The Secret Life of the Lonely Doll: The Search for Dare Wright

The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

Contents

Title Page

Copyright Notice

Dedication

Epigraph

Prologue

Chapter One: Beginnings

Chapter Two: Cleveland

Chapter Three: New York

Chapter Four: Making Family

Chapter Five: After Philip

Chapter Six: Behind the Little Green Door

Chapter Seven: The Books

Chapter Eight: The Lonely Doll’s Dilemma

Chapter Nine: Loss

Chapter Ten: After Edie

Chapter Eleven: Disenchantment

Epilogue

Notes and Acknowledgments

Books by Dare Wright

Illustration Credits

Praise for Jean Nathan’s The Secret Life of the Lonely Doll: The Search for Dare Wright

Copyright

For W.E.N.

My childhood bends beside me. Too far for me to lay a hand there once or lightly. Mine is far and his secret as our eyes. Secrets, silent, stony sit in the dark palaces of both our hearts: secrets weary of their tyranny: tyrants willing to be dethroned.

—JAMES JOYCE, Ulysses

Prologue

Some books are undeservedly forgotten; none are undeservedly remembered.

—W. H. AUDEN, "The Dyer’s Hand"

It was on the first day of spring that the oddest image floated into my mind: the cover of a children’s book I hadn’t seen or even thought of in over thirty years. At first I could barely make it out. It was no more than the image of a pattern, pink-and-white gingham. But there it lodged and there it remained; it felt as if it were a message, and from the farthest edge of consciousness. Its insistence startled me. I tried to tromp it down. I lived among the grown-ups now. I was a journalist, fourteen years into a career that had taken me from newspaper reporter to magazine editor to freelance writer. On this day, a deadline loomed. I had work to do.

But the image kept flashing in my mind, becoming clearer and clearer, like a photograph developing, until I could see that the gingham was a frame of sorts, surrounding a photograph, a black-and-white photograph of a blond-haired wide-eyed doll, an open book between her outstretched legs. The Lonely Doll. That was the title. Encouraged, I strained to peel back the layers of memory, to summon up at least something about its narrative. But that was all I could come up with: the image of the cover, its title, and the fact that it had once fascinated me.

*   *   *

My first stop was one of the best children’s bookstores in New York, a store known for its experienced staff. I asked the clerk behind the front desk if they had the book. It was out of print, he said, adding that it was just as well. He murmured something about it being politically incorrect. Curious—were we talking about the same book?—I asked why. The spanking scene, he scoffed.

I had no recollection of any spanking scene. Could he give me the information I would need to find the book elsewhere? Consulting his computer, he read it out to me and I wrote it down: Dare Write, Doubleday, 1957. As I turned to leave, he called me back, pointing to a rack of business cards by the cash register. An enterprising book searcher whose specialty was children’s books had placed the cards there. She might be able to help me.

The New York Public Library listed several copies of The Lonely Doll but none now fit to circulate; beside each notation in the electronic card catalog were the words damaged or missing. This, the children’s librarian told me, was the sign of a well-loved book. Children read their favorite books to death, she said. They are careless in their devotions. They rip the pages, scribble, and spill things on them. And they are demon book thieves. At least I had now cleared up the spelling of the author’s last name. It was Wright.

I had misplaced the book searcher’s card but I did remember her name and found her number in the phone book. Unlike the bookstore clerk, she passed no judgment, but she surprised me too, offering to add my name to her long waiting list. I couldn’t imagine why anyone else would be thinking of this book. And people willing to spare no expense: A copy in good condition could cost $200, she informed me. Should she go ahead and add my name to the list? I thanked her anyway, unwilling to pay such a sum to satisfy such an ill-defined curiosity. She asked if I would be interested in a paperback copy. That would run about $30, although the wait might be longer still. The price seemed more in line; I gave her my address and credit card number. As I put down the receiver, I felt an almost childish sense of disappointment at more delay, but also astonishment to learn that the book lived on in other people’s consciousnesses.

