Hilary Hallett

Gentle readers, the muffled shriek I emitted on finding out that Inventing the It Girl was written not just by a professional historian, but by one who holds a tenured position at an Ivy.

Hilary Hallett certainly picked a fascinating subject to write about in Elinor Glyn. Almost unknown today, through an eye for the kind of soapy melodrama that would sell in vast quantities and an incredible talent for self-promotion, Glyn catapulted herself from the ranks of the financially embarrassed Edwardian gentry first to fame as the author of "scandalous" (by contemporary standards) romance novels and then to wealth as the writer/producer of a number of movies in 1920s Hollywood.

But while Hallett may know her stuff about the history of Hollywood (per her faculty profile, her expertise is "histories of American culture industries, particularly theater, music, film, and Hollywood's history"), she flounders repeatedly and badly when discussing Glyn's early life and whenever she tries to provide the reader with a broader grounding for Glyn's career. Some of these are issues of interpretation and contextualisation that show that Hallett's not read deeply in British social or political history.

But there are also just swathes of errors that could have been caught by dint of a quick Google search and that I'd find inexcusable in an undergraduate paper, let alone in a published book. No, Thucydides is not "the so-called father of history" (that's Herodotus). No, it's not true that "[a]s Queen Victoria's grandson, the kaiser [Wilhelm II] shared the Hanover family name until the Great War led his cousin, King George V, to adopt the more Anglo-sounding "Windsor."" Victoria was the last Hanoverian; Edward VII and George V were members of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha; Wilhelm was a Hohenzollern. And on, and on.

I found it particularly galling that Hallett dared to have a slap at Louis B. Mayer for getting forms of aristocratic address wrong ("But 'Sir Rhys', as Mayer persistently called him"). Mayer might have been a thoroughgoing jerk in most respects, but in this he was correct! A British baronet is correctly referred to as Sir [First Name] or Sir [First Name] [Surname], but never as Sir [Surname]—exactly the kind of error that Hallett makes throughout with her references to "Sir Rhys-Williams" (instead of Sir Rhys Rhys-Williams) and "Sir Beaton" (instead of Sir Cecil Beaton).

Exactly the kind of mistake that I imagine Elinor Glyn—to the end a snobby anti-Semite—would have turned her nose up at. "Not our kind of people," you can just hear her say. "Not at all it."… (meer)

I must warn readers straight up: this is an academic book, and though it reads like a textbook, it does contain a great deal of interesting material on the major role women played in the early years of silent film. Just work through the slow start and be aware there's some repetition throughout. Especially large paragraphs make for awkward reading as well.

So much has been lost in regards to the history of silent movies in America. Many movies have not survived, and knowledge has been lost as well. The simple fact is, in 1920, Los Angeles was the only major city where women outnumbered men in the west. These were New Women of the era, women trying to survive. It's estimated that over half of early movie scenarists (that's what they were called rather than screenwriters) were women. Many early movie stars were women as well. Mary Pickford, is of course, the best example (actress, producer, founder of United Artists, savvy businesswomen) but she was one of many. While many Jewish men were studio heads, Jewish women also thrived as actresses.

The end of the Great War--and the devastation of the French and German film industries--secured Hollywood's place as the film capital of the world. The existing order did not approve of the new independence of women, however. As the 1920s began, hate groups escalated. Immigration from perceived "lesser" nations to America was stopped, and the KKK experienced a revival that opposed Catholics, Jews, and New Women. Along with major church groups, they argued that if women left the home, white society would be destroyed. Movies were considered a major instigators, inspiring women to be adventurous and independent. The Fatty Arbuckle case--and the character assassination of the victim, Ms. Rappe--only proved their point. Independent women were fallen women. Therefore, as federal censorship began and the Hays Code kicked in, depictions of women also changed as well.

If you have any interest in women in Hollywood in this era, work through this book. It's not always an easy read, but it's still a fascinating one... and a sad one as well, as we're only repeating history when it comes to the rights of women and immigrants. A century has passed, yet so little has changed.… (meer)