Search Results

This chapter focuses on the appearance of much memorable children's literature during what has come to be known as its ‘Golden Age’. Covering the work of three of the main innovators in this field, this chapter shows how new writers reinvented existing popular forms of writing for children to make them attractive and newly relevant for readers in the new century. It first looks at how Beatrix Potter's animal tales illustrate the ways in which new production techniques had comprehensively transformed the appearance of children's books at this time. The chapter then investigates the fiction of E. Nesbit, looking at the ways in which she modernised several forms of writing — in particular the fantastical tale and the family story — that had long proved popular with child readers. Finally, one of the most enduring genres of children's literature, the school story, is discussed through the work of P. G. Wodehouse.

Following a disagreement with Metro about production costs, Capellani left the company for good in spite of the huge success of The Red Lantern. He decided to become an independent producer himself. Albert Capellani Productions started in 1919 with an innovative “filmusical-comedy” after P. G. Wodehouse, Oh Boy! Capellani produced eight features, but the company encountered severe financial difficulties following the destruction of the studio laboratory. By 1920, the company was dead, and Capellani had to sign a contract with Cosmopolitan Productions, headed by William Randolph Hearst.

In the first half of 1936, Gershwin published little new music other than a song, “King of Swing,” that helped fill out an all-Gershwin revue, Swing Is King, at the Radio City Music Hall. The Gershwins had shown interest in working on an Astaire–Rogers musical as early as October 1935. George and Ira completed the score in early December, and during production in early 1937, the film was renamed Shall We Dance. For Astaire's next picture, RKO decided, at Gershwin's suggestion, to adapt P. G. Wodehouse's 1919 novel A Damsel in Distress. Like Shall We Dance, though more subtly, the film engages the theme of high versus low art; patron of a madrigal consort, Lady Caroline disapproves of jazz, the music her stepson adores, even if he is forced to oblige her preference for traditional English music.

Finn Pollard explores P. G. Wodehouse’s early twentieth-century fiction and charts the evolution of the famous author’s portrayals of the United States and its people from his initial use of common archetypes to much more complicated themes and character relationships, including Anglo-American friendships as well as romantic entanglements. Pollard delves into the period influences that contributed to this evolution, including the boys’ school story, the nature of London theatre, and Anglo-American romance novels, and seeks to illuminate why Wodehouse’s British and American characters mingled with increasing ease, were at times treated as interchangeable, and asserted a mutually positive relationship. Ultimately, this exploration of popular literature suggests readers in both countries were increasingly exposed to a new, influential, and warmer narrative of Anglo-American relations in the period preceding the Great War.

Ziegfeld and Burke join forces to make Burkeley Crest into their own fantasy world, which includes a menagerie of animals. Commentary from Patricia and local residents of Hastings-on-Hudson (the town in upstate New York where the Ziegfelds live) is included. The remaking of Burkeley Crest into a family home brings Burke and Ziegfeld closer together. The theater further bonds the couple, although the shows Ziegfeld produces to reintroduce Burke to Broadway prove to be flops. The chapter includes an in-depth discussion of the continual changes taking place on Broadway and the fresh musicians and writers who influence these changes, including P. G. Wodehouse, Guy Bolton, Jerome Kern, and George Gershwin. The Ziegfeld Follies of 1917 includes songs that increasingly suggest the archetypal independent and hedonistic woman of the Jazz Age. Burke alerts Ziegfeld to Marilyn Miller, a bright young dancer she spots in a Shubert show. Marilyn is the embodiment of the youth-centered 1920s.

As the chapter begins, Ziegfeld is struggling to get his new musical off the ground. He funds the entire production himself and hires Jerome Kern, P. G. Wodehouse, and Guy Bolton to write the play. Sally is different from Cinderella musicals of the past; it has a distinctly modern feel, for in the end, Sally finds not only love and wealth but also a successful career. Sally is a monumental success. The seemingly unstoppable team of Marilyn Miller and Ziegfeld is threatened when she meets Jack Pickford, former husband of Olive Thomas. To Ziegfeld’s dismay, Pickford and Miller become involved romantically. He encounters more woman troubles when Lillian Lorraine has an accident and severely injures her spine; Ziegfeld secretly pays her bills. The chapter includes a brief description of the Follies of 1920 and 1921 and explains how the lucrative Midnight Frolic was forced to close due to Prohibition. The chapter concludes with rare correspondence between Ziegfeld and his parents and between Burke and Ziegfeld during his time alone in Palm Beach. Despite the enormous success of Sally, Ziegfeld still feels insecure about his finances, his place on Broadway, and his marriage to Burke.