Susan Keating Glaspell ( Eng. Susan Keating Glaspell ; July 1, 1876 - July 28, 1948) - American writer, playwright, journalist and actress. Together with her husband, George Creme Cook, she founded the Provincetown Players [6] , the first modern American theater company [7] .
Susan Glasspell | |
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English Susan glaspell | |
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Awards | Pulitzer Prize "For the best drama" ( 1931 ) [d] |
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Originally known for his short works (fifty stories published), Glaspell subsequently wrote nine novels, fifteen plays and a biography [8] . Her stories were often semi-autobiographical in nature, their action took place in the writer’s native Midwest . They usually explored social problems such as gender , ethics and divergence of views, and the characters were deeply sympathetic characters with a strong lifestyle. In 1930, the play " House Alison " brought Glaspell Pulitzer Prize [9] .
After spending two years in Greece, after the death of her husband, Glaspell returned to the United States with her children. During the Great Depression, she worked at the Chicago Public Works Office , where she served as director of the Midwest bureau at the Federal Theater Project. They became bestsellers during the life of the writer, after the death of her book ceased to print. Glaspell is also credited with the discovery of playwright Eugene O'Neill .
Since the end of the 20th century, a critical reassessment of the women's contribution to art has led to a renewed interest in the works of Glasspell and a revival of its popularity [10] . At the beginning of the 21st century, she became a recognized feminist author , the first modern female playwright in the United States [11] . Her one-act play “ Details ” (1916) is often referred to as one of the greatest works of American theater [12] . According to the leading British theater critic , Glaspell remains "the most secret secret of American drama" [13] .
Content
Biography
Early years
Susan Glaspell was born in Iowa in 1876 into the family of farmer Elmer Glaspell and his wife Alice Keating, a public school teacher. In addition to the daughter in the family, there were two sons: the elder Raymond and the younger Frank [14] . Susan grew up on a farm just below the cliffs along the Mississippi near the western border of Davenport . The farm was acquired by another paternal grandfather, James Glaspell, who bought it from the federal government after a previous purchase from the Indians [15] . Having a fairly conservative upbringing, Suzy was remembered as an “out-of-age adult child” who often saved homeless animals [16] . Despite the fact that the family farm was increasingly surrounded by residential buildings, the worldview of Glaspell was shaped by the grandmother’s stories about American pioneers and the frequent occurrences of Indians in the years preceding the founding of the state of Iowa [17] . Growing right across the river from the village of Black Hawk , Glaspell was also impressed by the autobiography of the Sauk leader: he wrote that Americans should be worthy heirs to this land. During the Panic of 1893, Father Glaspell sold the farm, and the family moved to Davenport [18] .
Glaspell was a diligent student, attended state schools in the city, and took an in-depth course of study. At the prom in 1894, she gave a speech. By the age of eighteen, the future writer got a job as a journalist in a local newspaper. By the time she was twenty she led a weekly column called “Society,” in which she mocked the wealthy Davenport class [19] .
At twenty-one, Glaspell entered Drake University , going against local public opinion that the college makes women unfit for marriage [20] . Having chosen philosophy as the main discipline, she successfully participated in debates with men and in the last year of study she received the right to represent the university at a state competition [21] . The newspaper Des Moines Daily News wrote about the graduation ceremony of Glaspell and called it "the leader of the social and intellectual life of the university" [22] .
The day after graduation, Glaspell got a full-time job in the Des Moines newspaper as a reporter, which was rare for a woman, and especially because she was assigned to cover state legislature and murder trials [23] . After reporting on the conviction of a woman convicted for the murder of a tyrant husband, Glaspell suddenly quit her job at the newspaper at the age of twenty-four.
