rich interviews…informative" --The New York Review of Books
"Exhaustive research" --Classic Images --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
"Rich interviews…informative" --The New York Review of Books
"Exhaustive research" --Classic Images --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
About the Author
Internationally acclaimed silent film pianist Stuart Oderman knew Lillian Gish for four decades. He is also the author of Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle (1994). He lives in East Orange, New Jersey.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
An Amateur Effort,
By
This review is from: Lillian Gish: A Life on Stage and Screen (Hardcover)
Generally, the best biographies are *not* written by people who were friends of their subjects. Oderman's book is no exception to this rule. A long-time friend of Lillian Gish's, Oderman lacks the critical distance that incisive biography requires. He interviewed many sources, but he seems to have accepted their statements more or less without question, and his analysis, both of Gish and of film, is sketchy and superficial. Stylistically, Oderman's prose suffers from repetition, awkward phrasing, and a disconcerting lack of transitions. If he plans to publish more works with McFarland Press, he might consider asking them to find better copy editors. Typos, apostrophe errors, and usage gaffes such as "did not phase her" abound throughout the text. The most valuable parts of the book are the many quotations from Gish herself and from her contemporaries.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Very Thorough Study,
By
This review is from: Lillian Gish: A Life on Stage and Screen (Hardcover)
This book is a very insightful study of a very great lady. I especially enjoyed the textbook format. But I would agree with one other reviewer that it was not proofread as well as it should have been. I had the great fortune to know Miss Gish, having been her and her sister Dorothy's neighbor in 1965 while she was at the Stratford theatre in Connecticut. I have personal photos which I would like to share with Mr. Oderman if he would e-mail me at JimFan630@aol.com . I am also fortunate to have several letters (typed with a full signature), a hand writted postcard and a personally written note sent after Dorothy's death. I would not part with them for the world! Miss Gish was a rare treasure and we will not see her like again. Thank you, Mr. Oderman!
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Friend's Appreciation,
By G. Pillson "georgiepillson" (Tilling on Rye) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Lillian Gish: A Life on Stage and Screen (Hardcover)
"A Life on Stage and Screen" is an affectionate tribute to a woman the author clearly much admires. That said, it's still not the authoritative critical biography that Gish's status as an artist deserves. Oderman's writing is functional at best, and he provides little critical perspective on Gish's post-silent career, relying instead on a straightforward "and then she did this, and then that" approach. Even so, it's good at last to have some work in addition to her own memoir by which to gauge Miss Gish's life and works, and the author's personal touch does illumine what he presents as a rather sad off-screen/off-stage life.
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