do I need spoiler warnings on reviews of 96-year-old books?
February 20, 2010

I'm working my way through the first two series of Grace Harlowe books; concerning her high school and college years. After reading the early Ruth Fielding and Betty Gordon books, I'm feeling let down.

This series lacks even the proto-feminism of a series like Ruth Fielding, which got its start around the same time. The girls don�t have so much money that they go to girls-only boarding schools like Ruth, or like Betty Gordon. But even the public high-school is run on a "separate-but-equal" basis; there are two distinct institutions to separate boys and girls. And of course, "separate-but-equal" is never equal; although the books put considerable emphasis on the fact that these girls play basketball, only the boy's high school actually has a gym.

Then there�s this little gem�which, sadly, would play today at your average right-wing soiree:

Tom returned presently to announce solemnly that an original one-act drama, entitled "The Suffragette," written by Mr. Wingate and presented by a notable cast, would be the next offering.

After a moment's wait, Hippy, Reddy and David appeared, and were greeted with shouts of laughter. Reddy minced along in a bonnet and skirt belonging to Mrs. Harlowe, while Hippy wore a long-sleeved gingham pinafore of Grace's, which lacked considerable of meeting in the back, and was kept on by means of a sash. After deliberately setting their stage in full view of the audience at one end of the room, the play began, with David as the meek, hen-pecked husband, Hippy as the neglected child, who wept and howled continuously, while Reddy played the unnatural wife and mother, who neglected her family and held woman's suffrage meetings in the street.

The dialogue was clever, and the action of the sketch so ridiculous that the audience laughed from the first line until the climax, especially when the suffragette was hustled off to jail by Tom Gray, in the role of a policeman, for disturbing the peace, while her husband and child executed a wild dance of joy as she was hauled off the scene, protesting vigorously.

Poor, poor meek and hen-pecked patriarchy�yes, it is a relic of its times, but I have read enough of these books to know that not all of them from the era are so misgynistic.

What can I say about Grace herself? Well, she�s a totally normal average girl�captain of the team, president of the class, pet of the principal, avenger of the downtrodden, protector of the innocent, and sworn enemy of at least 1 other girl in her school, at any given time. Like I said: COMPLETELY AVERAGE.

She�s the sort of paragon who would never forget to return a library book�unless forgetting it would enable her to discover the school was on fire and sound the alarm.

She wouldn�t do something as foolish as wandering away from the picnic and getting left behind�unless doing so put her in a position to overhear the robbers and foil the plot to knock the old judge on the head.

She's a young woman who upholds the highest standards of honor�except for the fact that at least once in every book, she manages to stifle someone's actions through blackmail. This is somewhat camouflaged by the circumstances�usually Grace has something on them from the enemy�s previous attempts at mischief, and uses it to dissuade the evildoer from further nastiness. But when you get right down to it, it's good old-fashioned blackmail.

As I said, Grace always has at one (and frequently more) sworn, bitter foe. But rest assured�it may take a few volumes, but eventually, these unfortunate, misguided fools see the error of their ways and come to bask in the radiant glow of Grace�s friendship. In fact, if you crunch the numbers, Grace seems to make a majority of her friends this way.

Grace's special talent: befriending poor foundlings, taking them in hand, improving their lot, and eventually taking advantage of unbelievably contrived coincidences to reuinite them with their long lost parents. So far, this has happened once in high school, once in college, and once in her post-grad period.

I'm keeping on with this series--and I'm sure I'll have other things to say about it.