Cupid's Understudy

[from review in The San Francisco Call May 29 1910]

By the use of wide margins, decorated thick paper and large print, "Cupid's Understudy," by Edward Salisbury Field, is made to look like a real book. The dainty little tale, however, is well worth preserving in book covers, for, like other light little stories by this clever young author, they amuse and interest for more than one hurried reading.

This newest charming little tale is all about the dearest American that ever was, who only brags about two things, "Dad and California." He was typical, and has struck it rich by a fluke, so his girl went to Paris to be educated. When we meet her she is returning and Dad goes out from Santa Barbara to New York to meet her. They have seven millions and a private car and it's difficult to realize that they could still be the real, sweet, unaffected people they are -- it's hardly human.

Of course, the inevitable man appears. He has appeared on the steamer coming over and he goes to California with them. They both fall head over heels in love and Dad is pleased. The young man has a mother and as soon as they arrive he goes to hunt her up to have her call on his lady love. Then the troubles begin. It is just too much fun to watch the smoothing out of all the difficulties, for it looks for a time like a hopeless mess. The story fills a happy half hour and every reader is the author's good friend.

Edward Salisbury Field novellas are like bonbons -- sweet, tasty, one-bite indulgences for a sunny afternoon.

Field was an interesting guy: employed by and friendly with William Randolph Hearst, the personal secretary of Robert Louis Stevenson, then of his widow, Fanny with whom it's rumored he was also romantically involved. On her death (he was nearly forty years her junior), he married her daughter, the artist Isobel Osbourne, went into real estate and, when oil was discovered on some of his holdings, became wealthy. In 1926, he purchased land on Zaca Lake outside Los Olivos. Santa Barbara, at the time, was still a center of the film industry, which was gradually shifting south to Los Angeles, and he and Isobel seem to have run their home like a San Simeon extra-light, with a guest list of diverse creatives. Field died at Zaca of a heart attack in 1936. The land remains privately owned -- the lodge burned in 2016 and was sold to another local family in 2020. [sources: Wikipedia, luxuryestate.com]

Through all this, he wrote a chocolate-box-ful of light romances, shepherded several through adaptations as silents, and worked on scripting for other films.

Cupid's Understudy is one of the most insubstantial, but charming, of Field's confections. The first-person female narrator, 18-year-old Elizabeth Middleton, is the kind of character from this period I like the best -- the new girl for the new century. Smart, independent, and principled, they boss around their wealthy fathers and are their closest confidantes. In every way the equal of their men, they maybe be admired by them as beautiful, vivacious girls but they're respected by them as people. When Elizabeth's dad declares "You are my supreme court" or Blakeley tells her "Dearest...everything I should love best to be, you are" -- and this from a male writer -- you feel the optimism in the air. Things will be different for women: these girls will make it so & their men are ready and will benefit, too. It is a joy to read, though it makes the sexism in mid-century popular culture feel like such a setback and a betrayal of the hopes and the confidence of a generation.

Another delightful aspect of Understudy is the affectionate digs Field takes at California -- portrayed as kind of a cultural backwater striving for cosmopolitan creds, at the kind of people rags-to-riches and riches-to-rags drawn to this land of golden opportunity (and grift) -- the "Choicest Flowers" of San Francisco "whose grandfathers had come over from Ireland in the steerage"; the "third son of an English baronet who owned a chicken-ranch near Los Angeles" (67), etc. -- and at the newspapers that breathlessly report it all with "adjective piled on adjective, split infinitive on split infinitive." (68) It's ridiculous but Fields loves it as anyone with a taste for sushine and citrus and wide open possibilities would. And will. "Dad and California" -- hear, hear!

Flags: Elizabeth's mother was from the South and there's outdated language briefly used re. her nurse.