Meaning to put the phone book away, I found myself turning absently to Wright. And there, jumping out at me from blurred columns of type, was Wright, Dare, 11 East 80th Street, 249-6965. I don’t think I could have been any more amazed if the address given had been, say, Second to the right and then straight on till morning, Peter Pan’s address on the island of Neverland.

*   *   *

In the weeks to come I dialed the number many times. There was never an answer. One day I set off for 11 East 80th Street, but on the way I lost my nerve. What would I do once I got there? Ring the doorbell? I decided instead to write a letter. In it, I explained that I had been a fan of her book as a child and asked if she knew where I might find a copy. Optimistically, I enclosed my phone number. As I addressed the envelope, it occurred to me that what I was really doing was sending a letter to my childhood, or trying to. But time passed and I heard nothing. My attempt to make contact through writing was proving as fruitless as my phone calls. Maybe this Dare Wright had died.

Some weeks later, a package arrived, wrapped in brown paper, actually a recycled grocery bag. As I tore it open carefully, I could see the pink-and-white gingham peeking through. There was the cover, just as I remembered it; there was the doll, a black ribbon tied around her high blond ponytail, her bangs, her gold hoop earrings, her gingham frock, the lace petticoat beneath it, the starched white apron over, and between her outstretched legs, ending in white socks and Mary Janes, an open book. It was all exactly as I had pictured it—down to the downward glance of her painted-on eyes.

I opened it slowly and began to read the story of a little doll named Edith who lived in a nice house and had everything she needed except somebody to play with. I studied the photographic illustrations of Edith, eating her cereal all by herself, wishing for company, and at night kneeling by her bed praying for friends. Even the pigeons she feeds on her terrace fly away as she begs them to stay and talk to her.

One morning, two teddy bears appear on the terrace. They tell her they’ve come to be her friends. Edith isn’t lonely anymore as the bears move in, providing a home life and taking her on wondrous adventures around New York City and to the beach.

Then one rainy day, Mr. Bear, umbrella in paw, sets off on an undisclosed errand, leaving Edith and Little Bear on their own with only an admonition to stay out of trouble. Edith despairs, wondering how they will find a way to entertain themselves. There’s nothing for us to play indoors, she grumbles. Little Bear suggests they explore the house. Soon they discover, behind a set of louvered doors, a glamorous dressing room with a vanity table and a big round mirror. While Edith considers her reflection, Little Bear comes upon a woman’s closet, filled with an enticing array of clothing, shoes, and accessories.

A frenzied dress-up session follows. Little Bear adorns himself with rhinestones and pearls; Edith dons a ruffled petticoat, a hat with roses and ribbons, and high-heeled shoes, but passes on the leopard handbag. In their excitement, they knock over a vase with one long-stemmed rose. The water spills into the jewelry box, but they are oblivious.

Wielding a lipstick, which he has helpfully swiveled out, the mischievous Little Bear goads Edith to try it on. She says she wouldn’t dare. You know what Mr. Bear would say. With that, he uses the lipstick to scrawl Mr. Bear is just a silly old thing across the mirror, when whose reflection should appear in the mirror…? Spankings ensue—the lipstick is what really gets him—but Edith fears the worst is yet to come, that their bad behavior has jeopardized the whole arrangement. When the little ones clean up the mess and promise to be good, however, Mr. Bear gives his word that he and Little Bear will stay with her forever and ever.

Yes, I now recalled the spanking scene, but it had been the dressing up that thrilled me most. I was surprised to see it lasted only a few pages. As I remembered it, the scene stretched on and on. Now I realized it did so only in my childish imagination. But even for a grown-up, this book was still full of wonder. The effect of time telescoped reminded me of a movie. And the setups for each of the photographs seemed obsessive, the effort required astounding.

I could recall the long-ago sensation, an almost erotic charge, that the photographs of the grown-up appurtenances—the bottles of perfume and nail polish, the jewelry in the box—elicited. It was all so sophisticated. My own home when I was five was filled with screaming babies, diapers, and an overwhelmed mother in practical shoes; this book was proof that glamour and elegance existed out there somewhere. And I remembered how I envied the characters their autonomous afternoon. I was never left at home alone, unwatched and unsupervised.

