Louise Brooks Society: Book recommendations from the Louise Brooks Society

Tuesday, March 31, 2020

Book recommendations from the Louise Brooks Society

If you are stuck at home due to the coronavirus pandemic and are wanting to catching up on your reading... may we recommend the following books on Louise Brooks, silent film, and early Hollywood. Many, but not all, of these titles are available through local independent bookstores like Powell's Books in Portland, Oregon, national chain stores like Barnes & Noble, online stores like amazon.com, or specialty shops like Larry Edmunds in Hollywood. The latter was written up here in the previous post. Some of these titles, especially those published by larger publishers, might also be available as an e-book through your local library.

Before getting into books on the silent and early sound era, let's look toward the Louise Brooks bookshelf. Three essential books any fan will want to read are the biography by Barry Paris and Louise Brooks' own volume of memoirs, Lulu in Hollywood. Both are still available thanks to the efforts of the Louise Brooks Society, which helped bring them back into print. I would also recommend both Jan Wahl's wonderful Dear Stinkpot: Letters From Louise Brooks, and Pamela Hutchinson's recently reissued Pandora's Box (Die Büchse der Pandora), from BFI Film Classics. And, I might also put in a plug for a few of my recent books, Louise Brooks, the Persistent Star (a collection of essays), Beggars of Life: A Companion to the 1928 Film, and Now We're in the Air: A Companion to the Once "Lost" Film.

There are a few other titles available, like Peter Cowie's Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever and Roland Jaccard's Louise Brooks: Portrait of an Anti-Star, but they are out of print and a bit harder to track down. Tom Graves' My Afternoon with Louise Brooks is also of interest, and I've written about it a number of times here on the Louise Brooks Society blog. Otherwise, be sure and check out the Books for Sale table here on the blog for even more related and recommended titles. On a final note, let me add that a title like Louise Brooks: Her men, affairs, scandals and persona is a pile of crap, and unless you like stepping in dog-shit, I would avoid it all together.

Among the new and recent releases realted to the silent and early sound era, I would recommend Rediscovering Roscoe: The Films of “Fatty” Arbuckle, by Steve Massa. I recently wrote it here on the LBS blog. It is an interesting read, and not only because Arbuckle directed Louise Brooks in a 1931 short, Windy Riley Goes Hollywood.

Also recently released and more than deserving of a read is Donna Hill's Rudolph Valentino: The Silent Idol, His Life in Photographs. As Kevin Brownlow remarked, "Besides being superbly researched, Silent Idol is filled with outstanding photographs, [and] given the standard of reproduction they deserve. I recommend it wholeheartedly."

If you find yourself drawn to the exoticism of early Hollywood, then you will likely find yourself drawn to the Agata Frymus' Damsels and Divas: European Stardom in Silent Hollywood (Rutgers University Press). Film scholar Michael Williams stated, "Written with engaging clarity and scholarly vigour and founded on first-class archival research, Damsels and Divas is a hugely welcome addition to scholarship on Hollywood stardom in the 1920s. The book shines much-needed light on the extraordinary careers of European female stars Pola Negri, Vilma Bánky and Jetta Goudal as well as the discourses of ethnicity, gender and class that shaped the firmament in which they, as Frymus puts it, ‘shone briefly, but very brightly’."

Two other recent titles worth noting are Dan van Neste's They Coulda Been Contenders: Twelve Actors Who Should Have Become Cinematic Superstars (Bear Manor), a highly enjoyable read, and Barbara Tepa Lupack's Silent Serial Sensations: The Wharton Brothers and the Magic of Early Cinema (Cornell University Press). Regarding the latter, Jack Garner (Louise Brooks' friend and former staff film critic at the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle) stated, "Silent Serial Sensations shines an overdue spotlight on a little-known but essential part of cinema history. Barbara Tepa Lupack tells the surprising and rich story of the creative Wharton brothers and their Ithaca studio in this well-researched and engaging history."

Louise Brooks Society

Launched in 1995, the Louise Brooks Society™ is a pioneering fansite and online archive devoted to the legendary silent film star. The Louise Brooks Society operates with the consent of the Estate of Louise Brooks (Louise Brooks Heirs, LC), and have its permission to use the name and likeness of the actress. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. CONTACT: louisebrookssociety (at) gmail.com

1 comment:

Simon Fielder said...: Great recommendations, thank-you. I like the look of They Coulda Been Contenders.
Also, I really like the illustration of Louise Brooks on the cover of Pandora's Box there. Who is the artist, do you know?; April 28, 2020 at 2:34 PM