The Fierce Dispute

Last updated
The Fierce Dispute
Author Helen Hooven Santmyer
Country United States
Language English
Genre Gothic, psychological, family saga
Publisher Houghton Mifflin
Publication date
1929
Media typePrint (Hardcover)
Pages208 pp (1st edition, hardcover)

The Fierce Dispute is a 1929 novel by Helen Hooven Santmyer. Her second novel, it is set around 1900 in an unnamed town in Ohio (later acknowledged by Santmyer to be Xenia [1] ).

Contents

The novel tells of three generations of women, the wealthy, elderly Margaret Baird, her daughter Hilary, and Hilary's daughter Lucy Anne, aged 9, who live reclusively. Hilary had studied in Italy, supported by her financially successful elder brother Will. There she met and married Paolo, a gifted musician and composer, over her mother's objections. Paolo proved to be a philanderer, and Hilary eventually left him. Margaret has allowed Hilary and Lucy Anne to stay, provided that Lucy Anne be kept ignorant of her father and of music, and has even written her will to provide generous support conditional on continued music avoidance. But Lucy Anne has a natural talent, setting up the "fierce dispute" between mother and grandmother, which is only resolved by Paolo's ghost.

Santmyer acknowledged that the house itself, and its reclusive atmosphere, is based on the "Roberts Villa", in Xenia. [1] The actual occupants had been, when Santmyer was growing up, two elderly spinsters who never went out, and their nephew who sometimes went out the back way. [2]

Like Santmyer's first novel, Herbs and Apples , the novel received a minor reception at the time, but otherwise made no impact. It too was rediscovered when Santmyer became a literary sensation in 1984, and reissued in hardcover (St. Martin's Press, 1987) and paperback (St. Martin's Press, 1988) with an introduction by Weldon Kefauver (Santmyer's editor at Ohio State University Press), three poems by Santmyer, and a biographical postscript.

A 1999 paperback re-issue (OSU Press) had a foreword by Cecilia Tichi (of Vanderbilt University) and the three poems by Santmyer.

Plot summary

One summer, Lucy Anne learns to sing from Aaron, the family's Negro servant, who has not been told this is not allowed. Margaret rebukes Lucy Anne, and explains that she is to stay away from music. When she is caught playing the piano, she is sent to bed. Lucy Anne sneaks out, but when she tries to scale the locked gate, falls and sprains her ankle. Her fall is witnessed by Dr. Martin Child, who climbs the gate and brings the child in and treats her. He is invited back for regular medical visits. Hilary herself is somewhat sick, possibly tuberculosis, and Dr. Martin, who was sweet on Hilary from before she left for Italy, proposes to her and asks her to move with him to a warmer, drier climate. She refuses.

When Lucy Anne has healed, Margaret takes Lucy Anne with her on her once-a-year all-day visit, by interurban train and trolley, to her son Tom, his wife and their daughter. The lousy time Lucy Anne has thereher cousin and friend call her a "wop" among other thingsconvinces Margaret to revise her will, leaving out the clauses that would force Lucy Anne to live with her Uncle Tom, but otherwise just as controlling. Margaret also catches a terrible cold, a possible pneumonia, and is treated by Dr. Martin.

When Margaret improves enough that it is clear she will recover, she dismisses the doctor and the nursing help. Dr. Martin proposes once more to Hilary, she says she will send him her answer by note that evening, which is again a rejection. That night there is a rainy windstorm, and Hilary wakes up to Lucy Anne's cry of terror. She reports that she had been drawn by music, and that there had been a man playing the piano in the drawing room, whistles some of the music for Hilary who recognizes it, and then Grandmother showed up, the man and Margaret discussed things, with Margaret asking Paolo what does he want and he answers "Lucy Anne", at which point Lucy Anne screamed and ran off. Hilary insists this was just a dream, but finds her mother dead in the drawing room.

The will and its codicil are read, containing terms that are very controlling regarding Hilary and Lucy Anne. Afterwards, while cleaning up, a sheet falls out of a chair coverthe cover for the chair Margaret had died inand it is one more revision to the will, dated for the day she died, leaving everything to her three children equally and without any conditions attached.

Reception

With an unobtrusive artistry, Miss Santmyer envelopes the situation in an atmosphere akin to a musical mood....

, New York Herald Tribune Books [3]

Notes

  1. 1 2 Santmyer, Helen Hooven (1985). "Introduction to the 1985 Edition". Herbs and Apples (2nd ed.). ISBN   9780060154868.
  2. Santmyer, Helen Hooven (1962). Ohio Town. OSU Press. p. 77.
  3. Herald Tribune 1929.

Further reading

Early book reviews

Later book reviews

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helen Keller</span> American author and activist (1880–1968)

Helen Adams Keller was an American author, disability rights advocate, political activist and lecturer. Born in West Tuscumbia, Alabama, she lost her sight and her hearing after a bout of illness when she was 19 months old. She then communicated primarily using home signs until the age of seven, when she met her first teacher and life-long companion Anne Sullivan. Sullivan taught Keller language, including reading and writing. After an education at both specialist and mainstream schools, Keller attended Radcliffe College of Harvard University and became the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.

