This Day In Literary History
On April 16th, 1962, The Golden Notebook, the classic novel by the Nobel Prize winning English writer Doris Lessing, was published. The novel is rightfully considered a seminal early work of feminist literature.
That wasn't what the author intended, though the book does have feminist themes. The Oxford Companion to English Literature described it as "inner space fiction." A more accurate description would be experimental existentialist fiction.
The Golden Notebook uses a fragmented, stream-of-consciousness narrative to tell the story of Anna Wulf, a middle aged writer and single mother who has come apart - literally and metaphorically. She keeps four notebooks, each one representing a part of her personality.
In her black notebook, Anna records her experiences in Africa, where she helped fight the colonial oppression of black Africans. In her red notebook, she records her idealism, specifically her political idealism, as she first becomes a passionate young communist.
Over time, however, she changes into a sober realist, disillusioned by the crimes of the Stalin regime and the realization that communism can't create the better world she had hoped for.
Anna's yellow notebook contains her novel, which is a fictionalized version of her life. Her blue notebook is her personal diary, a record of her day to day life.
The narrative is comprised of alternating fragments from each of her four notebooks, which reflects her chaotic state of mind. Fearing that she might go insane, Anna tries to weave together the threads of her four notebooks and create one complete Golden Notebook.
In doing so, she embarks on a harrowing journey in search of her true self, confronting her anxieties and the painful truths at the heart of her personal crises.
The Golden Notebook is a classic existentialist novel written in a post-modernist style. In 2005, Time magazine listed it as among the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
In 2007, Doris Lessing was awarded the Nobel Prize; at 87, that made her the oldest person ever to receive the award. The Swedish Academy lauded her as "that epicist of the female experience, who with scepticism, fire, and visionary power, has subjected a divided civilisation to scrutiny."
Quote Of The Day
"With a library, you are free, not confined by temporary political climates. It is the most democratic of institutions because no one - but no one at all - can tell you what to read and when and how."
- Doris Lessing
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a BBC documentary on Doris Lessing. Enjoy!
This Day In Literary History
On April 15th, 1755, A Dictionary of the English Language, the classic reference book by the legendary English writer Samuel Johnson, was published. Neither the first nor the last English language dictionary ever published, it was, however, one of the most memorable dictionaries ever published.
That's because it was written by Samuel Johnson - the legendary English poet, essayist, critic, biographer, and lexicographer considered to be "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history."
Most dictionaries of the time were found to be unsatisfactory at best, so in 1746, a group of London booksellers commissioned Samuel Johnson to write a dictionary for £1,575 - about £250,000 in today's money. Johnson claimed that he could complete it in three years.
Actually, it took him almost nine years to finish his dictionary. It took Johnson a whole year just to draft a plan for the design of the dictionary. The plan received the support of statesman Lord Philip Stanhope, the 4th Earl of Sandwich.
After the dictionary was published, Stanhope wrote an anonymous essay endorsing the work and complaining that the English language lacked structure. Johnson didn't like the tone of the essay and felt that Stanhope hadn't done enough to fulfill his obligations as a patron.
The first edition of A Dictionary of the English Language was published in a ponderously large sized volume, (18" tall by 20" wide) on the finest quality paper available.
This made the dictionary incredibly expensive to print and affordable only by nobility and royalty. Johnson called this volume Vasta mole superbus - Proud in its great bulk.
Johnson's dictionary contained the definitions of 42,773 English words (only a few more words would be added in its revised editions) and was innovative in its use of literary quotations to illustrate the meanings of words.
The dictionary contained some 114,000 quotations by authors such as Shakespeare, Milton, and Dryden. In addition to the quotations, Johnson's dictionary was the first to use humor in its definitions of words.
A famous example is Johnson's definition of the word oats as "a grain which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people." The legendary American writer Ambrose Bierce would employ similar humor in his masterpiece of scathing satire, The Devil's Dictionary (1911).
