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Fanny Herself
Hardcover
General FictionLiterary Fiction
Publisher: Bibliotech Pr
Published: Jan 6 2023
Pages: 230
Weight: 0.99
Height: 0.69 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
One of the Great Novels of American Business
Edna Ferber's classic novel Fanny Herself is many things. It is a semi-autobiographical novel about a young girl growing up in Appleton Wisconsin in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century. It is loosely based on episodes from her own life, and other family members. Her older sister was named Fannie, and was the author of a famous cookbook titled Fannie Fox's Cookbook. In her autobiography A Peculiar Treasure Ferber even quotes several episodes from this book saying that the account cannot be improved upon.
But this is also a novel about religious tolerance and the culture of the midwest during this period of history. Ferber is an acute, humorous, and precise observer of culture and behavior. Her eye for detail, and her ear for dialogue are apparent in the many plays and movies which she wrote. Her observations of the pleasures of growing up as a bright, curious, and Jewish girl in small town Wisconsin are both revealing, and amusing.
Ferber also writes tellingly of the dynamics of her family, a father who could not work, and had no business instincts; a mother who was proud, capable, and competent, unafraid of taking risks, and a sibling for whom much was sacrificed.
Perhaps the most interesting story in this novel evolves after Fanny leaves home and goes to work for a new, rapidly expanding, mail order catalog company based in Chicago. A thinly disquised version of the new and explosive company subsequently called Sears and Roebuck. Although this part of the story is fiction, the descriptions of Sears, how it operates, how it changed American business, it's management, and it's methods are excellent. As with her famous Emma McChesney stories, Ferber is able to capture the essence of business transactions as interpersonal relationships in a way that no other author has done. Ferber wrote about businesses all over the United States, from the riverboat business of Showboat, to the oil business of Giant! Her novels are extensively rooted in the growth and challenges of business owners, workers and customers.
One of the great scenes of the novel is the description of a Suffragette parade in New York in the years before WW1. It brings into sharp focus the feelings of women who were unable to vote, even as they expanded their roles into all other areas of society.
This novel is a great place to start for anyone who has not read Ferber. It has many of the themes and even some of the characters of her other work. Highly recommended. (Dharma)
Bio
Edna Ferber (August 15, 1885 - April 16, 1968) was an American novelist, short story writer and playwright. Her novels include the Pulitzer Prize-winning So Big (1924), Show Boat (1926; made into the celebrated 1927 musical), Cimarron (1930; adapted into the 1931 film which won the Academy Award for Best Picture), Giant (1952; made into the 1956 film of the same name) and Ice Palace (1958), which also received a film adaptation in 1960.
Ferber's novels generally featured strong female protagonists, along with a rich and diverse collection of supporting characters. She usually highlighted at least one strong secondary character who faced discrimination, ethnic or otherwise.
Ferber's works often concerned small subsets of American culture, and sometimes took place in exotic locations she had visited but was not intimately familiar with, such as Texas or Alaska. She thus helped to highlight the diversity of American culture to those who did not have the opportunity to experience it. Some novels are set in places she had not visited. (wikipedia.org)
14 different editions
Also available
Also from
Ferber, Edna
So Big: A Pulitzer Prize Novel of Ambition, Sacrifice, and the Meaning of Success
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
Buttered Side Down - An Edna Ferber Short Story Collection;With an Introduction by Rogers Dickinson
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
Bon Bons, Bourbon and Bon Mots: Stories from the Algonquin Round Table
Ferber, Edna
Benchley, Robert
Broun, Heywood
Paperback
So Big: A Pulitzer Prize Novel of Ambition, Sacrifice, and the Meaning of Success
Ferber, Edna
Hardcover
Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed - An Edna Ferber Novel;With an Introduction by Rogers Dickinson
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
Half Portions - An Edna Ferber Short Story Collection;With an Introduction by Rogers Dickinson
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
Cheerful - By Request - An Edna Ferber Short Story Collection;With an Introduction by Rogers Dickinson
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
Gigolo - An Edna Ferber Short Story Collection;With an Introduction by Rogers Dickinson
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
My Story That I Like Best
Cobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
Curwood, James Oliver
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
My Story That I Like Best
Cobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
Curwood, James Oliver
Ferber, Edna
Hardcover
Personality Plus: Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock
Ferber, Edna
Flagg, James Montgomery
Paperback
Roast Beef, Medium: The Journey of Emma McChesney: Navigating Business and Life on the Road
Ferber, Edna
Paperback
My Story That I Like Best (Cram Edition)
Curwood, James Oliver
Ferber, Edna
Cobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
Paperback
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