Thomas Kernan

181. Now with the Morning Star, by Thomas Kernan (read 10 Mar 1945) I confess I remember little about this book, which I finished reading 10 March 1945. On that day I wrote in my diary: "Tonight finished Now With the Morning Star. Very good. Thomas Kernan is certainly a good writer." Here are some words about Kernan and the book which I found by a Google search: "Thomas Kernan was educated at Georgetown University, receiving his B.A. in 1922, and his M.A. in 1923. In 1925, he joined the staff of Conde Nast Publications in New York City. He was general manager of the staff and later circulation manager of Vogue, Vanity Fair, and House and Garden magazines. In 1937, Kernan became the publisher of the French edition of Vogue in Paris. When Nazi Germany invaded France in June 1940, he remained in the country assisting with the evacuation of French and American friends and the preservation of their property. Kernan returned to the U.S. in 1941, and resigned from Conde Nast the following year. He became a freelance journalist for some time until August 1942, when he returned to France with the American Red Cross to further assist in the evacuation of American civilians and diplomats. In November 1942, Kernan was interned with the American diplomatic corps at Lourdes. Early in 1943, he was moved to Baden Baden, Germany, where he would be detained for another thirteen months. Here, he wrote his novel, "Now with the Morning Star," perhaps the first to be written in an internment camp.After his release, Kernan entered the U.S. Intelligence Service and served in England and Germany with the Office of War Information from 1944 through the end of the war. In the years after the war, and for the rest of his life, Kernan continued to reside in France. He inaugurated the French edition of House and Garden magazine, composing from its pages several expensive and best-selling books on architecture, interior decoration, and gardening. Kernan officially retired from Conde Nast in 1969. His addresses in Paris were the Place Vendome and the Rude de Marignac, successively. He also bought and renovated a country house on the Rue de la Montaigne, St. Aignan, in Senlis. Thomas Kernan was author of several books including Across a World in collaboration with John J. Considine (1942); France on Berlin Time (1941) and the forementioned novel, Now with the Morning Star (Scribner's, 1944, 1951 and Bodley Head, 1945). It should be noted that both Thomas and Julie Kernan's books were translated and published variously in French, Spanish and German.… (meer)