I finally finished reading Dorothy Scarborough's The Wind, a novel that caused quite a stir in West Texas when it was published in 1925. I say I finally finished it because I started it months ago and then stopped reading right in the middle. It was not that I had lost interest in the story but because of the myriads of other projects I had going, and I wasn't giving the book the attention it deserved. I somehow managed, however, to read a few other books along the way, but I had other reasons for those--sorry, I digress.
When I began The Wind, I knew nothing about Scarborough but had heard a bit here and there about the book. For one thing, a Hollywood studio bought the movie rights, Dorothy and her brother George did the film adaptation, and the famous star of the silent screen, Lilian Gish, played Letty Mason, the book's protagonist. Not too shabby! Before I go any further with The Wind, however, I want to introduce, those of you not already familiar, to Emily Dorothy Scarborough, a most remarkable woman.
Dorothy, or Dottie as she was called by family and close friends, was born on January 27, 1878, in Mount Carmel, Texas, a small East Texas town in Smith County near Tyler. Her father, a confederate veteran originally from Louisiana, was an East Texas lawyer--John Bledsoe Scarborough. Her mother was Mary Adelaide (Ellison) Scarborough. Dorothy had three siblings, but the oldest child, Elison Bledsoe, died young. All three of the remaining children were to become quite accomplished and all three had literary inclinations. Martha Douglass, her sister, studied Modern Languages at Vassar; taught at Baylor University; married George White McDaniel, who pastored First Baptist Church in Richmond, Virginia, for over 20 years; and wrote three novels, a volume of poetry, and a biography of her husband. Her brother, George Moore, graduated from the University of Texas Law School, served with the U.S. Department of Justice, and wrote plays performed on Broadway. His play The Lure was a Broadway sensation.
In 1882, Dorothy's family moved to Sweetwater, Texas, for her mother's health. After living there for five years, they moved to Waco, Texas, in 1887 so the children could attend Baylor University. Dorothy's father, now Judge Scarborough, served as a member of the Baylor Board of Trustees from 1888 until his death in 1905. Here in Waco, Dorothy began her academic career.
Dorothy graduated from Baylor University with a B.A. in 1896 and an M.A. in 1899, all the while teaching at Baylor as a graduate student. Both degrees were in English. In 1905, she became a regular faculty member at Baylor (1905-1915). Dorothy, a staunch Baptist, also taught a college men's Sunday School class at the First Baptist Church in Waco and began working on her Ph.D. at the University of Chicago during the summers of 1906 to 1910, taking off to study at Oxford University during the 1910-1911 school year, even though Oxford did not confer degrees on women. She finished her Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1917 and in 1918 was hired by Columbia to teach creative writing, as well as The Development of the English Novel and The History of the English Language.
Scarborough's publishing career was impressive. In 1912, she published a volume of poetry called Fugitive Verses. Her doctoral dissertation The Supernatural in Modern English Fiction was published as a monograph in 1917, From a Southern Porch in 1919, Humorous Ghost Stories in 1921 (Editor), Famous Modern Ghost Stories in 1921 (Editor), In the Land of Cotton, in 1913, The Wind in 1925, The Unfair Sex as a serial in 1925-1926, Impatient Griselda in 1927, Can't Get a Redbird in 1929, The Stretch-Berry Smile in 1932, and The Story of Cotton (children's) in 1933. Finally, in 1935 she compiled and edited the literary collection The Collected Short Stories of Today which was published posthumously. Additionally, she published poems in magazines and journals, and published book reviews, short stories, critical essays and articles on folklore and was on the staff of the New York Sun.
Dorothy was largely a novelist "whose works dealt primarily with the plight and role of women in Texas and elsewhere." (Sylvia Grider, "Scarborough, Emily Dorothy") and that brings us back to The Wind which was published by Harper and Brothers, New York City. It was set on a ranch near Sweetwater, Texas, and caused an uproar because of its depiction of the harsh West Texas environment and its effect on a young woman who comes there to live. In a nutshell, it begins when the eighteen-year-old, genteel Letty Mason comes from Virginia to West Texas to live with her cousin after her parents die. Her cousin's wife, who is none too welcoming and a bit jealous, pressures Letty into a loveless marriage (on Letty's side) to one of the two young ranchers who come calling. Living conditions on her husband's ranch are bleak. Letty does her best to adapt and be a good wife but having been sheltered and raised with wealth in Virginia, she is a bit of a hot house plant compared to her cousin's wife who is older, rugged, and strong-willed. The main terror of Letty's life is the wind that never seems to stop and becomes anthropomorphized in her mind. The wind shatters Letty's nerves. Complications mount in the form of a man she thinks she may love, a long and relentless drought, dead cattle, and the wind, the wind, the wind. Of course, I am simplifying the plot, characters, and theme with all their psychological implications and the shocking nature of the ending, especially for its time. When I have time, I want to think more deeply about the story.
I hope to write a Part 2 blog on Dorothy Scarborough. I find her and what I have read of her writing fascinating. For you speculative fiction fans out there, I'll try to discuss then the idea that Dorothy may be the first academic critic of science fiction, which she referred to as scientific supernaturalism, her penchant for folklore and folksongs, and her interest in ghost stories.
Works Cited:
Sylvia Grider, "Scarborough, Emily Dorothy," Handbook of Texas Online, accessed August 19, 20024, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/scarborough-emily-dorothy. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.
Bibliography
Dorothy Scarborough: Early journalism prof, trailblazing author, and Baylor Bear, posted in Alumni Extraordinary Stories, History. March 18, 2022
Dorothy Scarborough papers, Accession #153, The Texas Collection, Baylor University, Described by Casey Schumacher; Benna Vaughan; Perry Harrison, and released on 2015-03-27. Accessed 2024-08-19
"I Have Books I Must Write--Dorothy Scarborough." Women in Texas: their lives, their experiences, their accomplishments. Crawford and Ragsdale--Eakin Press--1982.
Scarborough, Dorothy. The Wind (reprint). Austin: The University of Texas Press, 1979.