'Cain was not just a great hard-boiled novelist but a great novelist, period ... To read MILDRED PIERCE now is to experience a double vision, in which we confront both how much and how little things have changed' LA TIMES 'Vivid, gritty, real...this is crime writing at its very best' MY WEEKLY Mildred Pierce is the story of a determined and ambitious woman who, after her feckless husband abandons her, by hard work and sacrifice builds a successful business to ensure the future of her pampered and selfish daughter. But she ...
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'Cain was not just a great hard-boiled novelist but a great novelist, period ... To read MILDRED PIERCE now is to experience a double vision, in which we confront both how much and how little things have changed' LA TIMES 'Vivid, gritty, real...this is crime writing at its very best' MY WEEKLY Mildred Pierce is the story of a determined and ambitious woman who, after her feckless husband abandons her, by hard work and sacrifice builds a successful business to ensure the future of her pampered and selfish daughter. But she isn't prepared for the intrigues and devastating betrayals of those closest to her. This is James M. Cain's most substantial novel and a classic of the Depression years.
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Publisher:
Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
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06/23/2011
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English
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Probably more famous as a celebrated 1945 movie starring Joan Crawford, James Cain's novel "Mildred Pierce" (1941)is set in the gritty world of Depression-era Los Angeles in the 1930s. Cain is famous for the noir writing of his shorter and earlier novels, "The Postman Always Rings Twice" and "Double Indemnity", which also became classic films. Unlike these books, "Mildred Pierce" does not involve the murder of a husband by his wife and her lover, but it includes and expands upon the themes of sex, greed, and class of these two earlier books. It also portrays a world of pervasive philistinism. Unlike its predecessors, much of the focus of "Mildred Pierce" is on the mother-daughter relationship and upon ingratitude. Although related in the third person (unlike the confessional first-person narratives of Postman and Double Indemnity) in a clipped, hard-boiled tone, the novel is an introspective character study of its heroine.
When the book begins, Mildred and her husband Bert are living in a Glendale, California in a middle-class home that the couple can no longer afford. The marriage is breaking up as a result of Bert's affair with a woman named (Maggie) Mrs. Biederhoff, who appears to have been widowed for about a year. Mildred is left with the job of raising two young daughters, Ray, 7 and Vera, 11, faced with a heavy mortgage, no job, and no skills other that her ability to bake pies. Mildred also has a lovely figure and gorgeous legs. She soon falls into a relationship with Wally, an unscrupulous lawyer and former business associate of her husband. But Mildred has ambitions. At first she proudly spurns domestic work, but she eventually takes a job as a waitress in a hash house, where customers grope her legs but where she determines to learn the business and make something of herself. Mildred uses what she learns at the hash house and her skills as a baker to open her own restaurant and, eventually, a chain of restaurants, which succeed aided by the repeal of Prohibition.
Besides showing Mildred's rise as a woman entrepreneur, Cain shows her sexual relationships with Wally and with a rich idler named Monty who loses his fortune during the Depression. Monty sponges off Mildred, and his interest in her is limited to sex and to her body. Mildred maintains through most of the book an ambiguous relationship with Bert, whom she divorces to secure the property she needs for her restaurant. Of the two daughters, Veda gets most of her mother's attention, for her apparent musical talent and her snobbery. Veda mocks her mother and spurns her love, which Mildred want to gain at all costs. Mid-way in the novel, after a torrid weekend affair between Monty and Mildred, the younger daughter Ray dies from an infection caught at seaside. Her death and funeral are portrayed in detail. Mildred redoubles her efforts with Veda and with Veda's piano lessons.
Among many other things, Cain portrays the harsh competitive side of the world of classical music when Veda learns from a reputed conductor and teacher, Treviso, in no uncertain terms that she has no talent for the piano. Shortly thereafter, however, Veda becomes a famous singer. In an astonishing scene between Treviso and Mildred, Treviso compares Veda to a poisonous coral snake with no thought of anything but herself. He advises Mildred to stay away from her daughter. This is advice that few mothers would take. The relationship between Mildred, Veda, Monty and Bert leads the novel to a crashing climax and ending.
The focus of the novel is on Mildred, but the novel portrays well many secondary characters. Broadly, the characters in Cain's world are driven by lust and money. There is also a strong component of class jealousy. The male characters, including Bert, Wally, Monty, and a young man named Sam, who is the victim of an extortionate scheme of Veda's are weak, lazy characters, ruled by their sex drives. Mildred is a much more complex character than any of the men. For all her faults and her ultimate downfall in the novel, Cain evokes sympathy for her. Some of the other women, including Mildred's friend Ida, from her hash house days, and her neighbor Mrs. Gessler, receive convincing-multi-faceted tough portrayals. Besides showing character, "Mildred Pierce" has a strong sense of place in showing Southern California in the 1930s. The book includes an extraordinary scene of a furious rainstorm which Mildred braves in her attempt to break up with Monty who is siphoning off her money and her ambitions.
"Mildred Pierce" is a dark portrayal of people and place. It succeeds through its unremitting emphasis of sex, greed and human weakness and through its picture of Mildred. Strong but flawed female characters are relatively rare in American literature, particularly of Cain's time. This is a book that deserves to be read and remembered.
