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When Consuelo's grandfather died, he was the richest man in America. Her father soon started to spend the family fortune, enthusiastically supported by Consuelo's mother, Alva, who was determined to attain the top of New York society. She was adamant that her daughter should make a grand marriage to the underfunded Duke of Marlborough--it didn't matter that Consuelo loved someone else. However, the story of Consuelo and Alva is not simply one of the emptiness of wealth, of the glamour of the Gilded Age, and of enterprising social ambition. This is an account of how two women struggled to break free from the materialistic world into which they were born, taking up the fight for female equality. Consuelo threw herself into good works, and her social and political campaigns proved an antidote to loneliness. Alva embraced the militant suffragette movement in America, campaigning vehemently for women's rights until she died.--From publisher description.… (mais)
Interesting biography, a bit tedious at times, it could have used more editing; parts for it went on and on about trivial details (and in some instances pages later went on about it/them again), at other times there was only a paragraph or two on some information upon which she could/should have expounded. I was unaware of Alva's involvement in the suffrage movement and this part made interesting reading (though this was one area that did need an editor). ( )
Interesting biography, a bit tedious at times, it could have used more editing; parts for it went on and on about trivial details (and in some instances pages later went on about it/them again), at other times there was only a paragraph or two on some information upon which she could/should have expounded. I was unaware of Alva's involvement in the suffrage movement and this part made interesting reading (though this was one area that did need an editor). ( )
5104. Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt The Story of a Daughter and a Mother in the Gilded Age, by Amanda Mackenzie Stuart (read 23 Dec 2013) This is a biography of Consuelo, granddaughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and of her mother. I was interested in the book because of the famed annulment of Consuelo's marriage to the 9th Duke of Marlborough, which annulment is learnedly studied in John T. Noonan, Jr.'s excellent book Power to Dissolve Lawyers and Marriages in the Courts of the Roman Curia, which book I read 16 June 1973 and which was the best book I read that year. The sensation and controversy which the annulment aroused in the U.S. papers in 1926 are well related in the biography I have just read. I did not realize that the man who Consuelo was in love with and who she wanted to marry till her mother induced her to marry the Duke was Winthrop Rutherfurd--who went on to marry Oliver P. Morton's daughter and after her death Rutherfurd married the much younger Lucy Mercer, famous because of her involvement with FDR. The book spends much time telling of the extravagances of the rich subjects (kind of sickening, in a way) and of their enthusiasms and eccentricities. Some of that was not too entrancing. ( )
Outstanding biography. The genre itself is difficult to approach - it's not enough for the reader to be mildly curious about someone's life, you have to be interested for 500 pages. If you have only a passing interest in the lives of the rich in the Gilded Age period - which in many ways Alva and Consuelo embody - don't pick this up. If, however, your idea of bliss is a good few days spent reading about first-wave feminism, architecture and the class system, this book is a must-read. Highly readable, detailed enough to be rich and generous in its attempt to give a sense of not only two extraordinary women but also of a whole era, it's a superb account of Consuelo and Alva's lives following both of their paths with equal energy. It's also a story of finding your own path despite family ties - Consuelo suffered from Alva's dominating personality throughout her childhood and teenage years and yet blossomed into a loving and lovely woman with varied, current interests. I was pleasantly surprised to see the author didn't try and demonize Alva who definitely had her flaws (eccentricity and total lack of empathy being two) but was an astonishing character in her own right and I sided with many of her positions (she seemed way ahead of her times and once said that the secret to happiness is not to look back or forward but to live in your time, demonstrating a clarity of thought that's strange for her). I loved best the chapter dealing with both women's involvement with the struggle for female suffrage. Books that open new doors and leave you eager to read about different things (in my case, Winston Churchill and the suffragettes) are the best because they manage to convey marvellous scope. It's a fine balance to keep evoking a way of life that's almost completely extinct now save for the very few (and the author does take pains to explain striking differences) and focus intimately on just two figures who experienced those times but in an incomplete fashion and Stuart manages beautifully. Excellent account and beautiful photographs. Highly recommended. ( )
I ended up returning this after flogging through about 3/4 of it. this book wasn't bad, but it wasn't very interesting either. it just kind of plodded along. I learned some interesting things about the idleness of wealthy women in the US vs their English counterparts who did a lot of charity work but that's about it. ( )
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
To my daughters, Daisy and Marianna
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Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
In November 1895, shortly before the New York wedding of Consuelo Vanderbilt to the 9th Duke of Marlborough, her cousin Gertrude raged at her journal about the unhappy lot of heiresses.
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Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
It was not the absent Duke she wished to reassure, however, but surviving members of her family, a signal to her own flesh and blood that the unhappiest but most creative period of her life had been worth it after all: 'In loving memory of Consuelo Vanderbilt Balsan' read the tombstone, 'Mother of the tenth Duke of Marlborough - born 2nd March 1877 - died 6th December 1964.'
When Consuelo's grandfather died, he was the richest man in America. Her father soon started to spend the family fortune, enthusiastically supported by Consuelo's mother, Alva, who was determined to attain the top of New York society. She was adamant that her daughter should make a grand marriage to the underfunded Duke of Marlborough--it didn't matter that Consuelo loved someone else. However, the story of Consuelo and Alva is not simply one of the emptiness of wealth, of the glamour of the Gilded Age, and of enterprising social ambition. This is an account of how two women struggled to break free from the materialistic world into which they were born, taking up the fight for female equality. Consuelo threw herself into good works, and her social and political campaigns proved an antidote to loneliness. Alva embraced the militant suffragette movement in America, campaigning vehemently for women's rights until she died.--From publisher description.
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