Live Alone and Like It: The Classic Guide for the Single Woman [Paperback]

Marjorie Hillis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 13, 2008

"Whether you view your one-woman ménage as Doom or Adventure, you need a plan, if you are going to make the best of it."

Thus begins Marjorie Hillis' archly funny, gently prescriptive manifesto for single women. Though it was 1936 when the Vogue editor first shared her wisdom with her fellow singletons, the tome has been passed lovingly through the generations, and is even more apt today than when it was first published. Hillis, a true bon vivant, was sick and tired of hearing single women carping about their living arrangements and lonely lives; this book is her invaluable wake-up call for single women to take control and enjoy their circumstances.

Hillis takes readers through the fundamentals of living alone, including the importance of creating a hospitable environment at home, cultivating hobbies that keep her there ("for no woman can accept an invitation every night without coming to grief"), the question of whether single ladies may entertain men at home (the answer may surprise you!), and many more.

With engaging chapter titles like "A Lady and Her Liquor" and "The Pleasures of a Single Bed," along with a new preface by author Laurie Graff (You Have to Kiss A Lot of Frogs), LIVE ALONE AND LIKE IT is sure to appeal to live-aloners and many other readers alike.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

First published in 1936, with the chilling subtitle A Guide for the Extra Woman, this bestseller became a manifesto for single women (and those between husbands) keen on embarking on stylish solitary living. Although many of Hillis's prescriptions are naturally outmoded, it's impossible not to be charmed by her arch humor and old Hollywood glamour as she demands that her genteel readers simply must have four bed jackets, seven kinds of liquor and the right cold cream. A Vogue editor and proponent of solitary refinement, Hillis exhorts women to indulge themselves unblushingly—albeit thriftily—within their homes. Despite her fascination with frou-frou and beaux, Hillis bucks convention—arguing that women should be free to entertain men at home, drink in bars and generally do as they please; you will soon find that independence, more truthfully than virtue, is its own reward, she advises. If slight on prescriptions suitable to modern-day living, this slim guide is replete with entertaining illustrations by Cipé Pineles and case studies about live-aloners (Miss P. is a young woman of limited income, but unlimited ingenuity...) providing ample nostalgic pleasure. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

Candace Bushnell, your time's up. Drain your cosmo and step aside. You've been usurped by yet another single-woman arbiter: Marjorie Hillis, the author of Live Alone and Like It Saturday Post (Canada) Richly deserves to be this year's Christmas best-seller ... a perfect bedside companion for the post-Bridget Jones generation, who see no reason to put their lives on hold until Mr Right appears The Daily Telegraph (Canada) --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: 5 Spot; 1st Us Edition edition (June 13, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446178225
• ISBN-13: 978-0446178228
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.5 x 7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #723,531 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 41 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I'm stunned and delighted... January 15, 2005

By Amazoniac

Format:Hardcover

... to see that this book, first published in 1936, is being re-published. I discovered Marjorie Hillis Roulston through her second book "Orchids on Your Budget," a 1937 book for Depression survivors (the 1930's depression, not the modern kind) to help them keep up their spirits and appearances when in dire financial circumstances. I searched the net and found her other books, "Corned Beef and Caviar," and "You Can Start Again." All four books are delightful with a perky, saucy, just-between-us-girls tone that is absolutely charming. Imagine Carrie Bradshaw in a tailored suit, becoming hat, and white, wrist-length cotton gloves.

One of the most captivating features of the book are the "cases." At the end of each chapter in each of the books, she describes individuals who have adopted her principles to their own benefit, or failed to do so, and are suffering the consequences. In one pair of cases, she describes two different girls-- yes, we're all just "girls," but it's okay-- who spend their weekends in contrasting ways. Girl A plans her time wisely, going for beauty treatments after work on Saturday afternoon, being served sherry and then dinner by the maid she had the foresight to hire for the day, spending Sunday morning in bed reading the papers and gossiping on the phone while attired in her best bed jacket, then concluding the weekend by attending evening Vespers, followed by a hot date. Girl B just piddles the weekend away and can't get her act together.