A Dictionary of the English Language was a huge hit in England, receiving rave reviews and becoming famous throughout Europe. In America, however, it was poorly received, especially by one Noah Webster.
Webster, an American lexicographer, argued that British English should no longer be the American standard because "the taste of [Britain's] writers is already corrupted, and her language is on the decline." He would later write a famous dictionary of his own - a dictionary of American English.
In England, Samuel Johnson's dictionary would be the standard English dictionary until the Oxford English Dictionary was completed and published in 1884. It earned Johnson a £300 pension from King George III and a legacy that continues to this day.
Quote Of The Day
"Books, like friends, should be few and well-chosen."
- Samuel Johnson
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a BBC documentary on Samuel Johnson and his dictionary. Enjoy!
This Day In Literary History
On April 14th, 1939, The Grapes of Wrath, the classic, Pulitzer Prize winning novel by the legendary American writer John Steinbeck, was published.
Steinbeck had previously scored a literary triumph with his acclaimed and controversial novella, Of Mice and Men (1937). The Grapes of Wrath also courted controversy.
The Grapes of Wrath - the title comes from a line in the song The Battle Hymn of the Republic - told the story of the Joads, a poor family of Oklahoma sharecroppers.
Driven from their home by the Great Depression and the dust storms, the Joads go to California hoping to improve their fortunes. Instead, they encounter more hardship. The novel opens with son Tom Joad being paroled after serving time in prison for manslaughter.
On his way home, he meets Jim Casy, an ex-preacher he once knew. Casy, who shares the same initials as Jesus Christ, lost his faith after having affairs with his congregants and realizing that religion can provide no real answers or solace for the difficulties that people are experiencing in the Depression.
Tom and Casy go to Tom's uncle's house, where Tom finds his family loading their truck with their belongings. Their crops were destroyed by the dust storms and their farm has been repossessed by the bank.
So, the Joads have decided to go to California after an advertisement convinces them that the Golden State holds the key to prosperity. Leaving Oklahoma would violate Tom's parole - a risk he believes is worth taking.
They head out on Route 66, and soon realize that their prospects in California may not be as good as they thought. The road is full of other families on the same journey and the makeshift camps in which they live.
The Joads hear many stories of hardship from people who have been to California, but they feel they have no choice but to continue their journey.
When they finally arrive in California, the Joads find no hope of making a decent living. There's an oversupply of labor and no rights for workers, thanks to a collusion of big corporate farmers. Smaller farmers are suffering from a collapse in prices.
The Joads find hope at Weedpatch Camp, a clean camp operated by the Resettlement Administration, one of President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal agencies. Since the camp is a federal facility, the poor migrant workers are protected there from sadistic California state policemen.
The vigilante cops had been constantly harassing and brutalizing migrant workers, trying to drive them out of the state. Unfortunately, there's not enough money and space at Weedpatch to care for all the needy.
The novel reaches its apex when the Joads end up working (unknowingly) as strike breakers at a peach orchard. A strike turns violent and Tom Joad's friend Jim Casy is murdered. Tom witnesses the crime and kills the attacker to avenge his friend's death.
Now a fugitive, Tom says goodbye to his mother and flees, vowing that wherever the road takes him, he'll act as a defender of the oppressed.
The publication of The Grapes of Wrath in 1939 was described as:
...a phenomenon on the scale of a national event. It was publicly banned and burned by citizens, it was debated on national radio hook-ups; but above all, it was read.
Loved by most and denounced as communist propaganda by some, The Grapes of Wrath would become one of the most thoroughly discussed and studied novels of the twentieth century.
John Steinbeck was accused of exaggerating the camp conditions, but he had actually underplayed conditions that he knew had been much worse than what he'd described in his novel to avoid being labeled a propagandist. He was denounced as one anyway.
In 1940, The Grapes of Wrath was adapted as a feature film by legendary director John Ford, starring Henry Fonda as Tom Joad and John Carradine as Jim Casy.