She returned to Davenport to devote herself to fiction. [24] Unlike many new authors, her stories quickly found their way to the reader and were published in the most popular periodicals [25] , including Harper's , Munsey , Ladies' Home Journal and Woman's Home Companion . It was the golden age of short stories. The money prize received from The Black Cat magazine, Glaspel used to move to Chicago , where she wrote her first novel, The Triumph of the Vanquished ( English The Glory of the Conquered ), published in 1909. The novel became a bestseller, and the New York Times wrote:
"If the name Susan Glasspell is not the pseudonym of a well-known author - and the book has such unusual qualities for American fiction and is so individual that it seems unlikely - then" The Triumph of the Defeated "reveals to us a new author with an excellent and obvious gift" [26]
His second novel, "Imagination" ( Eng. The Visioning ), Glaspell published in 1911. About this book, the New York Times wrote that "she proves that Miss Glaspell is still strong and has abilities that put her on a par with the best American storytellers" [27] . Her third novel, Fidelity , was published in 1915. He was described by the New York Times as “a great and real contribution to the American novel” [28] .
Theater
While in Davenport, Glaspell contacted local authors to form the Davenport Group. It was George Cram Cook , a teacher of English literature at the University of Iowa . He came from a rich family, was a gentleman farmer. Cook was married a second time, and a second time unsuccessfully, but despite this Glaspell fell in love with him. After Cook's divorce, Glaspell married him in 1913.
To avoid disapproving gossip and become part of the artistic world, Glaspell and Cook moved to Greenwich Village , a bohemian area of New York . There they became key players in America’s first avant-garde art movement and made contact with many of the most famous social reformers and activists of the era, including Upton Sinclair , Emma Goldman and John Reed . Glasspell has become a leading member of the early feminist group Heterodoxy, made up of leading fighters for women's rights. After a series of miscarriages, she underwent surgery to remove a fibroid tumor.
Together with like-minded people in artistic circles, in the summer of 1915, Glaspell and Cook went to Provincetown (Massachusetts) at Cape Cod, where they rented a cottage. Despite her weakness after the surgery, Glaspell worked with Cook and his friends to create an experimental theater company, a creative team. They put the first plays in a renovated fishing pier, prepared by other members of their group. What later became known as the Provincetown Playhouse was intended to create and stage artistic plays that reflect contemporary American problems. The company rejected commercially more profitable and escapist melodramas created on Broadway.
Despite the successes of early fiction, Glaspell is best remembered for twelve innovative plays that she presented over the next seven years. Her first play, Details (1916), was based on the murder trial, which she covered as a reporter in Des Moines . Today considered to be an early feminist masterpiece, this production was a quick success, it captured the audience with bold views on justice and morality. The play became one of the most mentioned work in the history of American theater. In 1921, Glaspell graduated from the Heirs . Dedicated to three generations of the family of American pioneers, the work may have become the first modern historical drama of the United States. In the same year, The Edge ( English The Verge ), one of the earliest American expressionist plays, was completed.
Believing that the amateur group would lead to the emergence of new ideas, playwrights from Provincetown often took direct part in the production of their own plays. Without training, Glaspell received recognition as an actress. William Zorach , one of the first members of the group, said that "she just needs to be on stage, and the play and the audience come to life themselves." Jacques Copot , the legendary French theater director and critic, was touched to tears by a play with the participation of Glaspell. He called her “a truly great actress.” [29]
After the first two seasons in Provincetown, the theater company moved to New York. Picking up new plays for staging, Glaspell opened Eugene O'Neill , who will eventually be recognized as one of the greatest playwrights in American history. Other well-known band members include Edna St. Vincent Millay , Theodore Dreiser and Floyd Dell, Glaspel's friend from the Davenport Group. When the company became more successful, playwrights began to consider it as a means to enter commercial theaters, which was a violation of the original goal.
Cook and Glaspell decided to leave the company they had founded, which had become “too successful.” Glaspell was at the top of theatrical career, the last play, The Edge, brought the greatest recognition. In 1922, Glaspell and Cook moved to Delphi ( Greece ). Cook died there in 1924 from glanders - an infectious disease that he contracted from his dog.