<i>Anne of Green Gables</i> 1908 novel by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Anne of Green Gables is a 1908 novel by Canadian author Lucy Maud Montgomery. Written for all ages, it has been considered a classic children's novel since the mid-20th century. Set in the late 19th century, the novel recounts the adventures of 11 year old orphan girl Anne Shirley sent by mistake to two middle-aged siblings, Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert, who had originally intended to adopt a boy to help them on their farm in the fictional town of Avonlea in Prince Edward Island, Canada. The novel recounts how Anne makes her way through life with the Cuthberts, in school, and within the town.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Xenia, Ohio</span> City in Ohio, United States

Xenia is a city in southwestern Ohio and the county seat of Greene County, Ohio, United States. It is 15 miles (24 km) east of Dayton and is part of the Dayton Metropolitan Statistical Area, as well as the Miami Valley region. The name comes from the Greek word Xenia (ξενία), which means "hospitality".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Margaret Whiting</span> American singer

Margaret Eleanor Whiting was an American popular music and country music singer who gained popularity in the 1940s and 1950s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helen Hooven Santmyer</span> American writer (1895–1986)

Helen Hooven Santmyer was an American writer, educator, and librarian. She is primarily known for her best-selling epic "...And Ladies of the Club", published when she was in her 80s.

<i>"...And Ladies of the Club"</i> Book by Helen Hooven Santmyer

"...And Ladies of the Club" is a novel, written by Helen Hooven Santmyer, about a group of women in the fictional town of Waynesboro, Ohio who begin a women's literary club, which evolves through the years into a significant community service organization in the town.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helen Daniels</span> Fictional character from the Australian soap opera Neighbours

Helen Daniels is a fictional character from the Australian soap opera Neighbours, portrayed by Anne Haddy. Following the death of Jim Robinson in 1993, she remained the only original character played continuously by the same actor until her own death in 1997, making her the second longest-serving original character after her grandson Paul Robinson.

This is a list of bestselling novels in the United States in the 1980s, as determined by Publishers Weekly. The list features the most popular novels of each year from 1980 through 1989.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Helen Reimensnyder Martin</span> American novelist

Helen Reimensnyder Martin was an American author.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warren K. Moorehead</span>

Warren King Moorehead was known in his time as the 'Dean of American archaeology'; born in Siena, Italy to missionary parents on March 10, 1866, he died on January 5, 1939, at the age of 72, and is buried in his hometown of Xenia, Ohio.

The mission of the Bay Area Holocaust Oral History Project (BAHOHP) is to gather oral life histories of Holocaust survivors, liberators, rescuers, and eyewitnesses. The project is developing and maintaining a catalogue database for public use. Their goal is to provide students, scholars, resource centers on the world, and the general public access to their archives.

Margaret Elizabeth Jenkins was an English novelist and biographer of Jane Austen, Henry Fielding, Lady Caroline Lamb, Joseph Lister and Elizabeth I. Elizabeth Bowen said Jenkins was "among the most distinguished living English novelists."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">May 1929</span> Month of 1929

The following events occurred in May 1929:

Herbs and Apples is a 1925 novel by Helen Hooven Santmyer. Her first novel, it was largely autobiographical. Set in the fictional town of Tecumseh, Ohio, an unnamed Boston-area women's college, and Manhattan, it tells the story of Derrick Thornton, an aspiring female writer and poet, who ends up preferring the "herbs and apples" of Tecumseh to any sort of literary life.

<i>Farewell, Summer</i>

Farewell, Summer is a novella by Helen Hooven Santmyer. Written after her first two novels, it was not published until after Santmyer's death. The novella tells the 1935 memories of Elizabeth Lane about the summer of 1905, when she had been eleven and in love with her "Wild West cousin" Steve Van Doren, who was romancing, to no avail, another cousin, Damaris, who is intent on never marrying and is planning on becoming a nun. The 1935 Elizabeth now understands what the 1905 Elizabeth was actually seeing.

<i>Ohio Town</i>

Ohio Town is a 1962 autobiographical memoir by Helen Hooven Santmyer, describing the places, communities, and some notable people in the Xenia she remembers from her childhood. It is written in mixed first and second person, and the town name itself is never mentioned, except in the "Acknowledgements" small print where Santmyer names helpful sources, including "our paper, the Xenia Daily Gazette".

Helen Black was an American naturalist and conservationist from the Greater Cincinnati area.

Margaret Charles Smith was an African-American midwife, who became known for her extraordinary skill over a long career, spanning over thirty years. Despite working primarily in rural areas with women who were often in poor health, she lost very few of the more than 3000 babies she delivered, and none of the mothers in childbirth. In 1949, she became one of the first official midwives in Green County, Alabama, and she was still practicing in 1976, when the state passed a law outlawing traditional midwifery. In the 1990s, she cowrote a book about her career, Listen to Me Good: The Life Story of an Alabama Midwife, and in 2010 she was inducted into the Alabama Women's Hall of Fame.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thyrsa Frazier Svager</span> African American mathematician

Thyrsa Anne Frazier Svager was an American academic who was one of the first African-American woman to gain a PhD in mathematics. Born in Ohio, she graduated from high school at the age of 16, going to Antioch College in Ohio and then doing her postgraduate degrees at Ohio State University. Frazier Svager was the head of the Department of Mathematics at Central State University (CSU) in Ohio for decades, ending her academic career as provost and dean for academic affairs. She and her husband, physics professor Aleksandar Svager, invested one of their salaries during their careers to build a legacy for scholarships. After her death, the Thyrsa Frazier Svager Fund was established to provide scholarships for African-American women majoring in mathematics.

Margaret J. Andrew was an American experimental engineer. Born in Dayton, Ohio, she had a focus in science and technology. Her work as an experimental engineer lead to two patents for improving dishwashing and clothes washing appliances. In addition to her professional endeavors, Margaret had a passion for fine cooking and cuisine.