Though the ending of the film differs greatly from the novel, it's still rightfully considered one of the greatest films ever made. It won big at the Academy Awards, taking the Oscars for Best Actor (Fonda), Best Director (Ford), Best Picture, and Best Adapted Screenplay.
The legendary American folksinger Woody Guthrie was a big fan of the film. After he saw it, he wrote a song summarizing the plot for people who couldn't afford to see the movie. The result, Guthrie's classic song Tom Joad, was so long that it had to be broken into two parts.
In 1962, John Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize for literature. The prize committee cited the brilliance of The Grapes of Wrath as one of their main reasons for giving Steinbeck the award.
Quote Of The Day
"The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true."
- John Steinbeck
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a lecture by Dr. Gary Hylander on John Steinbeck's classic novel, The Grapes of Wrath. Enjoy!
I'm pleased to say that two of my poems, Mary Halstead, Runaway Slave, Spring 1776 and Ann Bates, Loyalist Spy, will be published in Highland Park Poetry's US250 Persona Poem Project.
It was interesting to research these historical women's lives and to create poems about them. The anthology will be released later this year.
This Day In Literary History
On April 10th, 1906, The Four Million, the classic short story collection by the legendary American writer O. Henry, was published. It contained two of the author's most popular stories - The Cop and the Anthem and The Gift of the Magi.
The Cop and the Anthem is set in New York City. It's late autumn, and with winter coming, a homeless hobo called Soapy isn't looking forward to sleeping out in the cold.
Soapy decides to get himself arrested so he can spend the night in a warm jail cell. He tries swindling, petty thievery, vandalism, and pretending to be publicly intoxicated, but he just can't get arrested.
When Soapy tries sexually harassing a young woman, she turns out to be a prostitute. Heartbroken, he moves on. As the sun begins to set on a cold night, he finds himself standing outside a small church.
Inside the church, the organist is practicing. Soapy listens to him play. Moved by the music, he contemplates his life and decides to clean up his act and get himself a job and a home. Lost in reverie over the prospect of a brighter future, Soapy is suddenly arrested by a cop - for loitering.
The Gift of the Magi, considered O. Henry's most beloved story, is a heartwarming Christmas tale. Jim and Della are a poor young married couple living in a modest little apartment.
Although poor, they each have a valuable possession that they take pride in. Della has her beautiful, long flowing hair, while Jim's prize possession is his grandfather's pocket watch.
It's Christmas Eve, and Della has just under two dollars to spend on Jim's Christmas present. Desperate, she decides to sell the only thing of value she has - her hair. She sells it for $20 and buys a shiny platinum fob chain for Jim's treasured pocket watch.
When Jim comes home, she gives him his present and tells him she sold her hair to pay for it. He fixes her with an expression “that she could not read, and it terrified her.” Then he gives Della her Christmas present - a set of expensive, fancy combs for her hair. He sold his grandfather's pocket watch to pay for them.
The couple is left with two Christmas presents they can't use and one invaluable gift they take great pleasure in - their deep love for each other. The story ends with the author comparing their sacrificial gifts to each other with the biblical gifts of the Magi given to the baby Jesus:
The magi, as you know, were wise men – wonderfully wise men – who brought gifts to the new-born King of the Jews in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication.
And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the Magi.
O. Henry was the pseudonym of William Sydney Porter, born in Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1862. A voracious reader as a child, he took up writing in his twenties. While living in Austin, Texas, in the late 1880s, he wrote short stories and founded a humorous weekly literary magazine called The Rolling Stone.
Porter supported himself by working at a bank, which would lead to his downfall. He would be accused of embezzlement and fired, but not indicted. He moved to Houston, where he worked on his magazine and also wrote for the Houston Post.
During this time, the bank where Porter had worked was audited by the feds, who arrested him on embezzlement charges. He fled, and while on the lam, went to Honduras, where he coined the term "banana republic" to describe that third world Latin American country and others like it.
When Porter learned that his wife was dying of tuberculosis, he returned to Texas and surrendered. He was granted bail so he could remain with his wife pending an appeal. After she died, Porter lost his appeal and was sentenced to five years in a federal prison in Ohio.