Initially, plays of Glaspell were published in print form, receiving laudatory reviews from the most prestigious periodicals of New York. By 1918, Glaspell was considered one of the most significant new playwrights of America. In 1920, the authoritative British publisher Small & Maynard began publishing her plays in England. Admission in England was even better than in the United States. English critics called Glaspell a genius and valued above O'Neill. They compared it positively with Henrik Ibsen , who was considered the most influential playwright since Shakespeare . To satisfy the demand for the essay of Glaspell, the British version of her novel Fidelity was published, which was sold in five weeks in five editions. When the Heirs play was published in England in 1925, each leading newspaper and literary magazine considered it their duty to publish an extensive review, merging in unanimous praise. One enthusiastic reviewer stated: “This play will live when Liverpool becomes a garbage heap.”
However, the demand for and success with critics of the plays of Glaspell did not lead to financial gain. To support herself and her husband in those years when they worked in the theater, Glaspell continued to publish stories in leading periodicals. Literary scholars consider the stories of this period the best works of Glaspell. It was during the most productive period that the playwright Glaspell also established itself as a "central figure in the development of the modern American narrative."
Late Career
Glaspell returned to Cape Cod after the death of her husband. Here she wrote a well-received biography of George Cram Cook, The Road to the Temple (1927). In the late twenties, she had a romantic relationship with the young writer Norman Matson. During this period, three bestsellers came out from under her pen, which she considered her best works: Brook Evans (1928), Return of the Exile ( Eng. Fugitive's Return , 1929) and Ambrose Holt and Family (1931). She also wrote the play “House Alison” (1930), for which she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1931. In 1932, Glaspell's relationship with Matson ended. The first and only period of low productivity began, associated with depression, alcoholism and poor health.
In 1936, during the Great Depression , Glaspell moved to Chicago, receiving the post of director of the Middle Fuse Bureau at the Federal Theater Project. Over the next few years, she re-established her relationship with her brothers, coped with alcoholism, and returned to creativity. After finishing work at the Federal Theater Project, Glaspell again went to Cape Cod Cape. Being in the Midwest influenced her work. The last three novels: The Morning is Near Us (1939), Norma Ashe (1942) and Judd Rankin's Daughter (1945) - increasingly focused on this region, family life and theistic issues.
Susan Glasspell died of viral pneumonia in Provincetown on July 28, 1948.
Heritage
Contemporaries highly appreciated Glaspell and were known as a playwright who won the Pulitzer Prize. Her short stories were regularly published in the leading periodicals of that era, and an obituary in the New York Times stated that she was "one of the most widely read novelists of the country."
But since 1940, a new generation of influential Broadway critics began to publish derogatory reviews of the plays of Glasspell, which had a significant impact in the long run. The situation was aggravated by Glaspell’s reluctance to seek publicity and the tendency to downplay his achievements, possibly as a result of the upbringing of the Midwest in traditional modesty. In addition, the idealistic novels of Glaspell about strong and independent heroines became less popular in the post-war era, when the role of women in creating home comfort was emphasized. Her novels ceased to publish after death, which is why in the United States the work of Glaspell was ignored for many years. Abroad, some scientists turned to its heritage, but were primarily interested in the experimental work of the provincial time.
In the late 1970s, critics with feminist views began to overestimate Glaspell's career [30] , and since then interest in her work has steadily increased [31] . At the beginning of the 21st century, this area of research was considered growing [32] . Since the end of the 20th century, university publishers have published several biographies and analytical materials about Glasspell’s books. After a long break, most of her works have been reissued.
Thanks to advances in drama, romance, and storytelling, Glaspell is often referred to as the “prime example” of an unsung writer who deserves “canonization” [33] . As the possible founder of contemporary American theater, Glaspell is called the “first lady of American drama” and “the mother of American drama”.
In 2003, the International Society of Susan Glaspell ( English International Susan Glaspell Society ) was founded, the purpose of which was declared "recognition of Susan Glasspell as a major American playwright and author of fiction." Her plays are often performed in the faculties of colleges and universities, but she is widely known for her most often anthologized works: the one-act play “Details” and, based on it, “ So the women decided ”.
Selected bibliography
Russian names are given in the magazine "Lifting" No. 7, 2016 [34] .
Drama
One-act plays
| Plays
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Fiction
Novels
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Others
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Notes
- ↑ 1 2 BNF ID : 2011 open data platform .