I've read all four books so often that I get them mixed up, but she talks about entertaining in your apartment if you don't have a kitchen or access to any ice(!). The solution: a shelf stocked with foreign crackers, spreads in jars, cute knives, red glass plates from the dime store, and sherry. She makes the assumption that a single woman will not know how to cook, describes dinner parties ranging from one where you serve canned spaghetti in a chafing dish, to one where you venture gamely into ethnic neighborhoods to buy exotic tidbits, to one where you will need to hire a maid to help you cook-- "don't worry about how to make this dish-- any competent maid will be able to handle it."

The books are endlessly fascinating for the window into an era and lifestyle far from today-- New York in the late 30's through the early 50's. There are probably some things in here that are sexist to today's sensibility, but you know what? who cares. The books are a treat from beginning to end.

I would love to know more about Marjorie Hillis Roulston and regularly search the internet for anything about her. I recently found a reprint of an article by her in the publication of the Art Deco Society (art-deco.org). It seems that there may have been another book by her entitled "New York: Fair or Not Fair." I've had no luck finding it.

If any relatives or descendents of Mrs. Roulston read this, I want to say to them that reading her books has given me hours of pleasure, and I bless her memory often.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I yelped with joy when I saw that this book has been reprinted... July 9, 2006

By Nina Karp

Format:Hardcover

...I've hunted down used copies for a half-dozen people, and now gift-giving will be a lot easier.

This book is more than just a primer for living alone happily; it's a primer for living happily and independantly, no matter your age or marital status. While there's considerable "period" charm to be found in her stories and advice, this book is by no means a quaint period piece. It's packed full of (often very funny) practical wisdom that's just as vibrant for a woman living today as in the 1930s.

Be warned, though: one thing Miss Hillis cannot abide is self-pity, so this book offers several invigorating slaps to those who see loneliness as "an affliction sent by Providence like a hare-lip, instead of self-inflicted torture, like a hair shirt". Her advice on living a rich and full single life is so inspiring that it's a bit of a pity to find out that she eventually forsook "the pleasures of a single bed."

Highly, highly recommended.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A True Pioneer July 7, 2009

By Sheila

Format:Paperback

1936...People were listening to the Green Hornet on the radio, reading Gone with the Wind. Jesse Owens made history at the Olympics held in Berlin. Franklin D. Roosevelt is reelected to a second term. Events were set in motion that would lead to the second World War. In the United States, the role of women was more conventional than it is today, but nevertheless women began finding themselves competitive in the workplace, living their lives apart from their parents, unmarried, and having a marvelous time.

Author Marjorie Hillis worked as assistant editor for Vogue magazine and was inspired by depressing tales of lone women wasting their lives, feeling sorry for themselves, or otherwise receiving a bad reputation from society at large. Her book "Live Alone and Like It" is a merciless appeal to single women living alone. Enjoy your life; do exactly as you please. Those that don't approve of you don't matter. What she had to say was, at the time, nothing short of revolutionary.

Today, us single women like to think we're fantastically liberated, appreciated, secure in ourselves. In many cases, though, the opposite is still true. It cold, hard data, the attitude toward single women living alone is not much different than it was in 1936. If we're not prudish we're sluts; if we're professional, we're consumed by our work; if we're independent we're picky, dependent and we're clingy. This book, and others that have been written since, has provided a lit up and mind-expanding view on what it means to be a single woman living alone. In truth, it's fabulous, one of the best-kept secrets of our time.

Enjoy the unconventional, refreshing language, quips, and tongue-in-cheek humor that was appropriate to the '30s but no less amusing today. Though you may not have your own personal maid, you may be no less able to appreciate the liberating intentions of the author, and learn how to make a killer cocktail in the meantime.