While serving his time, Porter continued to write. He used several pseudonyms, settling on O. Henry - the name he was becoming famous under. He had a friend in New Orleans forward his stories so publishers wouldn't know that he was in prison.
After serving three years of his five year sentence, he was paroled for good behavior. The year after his release from prison, O. Henry moved to New York City, which was the mecca of the publishing world.
He would become one of the great masters of the short story, writing nearly four hundred of them. The critics of the day were rarely kind to O. Henry, but his readers loved him and couldn't get enough of his stories.
Sadly, O. Henry's life would be cut short by chronic health problems such as diabetes, cirrhosis of the liver, and an enlarged heart. These problems were caused or worsened by his heavy drinking. He died in 1910 at the age of 47.
Stories from his classic collection would be adapted as a classic anthology feature film, O. Henry's Full House, in 1952. The movie, directed by multiple filmmakers, featured an all-star cast, with each story introduced and narrated by legendary writer John Steinbeck.
Quote Of The Day
"Each of us, when our day's work is done, must seek our ideal, whether it be love or pinochle or lobster à la Newburg, or the sweet silence of the musty bookshelves."
- O. Henry
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a complete reading of O. Henry's classic short story collection, The Four Million. Enjoy!
This Day In Literary History On April 9th, 1821, the legendary French poet Charles Baudelaire was born in Paris, France. His father Francois was a civil servant and amateur artist 34 years older than his wife, Baudelaire's mother Caroline. He died when Charles was six years old.
The following year, Caroline remarried. The young Baudelaire hated his stepfather Jacques Aupick, who was a lieutenant colonel in the army and a fierce disciplinarian at home. Aupick later sent his young stepson to boarding school in Lyon.
Recalling his boyhood, Baudelaire said, "I was a precocious dandy." As such, he was greatly disliked by most of his classmates. One of his few friends at school agreed with this assessment.
His friend would later say of the then 14-year-old Baudelaire, "He was much more refined and distinguished than any of our fellow pupils... [we] shared tastes and sympathies, the precocious love of fine works of literature."
While attending the Lycee Louis-le-Grand - the famous and demanding secondary school in Paris - Baudelaire's academic performance was erratic. Sometimes he was extremely diligent in his studies, while at other times, he was prone to periods of idleness.
He graduated in 1839 at the age of eighteen. At that time, he was described as "an exalted character, sometimes full of mysticism, and sometimes full of immorality and cynicism, which were excessive, but only verbal."
Baudelaire told his brother, "I don't feel I have a vocation for anything." His stepfather wanted him to pursue a career in law or diplomacy. Instead, he decided to become a writer. He spent the next two years living the bohemian life, socializing with other writers and artists.
He frequented prostitutes, and as a result, visited a pharmacist who specialized in the treatment of venereal disease. He took one prostitute, a girl named Sara, as his live-in lover.
In order to keep him under control, Baudelaire's stepfather kept him on a strict allowance, which he often spent immediately, mostly on clothes. When the money ran out, he bought on credit and ran up debts.
His stepfather decided to send him to Calcutta, to be supervised by an ex-naval captain. The arduous experience failed to dissuade Baudelaire from pursuing a literary career or change his laid-back nature.
The captain let Baudelaire go home to France. He did gain something from his year of travels - strong impressions of the sea, the sailing life, and exotic ports of call, all of which would have an effect on his poetry. Back in Paris, he began his literary career by reading his poems in taverns.
At the age of 21, Baudelaire inherited over 100,000 francs and several parcels of land. He squandered most of his new found wealth, and his family obtained a decree placing the rest of his assets in trust. Around this time, he met Jeanne Duval, the illegitimate daughter of a prostitute.
Their love affair would be the longest relationship he would have in his short life. His mother thought she was a "Black Venus" who "tortured [my son] in every way" and drained him of his money. By 1845, at the age of 24, Baudelaire was broke and eating on credit.