I knew I had once found this book deeply reassuring. And I knew my imagination, helped along by the realism of the photographs, had transformed the doll into a real little girl. But the warm associations I had carried for the book did not square with my new impressions. Decades on, the book struck me as dark and a little troubling. Had I never questioned to whom this doll and this closet belonged? The woman’s identity, and her absence, is never explained. It might be Edith’s mother, but from all indications Edith has no mother. And if she is a doll, where is the little girl who owns her, and where is the little girl’s mother, whose closet this might be? The doll herself was unsettling too, oddly sexy with her lacy white underpants almost always in view, even when she isn’t being turned over Mr. Bear’s knee.

However intriguing, my reunion with The Lonely Doll triggered no eureka moment. Although I mined the book carefully for clues as to why it had so suddenly and involuntarily sprung back into my consciousness, I found none. As I placed The Lonely Doll on my bookshelf, it was with a nagging sense that I had missed something I was meant to find. But I had spent far too much time on this project already. I had to get back to work. I consoled myself that the book would be there on the shelf, slipped in securely between Virginia Woolf and Marguerite Yourcenar, should the need to revisit it ever overtake me again.

*   *   *

A few days later, I received a phone call from a woman who introduced herself as Brook Ashley. My letter to Dare had been forwarded to her in California by Dare’s nurse, who also looked after Dare’s apartment. She explained that Dare was in a New York hospital on life support; since she was incapacitated and had no living relatives, Brook had stepped in to look after her affairs as her legal guardian. Dare, whom she said was eighty-four, had been in this condition for more than two years. Brook confirmed how difficult it was to find the book. I explained that I had finally, just days earlier, received it in the mail from a book searcher. I started to thank her for her call but she kept talking. And as she did, I reached for a pen and paper—a journalist’s reflex—and took down every word.

Brook’s mother, an actress, had met Dare when they both appeared in a 1930s stage production of Pride and Prejudice. The two became lifelong friends. Brook’s father had been Dare’s lawyer. Brook had known Dare for as long as she could remember.

Dare had been a great beauty, a Renaissance woman with many talents. She had been a gifted artist since childhood; Brook had watercolors Dare had done in Paris when she was thirteen. Although Dare had trained as an actress, she had been too humble to pursue acting. She had gone on to work as a fashion model and later became a fashion photographer. Photography had led her to the books. There were nineteen in all, ten that featured Edith and the Bears.

Dare had never married. She had been engaged, but her fiancé, a Royal Air Force pilot, was killed in the war. She had remained naive about men and the ways of the world. She has always kept the ingenuousness of a child, Brook said. The reason Dare was able to touch a chord in the children who read her books is that in a way Dare never grew up. She never lost a child’s capacity for wonder.

It was a fragmentary accounting though quite detailed, fascinating in all that it suggested and yet still mysterious. Whether this last was solely in Brook’s telling, there was no way to know. I didn’t probe, I only listened.

Without expecting or even wanting it, I knew I had stumbled onto the exact thing that drove my entire professional life: a good story. I felt excited as the possibilities expanded in my mind. I might like to write about Dare, I said. Brook had mentioned her hope to have The Lonely Doll reissued. If that happened, I could write about the synchronicity of my search for the book with the book’s second coming. I sent off a package of writing samples to her the next day.

A few weeks later, Brook called again. She was coming to New York to begin packing up Dare’s apartment. Did I want to meet her?

Five days later, I stood before a stately five-story red-brick townhouse half a block from Fifth Avenue and Central Park. Letting myself into a mosaic-tiled vestibule, I scanned the building directory, which, coincidentally, included the names of two acquaintances. Once I pressed the buzzer beside D. Wright, 4A, the inner door clicked open and, over the intercom, a voice instructed me to take the elevator to the fourth floor. I boarded a tiny elevator with a manual gate.

A light-haired woman in a flowing summer dress was waiting on the fourth-floor landing. This was Brook. She ushered me into the apartment, and as my eyes adjusted to the dark, I could make out a pullman kitchen and a woman hovering in the background. She was introduced as Winkie Donovan, Brook’s childhood friend and schoolmate at the Brearley School, who had come to help with the packing.

