The wife of radical journalist John Reed, Louise Bryant was a pioneering reporter and shrewd social activist, a committed feminist and champion of sexual freedom. Bryant's stormy life is the enthralling story of one woman's struggle to live by her convictions. Queen of Bohemia connects a brave and beguiling woman to an era of stunning transformations.
| ||||||||||||||||||
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Escaping what she saw as her bourgeois existence as the wife of an Oregon dentist, Louise Bryant (1885-1936) ran off to New York City's Greenwich Village with radical journalist John Reed, who became her second husband. They preached and practiced free love, although her affair with Eugene O'Neill led to explosive quarrels. In revolutionary Russia, while Reed wrote Ten Days That Shook the World, Bryant produced Six Red Months in Russia, a highly sympathetic account of the Bolshevik coup and the communist attempt to mold a new society. Reed died in Moscow in 1920, and four years later, Bryant, a leading Hearst reporter, married William Bullitt, formerly President Wilson's assistant secretary of state. Their move to Paris introduced Bryant to a lesbian subculture, and her affair with English sculptor Gwen Le Gallienne led to a bitter divorce in 1930, with Bryant denied custody of her daughter, Anne. Bryant's long, tragic decline was marked by heavy drinking, paranoia, mental confusion and weight gain, all of which are associated with Dercum's disease, a rare disorder with which she was diagnosed in 1928. Dearborn (The Happiest Man Alive: A Biography of Henry Miller) is much too uncritical of Bryant's role as cheerleader for the Bolshevik cause, and she seems caught up in the romantic saga of her subject's life. Even so, this is a vivid biography of a charismatic woman. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Dearborn ("The Happiest Man Alive": A Biography of Henry Miller, LJ 4/15/91) has written a nonjudgmental and compassionate biography of Louise Bryant. Considered too middle class and attractive by the Greenwich Village friends of her second husband, radical John Reed, and too bohemian by the family and friends of her third husband, Bill Bullitt, Bryant struggled to prove herself as a writer and journalist and as a person in her own right. Dearborn is as candid about her problems as about her successes. Based on original research and the papers of the late Virginia Gardner (Friend and Lover: The Life of Louise Bryant, LJ 10/15/82. o.p.), Dearborn's work is more focused on Bryant and covers some topics such as Bryant's liaison with Gwen Le Gallienne, to which Gardner merely alludes. Recommended for public and university libraries.?Sharon Firestone, Ross-Blakley Law Lib., Arizona State Univ., Tempe
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Mary Dearborn's "Queen of Bohemia",
By
This review is from: Queen of Bohemia: The Life of Louise Bryant (Hardcover)
Louise Bryant, like other figures of America's radical past, such as Eugene Debs, "Red" Emma Goldman, and her husband, Jack Reed, barely register on the radar screen of popular consciousness. Often radicals are expunged from American history textbooks or presented in watered down cartoon fashion, giving students the impression that the story of the United States has been one long tale of moderation and conservatism. Indeed, while almost every child knows the story of Helen Keller told through "The Miracle Worker," very few are aware that as an adult she was a militant socialist and feminist with an FBI file.Louise Bryant was one of those talented young people who came of age in the teens and twenties of the 20th century; a generation dubbed by Gertrude Stein as the "Lost Generation." She was a talented journalist with a socialist bent, but a strong sense of objectivity in her writing. Her "Six Red Months in Russia" was a first hand account of the Soviet Revolution of 1917, and while overshadowed by Jack Reed's "Ten Days that Shook the World," it is a much more accessible and human story of those events. She interviewed all the principal players (Lenin, Trotsky, Kerensky, etc) as well as important female revolutionary figures such as Maria Spiridonova and Aleksandra Kollontai. Her later re-entry into Soviet Russia during the Civil War to find her husband just before he died is a heroic tale in itself. After Reed's death Bryant continued to work as a journalist producing one of the first interviews with Benito Mussolini. Mary Dearborn's "Queen of Bohemia" is a compassionate portrait of Bryant, taking aim at many of the unkind myths repeated by back-biting leftists of her's and subsequent generations, typified by the Emma Goldman quote, "Louise wasn't a communist, she only slept with one" (originally stated by Max Eastman and later retold by Goldman). For them Bryant was never pure enough in her commitment to radical causes. Dearborn also draws attention to the role Bryant's beauty played in her appeal and in the way some harshly judged her. Many of her harshest critics seem to fault Bryant for getting older and losing that beauty. Much of the heavy lifting, in terms of research, may have been done by Virginia Gardner for her Bryant biography, "Friend and Lover" (Dearborn acknowledges her indebtedness to Gardner's research), but "Queen of Bohemia" delves into areas of Bryant's life less well examined in "Friends and Lovers" and draws more overtly feminist conclusions about her importance. The appeal of Louise Bryant is the exciting and ultimately tragic life she lived. Her place in the cosmos of American radicals is ultimately a small one, but she blazed a path through it by the sheer force of personality. Dearborn's biography draws the reader into Bryant's orbit. Bryant's charisma radiates from the pages and the excitement of her world is compelling. For anyone who has been even mildly intrigued by Diane Keaton's interpretation of Louise Bryant in the movie "Reds" I recommend "Queen of Bohemia" as a well written biography of a fascinating and dynamic woman who lived an authentic, vital life.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Book,
This review is from: Queen of Bohemia: The Life of Louise Bryant (Hardcover)
This book is a very thoroughly researched account of the life and times of Louise Bryant. There are been discrepencies about her actually birth date, but I found her family on the 1900 Census for Nevada and she is listed as being born in December 1886 instead of the guess year being 1885. Although Louise lied about her age, I highly doubt a 13-year-old girl would try to keep her actual age a secret.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Queen of Bohemia is just that!,
By
This review is from: Queen of Bohemia: The Life of Louise Bryant (Hardcover)
This is a great period piece about the lifr of a woman at the turn of the century through the depression. It gives a great look at the lifestyle of the people who were at teh front of the movements for workers rights, women's rights and the other social causes of the day! Louose Bryantis a wonderfully, delightful and colorful pereson.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