He began writing the poems that would appear in his classic first poetry collection, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) which would be published twelve years later. His first published work was an art review titled "Salon of 1845."
He gained a reputation as a passionate and well-informed art critic. Unfortunately, his debts were rising and his future was doubtful, so he attempted suicide by stabbing himself. He lost his nerve and ended up with a superficial wound.
Baudelaire wrote to his mother, begging her to visit him, but she ignored his pleas, as ordered by his stepfather. After being homeless for a time, he resolved to improve his situation. He continued his work as an art critic.
In 1846, he published a novella, La Fanfarlo. Being fluent in English since childhood, he earned extra money as a translator. He translated English works of literature into French - including some of his favorite works.
His translations included Matthew Lewis' notorious and classic Gothic novel The Monk, the writings of Edgar Allan Poe, and other classic works.
In 1857, Baudelaire's stepfather died. Although he had been disinherited, he did gain something from Jacques Aupick's death - he reconciled with his mother, to whom he had become estranged. As a boy, he had been very close to her, but he never forgave her for marrying Jacques Aupick.
1857 was a good year for Baudelaire. Not only did he reconcile with his mother, his first and most famous poetry collection was finally published. It had taken him twelve years to complete, as he had been sidetracked by indolence, emotional distress, and physical illness.
Les Fleurs du Mal established Baudelaire as one of the greatest French poets of all time. Some of the poems in it had been previously published in the Revue des Deux Mondes (Review of Two Worlds) magazine.
Sex and death were the main themes of the poems collected in Les Fleurs du Mal, which touched on taboo subjects such as lesbianism. Critics offered high praise for some of his poems; for others, they demanded he be arrested for obscenity.
In a letter to his mother, Baudelaire addressed the outcry over the alleged obscenity in his poems:
You know that I have always considered that literature and the arts pursue an aim independent of morality. Beauty of conception and style is enough for me. But this book, whose title Fleurs du Mal says everything, is clad, as you will see, in a cold and sinister beauty. It was created with rage and patience. Besides, the proof of its positive worth is in all the ill that they speak of it. The book enrages people.
Moreover, since I was terrified myself of the horror that I should inspire, I cut out a third from the proofs. They deny me everything, the spirit of invention and even the knowledge of the French language. I don't care a rap about all these imbeciles, and I know that this book, with its virtues and its faults, will make its way in the memory of the lettered public, beside the best poems of V. Hugo, Th. Gautier, and even Byron.
Baudelaire, his publisher, and the book printer had all been charged with obscenity. None were imprisoned - they were fined instead. Baudelaire's fine was 300 francs. The French literati condemned the author's conviction and offered him their support.
Legendary novelist Victor Hugo wrote to Baudelaire, telling him "Your Fleurs du Mal shine and dazzle like stars... I applaud your vigorous spirit with all my might." As a result of the obscenity conviction, Fleurs du Mal was republished in a censored version with six poems deleted.
These poems would be published uncensored in Belgium as Les Epaves (The Wrecks) in 1866. In 1949 - nearly a hundred years after its first publication - the original, unexpurgated version of Fleurs du Mal would finally be published in France.
Baudelaire continued to write. In addition to his own works, he translated more English works into French, including Thomas de Quincey's Confessions of an English Opium Eater (1821).
Baudelaire wrote a book about his own experiences with opium and hashish, titled Les Paradis Artificiels (Artificial Paradises) (1860). He believed that these substances could help mankind create an ideal world.
In 1861, Baudelaire's publisher went bankrupt. At the time, he had been living a peaceful and productive life with his mother in the seaside town of Honfleur. The stress and poverty of his earlier life, along with his chronic illnesses and use of laudanum (tincture of opium) had taken a toll on his health.
Just as he was starting to recover his health, his publisher's bankruptcy added new stress to his life, as once again he faced the prospect of poverty. In 1864, Baudelaire went to Belgium, hoping to have his works published there and to give lectures.
