Josephine Lawrence

Josephine Lawrence (1889–1978) was an American novelist and journalist. Her works chronicled the lives of common people, with stories often filled with a large cast of bustling characters, emphasizing the everyday lives of children and the elderly.[1]

Literary Career

Lawrence was among the many authors who ghost wrote series books for the Stratemeyer Syndicate of children's books. She wrote 51 such volumes between 1920 and 1935, for series including Betty Gordon, Honey Bunch and the Riddle Club.[2][3] After writing successfully for the Syndicate, she began writing her own series and stand-alone stories for children.

Later she wrote a number of novels for adults, including Glenna (1929), Head of the Family (1932), Years Are So Long (1934) — which was made into a movie Make Way for Tomorrow (1937) — If I Have Four Apples (1935), Sound of Running Feet (1937) and Bow Down to Wood and Stone (1938). The New York Times notes that her novels detailed "money troubles and those family problems and relationships that in the 30's were most deeply felt." Her last published novel, Under One Roof, came out in 1975.[4]

Years Are So Long has been examined among a set of film topics from two eras in the 20th century that reflect cultural conflicts around aging and femininity that helped to reinforce elder advocacy in American social policy and legislation.[5] The novel, described as “one of her more enduring works (out of approximately one hundred children's books and thirty-five social problem books for adults),”[6] was treated to an annotated edition in 2012, A Critical Edition of Josephine Lawrence's "Years Are So Long" (1934): A Novelistic Portrayal of Adult Children with Their Elderly Parents during the American Great Depression[7]

In 1965, her papers were gathered in the Josephine Lawrence Collection at Boston University, in an archive containing letters, clippings, novels, poetry and related materials.[8]

Biography

Lawrence was born in Newark, New Jersey on March 12, 1889. By 1915, she was the editor of the children’s page of the Newark Sunday Call, a weekly independent newspaper that was published from 1872 to 1946.[9] By the 1920s, she was also the editor of the Household Page of that paper. In 1940 she married musician and actor Artur Platz and moved to Manhattan. When the Newark Sunday Call closed down, she took a job at the Newark News where she wrote book reviews as well as a column titled “Book Marks.”[10] Lawrence died at home in New York City on February 22, 1978.[11]

References

  1. ↑ Kelsey Guilfoil. 1949. “Josephine Lawrence: The Voice of the People,” The English Journal, 38:7 pp. 365-370
  2. ↑ James D. Keeline. "Syndicate 101 or, Where did all those books come from?"
  3. ↑ Deidre A. Johnson. 1997. "Community and Character: A Comparison of Josephine Lawrence's Linda Lane Series and Classic Orphan Fiction," Nancy Drew and Company: Culture, Gender, and Girls' Series,Sherrie A. Inness, ed. Popular Press.
  4. ↑ C. Gerald Fraser, Josephine Lawrence, 88, Author; Novelist of Middle‐Class America, New York Times, Feb. 24, 1978.
  5. ↑ Andrea Walsh. 1989. “‘Life isn't yet over’: Older heroines in American popular cinema of the 1930s and 1970s/80s” Qualitative Sociology 12(1): 72–9.
  6. ↑ Augustyn, Frederick J. The Journal of American CultureVol. 36, Iss. 3, (Sep 2013): 244-245.
  7. ↑ Carmela Pinto Mclntire, Editor. 2012. A Critical Edition of Josephine Lawrence's "Years Are So Long" (1934): A Novelistic Portrayal of Adult Children with Their Elderly Parents during the American Great Depression. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press.
  8. ↑ Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center http://archives.bu.edu/collections/collection?id=122311
  9. ↑ Nat Bodian, Remembering The Newark Sunday Call https://www.oldnewark.com/memories/newspapers/bodiancall.htm
  10. ↑ Deidre A. Johnson. Josephine Lawrence: A Writer of Her Time. Garden State Legacy (28) Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/eng_facpub/52 June 2015.
  11. ↑ C. Gerald Fraser, Josephine Lawrence, 88, Author; Novelist of Middle‐Class America, New York Times, Feb. 24, 1978.


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.