As we stood on the threshold of the living room, I took in what looked like a stage set, half struck, on which the curtain had come down long ago. The room had two windows, but they were so coated with grime that almost no natural light could penetrate. The furnishings looked to be either disassembled or broken, and everything was covered with dust. Even the fireplace was nothing more than a mantelpiece backed against a wall. Beside it were paintings, dozens of paintings; on the opposite wall, stacked against floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, were more. The books, the paintings, the fireplace—everything looked slightly artificial, like props. The effect was somewhere between a Potemkin Village and Miss Havisham’s house. Pip’s line from Great Expectations came to mind: It was then I began to understand that everything in the room had stopped, like the watch and the clock, a long time ago.

The paintings were portraits, almost all of which featured the same subject: a striking blonde, viewed across a span of years. Here she was a rosy-cheeked toddler; here she was, older now, with a Dutch-boy haircut, standing straight and tall in a pink taffeta party dress; here, a moody teenager with a flower in her darker hair; on to womanhood, demure in a white gown, with a laurel wreath atop long flowing blond hair or looking over her bare shoulder in a black sleeveless gown and full-length black gloves, a red shawl clutched to her hip, a come-hither look on her face—unmistakably the same person. That’s Dare, I heard Brook say. They were all painted by her mother. This was news. Brook’s initial rundown had included no mention of her mother.

Not only was Dare beautiful, she looked very like the doll Edith, down to the blond hair, the bangs, the gold hoop earrings. One painting was turned, exposing the back of the canvas, on which I noticed a handwritten inscription: To my good and precious child, Alice Dare Wright. It was signed Edith Stevenson Wright.

Brook had a purpose in inviting me into what was left of Dare’s world. She said she would like my help, when the time came, in arranging Dare’s obituary. Handing me a one-page interview with Dare from the in-house newsletter of Random House, one of her publishers, she explained that was all there was in the way of official biographical information. She also gave me two black-and-white head shots of Dare, taken, she said, when she was in her sixties. Dare’s long blond hair blew around her face, which, although heavily made up, was pale and ghostlike. The photos were arresting. She was still quite beautiful and strangely untouched by time.

*   *   *

Two months later, Brook called to say she was planning another trip to New York. Again, she invited me to meet her at Dare’s apartment; again, Winkie was with her. When I arrived, they were sorting through a trunk full of what seemed to be old costumes, opulent fairy-princess gowns, of fine materials and beautifully made. Apparently, Dare had sewn them all.

As Winkie held up each item, pinning its shoulders to her own and striking a pose, she provided a running narrative. Miss Havisham’s name was mentioned as she held up what looked like a wedding dress. And when they moved on to exquisite lingerie, neatly folded, seemingly never worn, Winkie surmised, Probably from her trousseau. She called these discoveries, rich with possibilities for speculation, Nancy Drew moments. Had I been the detective in charge, my greater curiosity would have been to find Edith and the Bears and the louvered doors leading to the Lonely Doll’s dressing room. There was no such room in this apartment, but I did spot a dressing table in Dare’s bedroom. On it was a lazy Susan with a framed photograph of a man, two pots of a makeup popular in the 1960s, a tiny doll and teddy bear inside a bell jar, and an unopened bottle of Joy perfume.

That day, Brook gave me a 12-by-15-inch green leather-bound scrapbook containing mementos from Dare’s publishing career: reviews and correspondence relating to the first twelve books and their jackets. I had never known of any books beyond The Lonely Doll; combing through the scrapbook I was struck by this record of accomplishment.

I was summoned for a third visit six weeks later. Brook had called from California to say that some things had been put aside for me, and I could pick them up at Dare’s apartment.

I found the front door open and Winkie standing in a sea of boxes, waiting for the moving men to arrive. Most of my things were already packed, in boxes and in two battered suitcases bearing DW monograms and customs stickers, curling from age but still brightly hued, from places all over the world. On the couch were manila folders with Jean? scrawled across them, which Winkie now tossed in a shopping bag. She offered to help carry the load downstairs and into a taxi. We piled the boxes and the shopping bags on the front and back seats. As the driver hoisted the well-traveled suitcases into the trunk, I thought how odd it was that they would be making their last journey with a stranger.