In addition to his on and off relationship with Jeanne Duval, he took actress Marie Daubrun and courtesan Allonie Sabatier as his lovers. None of his relationships ever blossomed into true love.
Unsatisfied in his personal life and fearful of poverty, Baudelaire smoked opium and drank to excess. In 1866, he suffered a massive stroke that left him half-paralyzed. For the remainder of his life, he lived in sanitariums in Brussels and Paris.
Charles Baudelaire died in August of 1867 at the age of 46. Many of his unpublished works were published posthumously, and his previously published works were republished.
The proceeds enabled his mother to pay off his substantial debts. She found comfort in his fame, saying "I see that my son, for all his faults, has his place in literature."
Quote Of The Day
"Always be a poet, even in prose."
- Charles Baudelaire
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a reading of selected poems from Charles Baudelaire's classic poetry collection, Fleurs du Mal (Flowers of Evil). Enjoy!
On April 8th, 1954, The Bad Seed, the classic final novel by the famous American writer William March, was published. An iconic, disturbing psychological thriller, it was the perfect novel for the author, who died suddenly a month after its release, to go out with.
March, born William Campbell in Mobile, Alabama in 1893, was intellectually gifted, but his family was dirt poor, so he had to leave school at 14 to work. At 24, he enlisted in the Marines to serve his country during the Great War and became a highly decorated soldier.
In fact, March was awarded the Marines' Distinguished Service Cross, the Navy Cross, and the French Croix de Guerre for refusing to leave after being wounded twice in battle, opting instead to keep fighting the Germans and rescue his own wounded men.
He had also endured a mustard gas attack. His war experiences left him psychologically scarred for life, and he would suffer from anxiety, depression, psychosomatic throat and eye issues, and other mental illnesses. He also struggled with his sexual orientation.
March's war experiences would inspire his classic debut novel, Company K (1933), which followed a company of Marines during the Great War. A grim and brutal antiwar novel, it's been compared to Erich Maria Remarque's antiwar classic, All Quiet on the Western Front (1929).
Though William March wrote six quality novels and was an O. Henry Prize winning short story writer, he saw little commercial success during his lifetime. As he died of a heart attack at 60 just a month after it was published, he never got to bask in the glory of his final novel.
Ironically, he had dismissed The Bad Seed as a mediocre novel, never realizing the commercial juggernaut and cultural icon it would become. The novel was the result of March's expertise in psychology - he was very well read on the subject, given his own issues.
To her mother Christine, eight-year-old Rhoda Penmark seems like the perfect child - she's highly intelligent, charming, loving, obedient, polite, well groomed, and diligent in her studies. Yet, Christine can't help suspecting that something might be wrong with the girl, who also seems cold, calculating, manipulative, narcissistic, and self sufficient beyond her years.
At first, Christine blames her suspicions on her worsening anxieties, as her husband Kenneth's job keeps him out on the road and away from his family most of the time. Her landlady, close friend, and mother figure Monica Breedlove assures her there's nothing wrong with Rhoda.
Monica, who considers herself an expert in psychology, claims she was once psychoanalyzed by Sigmund Freud. When she invites Christine to a luncheon at her home, the party is attended by Monica's brother Emory and his friend, true crime writer Reggie Tasker. The psychopathic mind becomes the subject of discussion.
When Tasker begins discussing cases of female serial killers - women who murdered family members and others for monetary gain or to start a new life - the name of a particularly infamous killer, Bessie Denker, triggers Christine's recurring memories of living with a different family and running in terror from a different mother. Then she hears a chilling news report on the radio.
A child has been killed during a school outing - her daughter Rhoda's school outing. The identity of the victim is not released. Fearing that it's Rhoda, Christine runs back to her apartment. Rhoda returns home, very much alive, and is totally unaffected by the tragedy. She tells her mother that a classmate of hers, a boy named Claude Daigle, drowned.
