Kitty Foyle (novel)
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| Kitty Foyle | |
| Author | Christopher Morley |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Grosset & Dunlap & Lippincott |
| Publication date | 1939 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| ISBN | NA |
| OCLC | 466657 |
Kitty Foyle, subtitled The Natural History of a Woman, is a 1939 novel by Christopher Morley. It was a bestseller in 1939 and 1940[1]. It was adapted as a 1940 film and tells the story of a white-collar girl who falls in love with a young socialite, despite the objections of his family.
Contemporary Authors notes that "Central to the story is protagonist Kitty's affair with the affluent Wyn Strafford. Critics heatedly debated Morley's sexual sensationalism,"[2] notably her out-of-wedlock pregnancy and abortion.
The story is told by Kitty in the first person. A sociologist suggests that "Kitty, in her observations of the mores and behavior patterns of the upper class acts as the anthropological alter ego of Morley, viewing the upper class from the outside."[3]
"Kitty Foyle" is one of the works for which the publishing firm of J. B. Lippincott is remembered.[4]
In addition to the very successful film adaptation, Kitty Foyle also was the basis for an NBC television show, which starred Kathleen Murray, debuted in 1958, and aired for two seasons.
[edit] Early reception
Margaret Wallace, reviewing the novel in The New York Times, called it "sparkling."
There is no use trying to pick good things out of this book. Something on almost every page clamors for quotation.[5]
Wallace says that Morley first thought of calling the novel Nation Wide, showing that "he considered its problem national in scope and of social significance." Wallace points to a paragraph from the novel which can be taken as a statement of the problem:
Molly and me had a talk one time about the White Collar Women, there's millions of them, getting maybe 15 to 30 a week, they've got to dress themselves right up to the hilt, naturally they have a yen for social pleasure, need to be a complete woman with all a woman's satisfactions and they need a chance to be creating and doing. And the men their own age can't do much for them, also the girls grow up too damn fast because they absorb the point of view of older people they work for. Their own private life gets to be a rat-race. Jesusgod, I read about the guts of the pioneer woman and the woman of the dustbowl and the gingham goddess of the covered wagon. What about the woman of the covered typewriter? What has she got, poor kid, when she leaves the office? ... [Molly said] "Do you know what we are? we're sharecroppers. We work like nigger hands in a cotton field and give Palmer's more brainwork than they'd know what to do with and what do we get for it? Eight hour's sleep, I guess, because that's about all we're fit for.[6]
Wallace notes that Morley "knows Philadelphia and pokes fun at it constantly, with a sharpness born of long and affection intimacy."[5]
[edit] References
- ^ Burt, Daniel S. (2004). "Bestsellers 1930-1939" and "Bestsellers 1940-1949", The chronology of American literature : America's literary achievements from the colonial era to modern times. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 9780618168217. OCLC 52509521.
- ^ "Morley, Christopher (Darlington), 1890-1957" (2004). Contemporary Authors 213: 294–296. ISSN 0275-7176. OCLC 6921683.
- ^ Gordon, Milton M. (November 1947). "Kitty Foyle and the Concept of Class as Culture". The American Journal of Sociology 53 (3): 210–217. doi:. ISSN 0002-9602. OCLC 1831931.
- ^ DiStefano, Joseph N. "Lippincott family era over at publishing firm: Five generations had overseen the Phila. printing company", The Philadelphia Inquirer, 2006-08-26, p. D1. "During the mid-1900s, J.B. Lippincott put out enduring popular novels such as To Kill a Mockingbird, Kitty Foyle, The Egg and I, and My Friend Flicka."
- ^ a b Wallace, Margaret. "Mr. Morley's Sparkling 'Kitty Foyle", The New York Times, 1939-10-29, p. BR2.
- ^ Morley, Christopher (1939). Kitty Foyle. New York: Grosset & Dunlap, pp. 260–1. OCLC 776928.