Back at my apartment, day faded into night as I unpacked my treasures on the living room floor. It was light again when I had finished going through it all, paging through books that had belonged to Dare as a child, reading yellowed notes tucked inside as they fluttered out, deciphering her scribbles in the margins, skimming the books that she had grown up to write, poring over mock-ups of the works in progress. I noted that what appeared to be an earlier version of The Lonely Doll—it was no more than just the dressing-up scene—was titled Spring Fever.

But most enticing were the photographs, hundreds of 11½-by-16-inch black-and-white prints. Sifting through this trove, I found an astounding visual record of a life, as if illustrations to an autobiography. But the text was missing. Lacking dates and identifications, these beautiful but mute images seemed pieces of an immense and mysterious puzzle awaiting assembly. There were photographs of a woman I assumed to be Dare’s mother, photographs of a dark-haired man, and of a fair-haired man, sometimes in uniform, one of whom I surmised must be Dare’s true love, the RAF pilot.

The majority were pictures of Dare. From her modeling days there were modeling cards, including a selection of shots of Dare in various looks and outfits, a list of her measurements, and her hourly rate. From the fashion photography days, there were behind-the-scenes shots of Dare photographing models. And from the period in which she focused on the books, there were pictures of her photographing the doll and the teddy bears. In one, her subjects sit in a rowboat, while Dare, camera poised, crouches down by the water’s edge in a glamorous black velvet maillot.

There were magnificent photographs of what looked like Dare playing dress-up, in elaborate costumes, some of which I recognized from the trunk. But the most startling images were the ones depicting Dare playing, across a spectrum of ages, what could be described as undress: posing naked or partially so. Posing, always posing, but for whom?

*   *   *

It was to the characters that had peopled Dare’s world that I turned to unravel the mysteries. I began with a phone call to one of Dare’s neighbors, an opera singer whose name I had recognized on the building directory, a woman I had once met. She suggested I call Dare’s nurse, Christine Corneille, who cleaned her apartment from time to time to bring in extra money. In 1987, Dare had been hospitalized after an accident. When she was discharged, Brook had hired Christine, a nurse’s aide newly arrived in New York from the island of St. Lucia. Dare was Christine’s first assignment. The job was to have lasted three weeks but had continued, in some capacity, into the present.

Christine was thrilled when I divulged the reason for my call. She said Dare was lonely and would love to have a visitor. We agreed to meet at the hospital a few days later. The best way to get to Goldwater Hospital on Roosevelt Island, she informed me, was to take the tram, a gondola that traverses the 3,100 feet from 59th Street in Manhattan to the island in the middle of the East River. On that November day, a cold wind was blowing off the water as I disembarked and followed a winding road up a hill to the hospital.

Christine waited for me in the front lobby. She was wearing a soft purple sweater and a cotton flowered print skirt and smiling broadly. Beckoning me to sit beside her on a couch, she was as sunny and warm as the afternoon was bleak and chill, cheerful even in such grim surroundings.

As Christine led the way through Goldwater’s labyrinthine hallways, we dodged amputees in wheelchairs and howling patients being pushed on gurneys. This public hospital for indigent patients had in no way been sanitized for visitors. So few of the patients even had any. It was like a warehouse of the forgotten.

We stopped at a ward on the the third floor. From its doorway, I took in four beds and their occupants, all on life-support machinery. There was a terrible silence, punctuated only by the hum of electricity and intermittent alarms. In the bed closest to the doorway, tucked in tightly, was Dare. Her expression was blank and her head, propped up on pillows, looked waxen; she was hooked up to an intricate network of tubes. The resemblance to Edith was unmistakable, but this was the horror-story version, a gold hoop earring in one ear, the other missing, the high ponytail gathered to one side in a long yellowing white braid. Still, despite all this, she retained a fragile beauty. And