Christine knows that name. Rhoda had been furious when Claude won a penmanship award at school that she believed was rightfully hers. Later, Christine learns from Claudia Fern, who founded the private school with her sisters, that Rhoda has been expelled. On the day of Claude's death, Rhoda had been harassing him.
The other kids hated Rhoda, but more than that, they feared her. It didn't bother Rhoda at all; she had no use for friends. Christine also learns that although Claude Daigle's death was ruled an accidental drowning, he had unexplained crescent-shaped marks on his face and his penmanship medal was never found.
Overcome with dread, Christine fears that Rhoda may have killed Claude, though it seems impossible. But someone else sees through Rhoda's act - Leroy Jessup, the janitor, groundskeeper, and gardener for Monica Breedlove's apartments. He's a depraved sociopath and recognizes Rhoda's sociopathic nature.
Leroy sees a kindred spirit in Rhoda, but he's troubled by her meanness, which is greater than his own. He wants her to be nice to him, so he teases her by claiming that he knows she murdered Claude Daigle. He knows no such thing and doesn't believe for a minute that an eight-year-old girl could kill anyone.
Rhoda loathes Leroy and isn't about to be nice to him. So he constantly follows her around, and like an evil Uncle Remus, tells her stories about forensics and how the state has special little electric chairs for children who kill - a blue one for little boys and a pink one for girls like her. She discovers that he naps on a makeshift mattress in his shed when he's supposed to be working.
Meanwhile Christine, who recalls other strange deaths surrounding Rhoda - the puppy who fell out of a window after Rhoda got bored with it, an elderly babysitter who fell down the stairs to her death after promising to leave Rhoda a fancy trinket in her will - asks Reggie Tasker for his crime case histories.
Especially interested in the Bessie Denker case, she learns that beginning when Bessie was a little girl, all of her family members were mysteriously killed, leaving her the sole owner of the family's farm and bank account. Later, she married and had children, but murdered her husbands and kids, either for money or to start a new life.
When she was finally caught, Bessie had murdered her current husband and all but one of their children with an axe. The surviving child's name? Christine Denker, Bessie's youngest daughter. Arrested, tried, and convicted of multiple murders, Bessie died an agonizing death in the electric chair.
The man Christine thought was her biological father, the famous journalist Richard Bravo, best known as a war correspondent, was working as an investigative reporter when he saved Christine from her murderous mother. Then he and his wife, unable to have children of their own, adopted her.
They never told Christine any of this to spare her the knowledge and stigma of being a serial killer's daughter. Remembering Reggie Tasker's discussion of the psychopathic mind and how psychopathic tendencies can be inherited, she fears that Rhoda may be a psychopath like her biological grandmother.
Then she finds Claude Daigle's penmanship medal in Rhoda's treasure box. A hysterical Rhoda confesses to killing Claude in a fit of rage. Satisfied that her mother isn't going to turn her over to the police, she returns to her calm and charming self. Not knowing whether to love or hate her daughter, Christine blames herself for "carrying the bad seed" and passing it on to Rhoda.
Then Leroy Jessup makes the mistake of teasing Rhoda by telling her that he has incriminating evidence against her - the cleated shoes she'd beaten Claude with and disposed of down the furnace chute. She sneaks in when Leroy's sleeping and sets his mattress on fire. He runs out of the shed engulfed in flames. While she watches him burn to death, Rhoda giggles and says, "You're silly!"
Racked with guilt over Claude Daigle's death, unable to stop Rhoda from killing Leroy, and fearful that the little girl will grow up to follow her grandmother's path to the electric chair, Christine tricks Rhoda into taking an overdose of sleeping pills, then commits suicide with a handgun. Monica Breedlove arrives on the scene just barely in time to get Rhoda to the hospital.
With all the evidence of Rhoda's crimes destroyed by her mother, (to avoid scandalizing her husband and his prominent family) Kenneth Penmark is left griefstricken and confused, but thankful that his daughter survived. The novel ends with Rhoda uttering her famous line, "What will you give me for a basket of kisses?"
