Pigsties With Spires. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., (1928).
Fourth Impression. "An intensive study of a kept woman. The most intimate emotions and thoughts of Josephine Demayne, and draws a sensitive picture of a certain development, in her life, which is rare in fiction". A contemporary reviewer writes: "The novel is ugly and sordid, redeemed only by several bits of very clever characterization, hung upon an unconvincing plot that rises to a ridiculously melodramatic climax. Josephine Demayne, a widow with one small daughter, Sonia, is caught in the meshes of hopeless poverty. Pictured at first as a slovenly, rather unattractive creature, she blossoms into a veritable siren when she sets herself the task of capturing the fancy of Robert Burnett, father of the small boy for whom she is acting as nursery governess. This is the way out which Josephine, chooses to take. Her motives appear decidedly mixed; at one moment the reader is led to believe she really loves Robert, at another that she is merely seeking a life of ease; another that she'ss concerned for her daughter. Devoid of apparently any moral sense, alternately adoring and neglecting her child, she never appears in any but a repellant light. Robert is described by the author as "a man who could not be judged by ordinary standards of right and wrong. His intelligence, naturally far below the average, had been completely submerged by sex obsession. He was a slave to this Instinct, following it blindly, never pausing to analyze his emotions, entirely devoid of self-control." Truly it is difficult to discover the "spires" to the pigsty resulting from this alliance. Here is an age-old story, molded by novelists and dramatists into varying forms lime without end. If Georgina Garry had merely acknowledged that she was presenting a little cross-section of life, with all its mixed motives and ugliness, one might have accepted it, but when she attempts to ram a moral down one's throat it is much too much. It is the childhood of Sonia that does much to redeem the novel. Here the writer has created an unforgettably pathetic and moving character in the person of this neglected, lovable child." Near Fine in Very Good dustjacket, shallow loss at lower spine end, inch closed tear at lower front spine edge, small accordion tear at mid front panel.
Price: $125.00