- ↑ 1 2 Encyclopædia Britannica
- ↑ 1 2 SNAC - 2010.
- ↑ Internet Broadway Database - 2000.
- Lain Blain V. , Grundy I. , Clements P. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English : Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present - 1990. - P. 431.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, Linda. "Preface." Preface. Susan Glaspell: Her Life and Times . Oxford University Press, 2005. Ix.
- ↑ Sarlós, Robert K. (1984). “The Provincetown Players' Genesis or Non-Commercial Theater on Commercial Streets” , Journal of American Culture , Vol. 7, Issue 3 (Fall 1984), pp. 65-70
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, Linda. "Preface." Preface. Susan Glaspell: Her Life and Times , Oxford University Press, 2005. X.
- ↑ Alison's House at the Internet Broadway Database
- ↑ Smith, Dinitia. “Rediscovering a Playwright Lost to Time.” , New York Times , June 30, 2005. Theater page. Print.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, Linda (2005). Susan Glaspell: Her Life and Times . Oxford University Press, second cover
- ↑ Carpentier, Martha C. (2008). “Susan Glaspell: New Directions in Critical Inquiry.” Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 3
- ↑ Billington, Michael. Alison's House , The Guardian , Sunday 11 October 2009. Theater page.
- ↑ 1900 United States Federal Census
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, Linda (2005). Susan Glaspell: Her Life and Times . Oxford University Press, pp. 13
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 25
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. five.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 17
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. thirty.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 35
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 37.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 28
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 38
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 47
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 51.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 98
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 113.
- ↑ Ben-Zvi, p. 159.
- ↑ Helen Deutschland and The Stella Hanau, The Provincetown: A Story of the Theater (New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1931), pp. 24-25.
- ↑ Bach, Gerhard and Harris, Claudia (Mar., 1992). “Susan Glaspell: Rediscovering an American Playwright”, Theater Journal , Vol. 44, No. 1, pp. 94
- ↑ Patricia L. Bryan and Martha C. Carpentier, ed. (2010). Her America: “A Jury of Her Peers” and Other Stories by Susan Glaspell, University of Iowa Press, pp 3.
- ↑ Black, Cheryl (2000, Spring / Fall). [“Review of the book 'Susan Glaspell: A Critical Biography'”], by Barbara Ozieblo, The Eugene O'Neill Review , Vol. 24, No. 1/2, pp. 139–141
- ↑ Ozieblo-Rajkowska, Barbara (1989). “The First Lady of the American Drama: Susan Glaspell.” BELLS: Barcelona English Language and Literature Studies . 1, pp. 149-159.
- Под “Lifting” № 7, 2016 .
- ↑ 1 2 3 Susan Glaspell. Susan Glaspell: The Complete Plays (Paperback). - United States: McFarland Co Inc, 2010. - ISBN 978-0786434329 .
Literature
Books
- Ben-Zvi, Linda. Susan Glaspell: Her Life and Times. - Oxford University Press, 2005.
- Ozieblo, Barbara. Susan Glaspell: A Critical Biography. - University of North Carolina Press, 2000.
- Gainor, J. Ellen. Susan Glaspell in Context: American Theater, Culture, and Politics, 1915-48. - University of Michigan Press, 2001.
- Ben-Zvi, Linda. ed. Susan Glaspell: Essays on Her Theater and Fiction. - Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995.
- Carpentier, Martha C. The Major Novels of Susan Glaspell. - University Press of Florida, 2001.
- Makowski, Veronica A. Susan Glaspell's Century of American Women: A Critical Interpretation of Her Work. - Oxford University Press, 1993.
Critical articles
- Radavich, David. "The Heartland of Susan Glaspell's Plays," MidAmerica XXXVII (2010): 81-94.
Links
- The International Susan Glaspell Society
- Glaspell, Susan (English) on Internet Broadway Database
- Works by Susan Glaspell in the Gutenberg Project
- Works in the Internet Archive
- Reporting Glaspell about the Hossack killer for Des Moines Daily News , site Midnight Assassin
- Glaspell, Susan (Eng.) On the Find a Grave website