A hugely influential novel, its title, The Bad Seed, would enter the American psychological lexicon as a theory used to explain how a person raised in a loving, stable family could be a psychopath with violent tendencies. In the 70+ years since its publication, the bad seed theory has been largely debunked.
While psychopathic tendencies can be inherited, modern technology for scanning the brain has shown that the root cause of the psychopathic personality is a defect in the temporal lobes, which control the personality - a defect that renders a person's natural capacity for empathy retarded to nonexistent. The defect can also result in sociopathic or borderline personality disorders.
Of course, nature and nurture still play a part in the development of a psychopath. A child with risk factors for sociopathic or psychopathic personality disorders may not develop them if raised in a loving and stable environment, and not all psychopaths have violent or sexually deviant tendencies. (Psychopaths make the best CEOs.) And yes, there have been violent child psychopaths.
In 1968, a 10-year-old English girl named Mary Bell was arrested for strangling two small boys. A sadistic psychopath, Mary expressed no remorse and was found guilty but with diminished mental capacity. Her father had been a violent alcoholic and criminal, her mother a prostitute who repeatedly tried to kill her and allowed her clients to sexually abuse Mary for extra money.
The same year it was published, The Bad Seed was adapted as a hit Broadway play by playwright Maxwell Anderson. It starred Nancy Kelly (who won a Tony Award for her performance) as Christine Penmark, Henry Jones as Leroy Jessup, and child actress Patty McCormack in a chilling performance as Rhoda.
The play was itself adapted as a classic film two years later, with Kelly, Jones, and McCormack reprising their Broadway roles. Unfortunately, the stifling Hollywood Production Code was still in effect and it forbade showing criminals getting away with their crimes. Director Mervyn LeRoy was forced to change the ending somewhat.
To get the Code Seal and placate other censors, (at the time, states and cities had their own film censorship boards) in an obviously tacked on final scene after Rhoda survives her mother's murder attempt, she sneaks out on a rainy night to look for the penmanship medal and is struck by lightning and killed. This is followed by a cutesy "curtain call" scene - a nod to the film's Broadway origins.
In this scene, the cast members come out to take a bow, the actors introduced to the audience. After little Patty McCormack takes her bow, Nancy Kelly, who played her mother, takes the girl over her knee and playfully spanks her while Patty laughs hysterically.
This pointless scene isn't just a nod to the play that the film is based on - it's another attempt to placate censors and soothe horrified filmgoers, as the film was a real shocker for the time. Modern viewers who appreciate the movie don't watch these last two scenes.
The film, which made Patty McCormack a horror icon, was remade twice, first as a made-for-TV movie in 1985 that starred Blair Brown as Christine Penmark, David Carradine as Leroy Jessup, and a talented child actress named Carrie Wells as Rhoda, who is renamed Rachel Penmark here. Panned when it first aired, this movie now has its fair share of admirers.
The second remake was released in 2018, and aired on the Lifetime cable channel. It's pretty much an "in name only" adaptation of the novel and play, but it's still worth watching for the performances of the very talented young actress Mckenna Grace as Rhoda (renamed Emma Grossman) and Rob Lowe (who produced and directed) as her anxiety-racked and overmedicated single dad.
A grown-up Patty McCormack appears as a child psychologist who assures Lowe that his daughter is "one hundred percent perfectly average. In fact, I told her that she reminds me of myself!" A sequel, The Bad Seed Returns, with Mckenna Grace reprising her role as a now teenage Emma, premiered on Lifetime in May of 2022.
Legendary horror director Eli Roth said that he plans to make a new feature film adaptation of The Bad Seed. Roth, who invented the "torture porn" subgenre of horror films with his 2005 horror classic Hostel and its 2007 sequel, Hostel: Part II, said that his version will be darker and gorier than the novel and its previous adaptations.
Quote Of The Day
"Everybody must seem crazy if you see deep enough into their minds."
- William March
Vanguard Video
Today's video features a complete live performance of the stage play adaptation of William March's novel, The Bad Seed. Enjoy!
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