Mary Hallock Foote: Author-Illustrator of the West by Darlis A. Miller, and: Reading A Victorian Gentlewoman in the Far West: The Reminiscences of Mary Hallock Foote by Christine Hull Smith

Abstract

BOOK REVIEWS 219 life-giving nature of that world. As for what a woman is supposed to be like, the novel has the integrity ofboth refusing to accept easy answers and refusing to give up asking. A romantic interlude cut tragically short confirms Ruth’s ability to grow through love but does not define her: neither through romance nor tragedy is it a closure for life or novel. In more than one sense, she is an outsider at the end, deeply hurt but strong in facing an open future, although perhaps more able to connect with people in her community strong enough to accept her. Ruth’s mother, Cally, is quickly sketched, but memorably: Cally, too, is an outsider, but demeaning and selfish in her attempts to control Ruth. One senses that the author finds in Cally not just a negative energy against which Ruth can define herself, but also a figure in whose darkness lies a part of the history of crabbed human potential that needs to be understood. The sturdy achievement of Small Rocks Rising is such that one hopes Susan Lang will follow up this first novel with further explorations of vividly placed and questing characters. The achievement is also such that one expects her womento be stubbornly unsettling. Man1Hallock Foote: Author-1Liustrator of the West. By Darlis A. Miller. Norm an: University of Oklahom a Press, 2002. 270 pages, $29.95. Reading A Victorian Gentlewoman in the Far West: The Reminiscences of Mary Hallock Foote. By Christine Hull Smith. Western Writers Series #154. Boise, Idaho: Boise State University Press, 2002. Reviewed by Rachel T. Rich U tah State University, Logan Setting out to address “Foote’s growth as an artist and writer; her viewofwife­ hood and motherhood and the constraints these place upon her career; east-west tensions inher life andwork; and her portrayalofthe West infiction anddrawings,” Millers Mary Hallock Foote: AuthcrrAllvtstrator of the American West successfully dis­ cusses these issues (xiv). It describes Foote’s progressionfrom a young artist pleased to be published to a maturewoman confident inthe monetary value ofherwork. It chronicles the hours Foote spent next to her childrens sick beds rather than with hersketchbook. Itrelates Foote’slove ofhorsebackridingthroughbeautifuland dra­ matic western scenery and reveals her disdain for “low class” neighbors. It places Foote’s work within the context of contemporary artists and writers: Frederic Remington, Owen Wister, Bret Harte, Mark Twain, and Helen Hunt Jackson. However, Miller’s biography fails to draw important conclusions. Miller briefly compares Footes domestic, feminine western drawings to Remington’s male-centered, violent depictions of the West and claims that Remington’s por­ trayal “would eventually eclipse Molly’s domestic version and come to dominate public imagery” (115). Rather than taking the next step and suggesting that this male-dominated, western imagery may have something to do with Foote’s rela­ tive obscurity (a problem Miller acknowledges in the preface and claims she hopes to rectify), she changes the subject and leaves readers dissatisfied. Other 2 2 0 WAL 3 8 .2 SUMMER 2 0 0 3 issues—such as why Foote quit drawing and turned completely to writing in her later life, whyFoote’s lifelongfriend Helena de Kay Gildernever visited her in the West, and how Foote’s relationship with her husband, Arthur, evolved over the years—deserve more exploration as well. Miller’s biography is valuable because it acquaints readers with Foote’s life, her work, and her era. It is best read, however, in conjunction with Foote’s own work and critical analysis, such as Christine Hull Smith’s Reading A Victorian Gentlewoman in the Far West: The Reminiscences of Mary Hallock Foote. Written in the 1920s and edited by Rodman W. Paul in 1972, A Victorian Gentlewoman in the Far West: The Reminiscences ofMary Hallock Foote is an “informative and historicallyvital autobiography” that is the basis ofany Foote research and particularly interesting when compared to Miller’s biography (Smith 5). Smith’s Western Writers Series pamphlet offers biographical information, literary contexts, critical responses, and its own critical analysis of Foote’s Reminiscences. Foote enthusiasts, as well as those becoming acquainted with her remarkable life and work, will find Smith’s pamphlet a quick...