The Port of Adventure

"Nick thought her adorable in her gray motor bonnet"

The Port of Adventure is mostly typical Williamsons — part romance, part travelogue, and a dash of adventure — but something about it leaves an Elinor Glyn-ish taste in my mouth. Maybe it’s the girl from Europe (sort of) traveling through the U.S., as in Elizabeth Visits America, or the unhappy marriage to a European prince, as in The Reason Why and Three Weeks, or the villainess’ generally Glyn-ish aspect, or the red-haired, green-eyed writer who seems like she could have been based on Glyn herself. So, yeah, there are lots of reasons, and much as I enjoy the Williamsons, they don’t compare well when they try to edge into Glyn’s territory. They don’t have her flair for melodrama, or the sharp sense of humor that makes it bearable.

Still, I got pretty invested in the relationship between princess-by-marriage Angela, traveling as a young widow, and former cowboy Nick, using his new oil fortune to see more of the country. They really do seem to have things in common, beyond both being rich and good-looking, but it’s hard to believe that two people can simultaneously instinctively understand each other and constantly misinterpret each others’ actions. Also, there’s a scene where Nick rescues Angela from stampeding cattle in the canary yellow car he named after her, which is probably the most hilarious thing ever to happen in a Williamsons book.

High Noon

So, remember Paul Verdayne from Three Weeks? An anonymous someone wanted to give him a happy ending, and wrote this sequel, High Noon. Sadly, it does not take place in the Western United States, although that would be hysterical. Instead, Paul returns to Switzerland and again falls in love with another mysterious Russian lady with black hair. It’s not really clear why, since right up until he falls in love with her he’s supposed to be indifferent to women. But apparently she resembles his “Queen” from Three Weeks, and then he decides that his Queen must have sent her, or something. And then he starts acting like every other man in every other early twentieth century trashy romance novel — well, half of them. The other half are creepy rapists like the hero of The Sheik.

But I suppose it doesn’t really matter if the plot makes any sense, because the writing is terrible. I mean, check this bit out:

“Oh! God,” he cried, out of the anguish of his soul, “what a hideous world! Beneath all this painted surface, this bedizened face of earth, lies naught but the yawning maw of the insatiable universe. This very lake, with its countenance covered with rippling smiles, is only a cruel monster waiting to devour. Everything, even the most beautiful, typifies the inexorable laws of Fate and the futility of man’s struggle with the forces he knows not.”

Three Weeks

I haven’t been updating much lately because I’m home for spring break. With access to so many actual books, I don’t need to resort to etexts as often, and I haven’t found anything new. But then it occurred to me that I haven’t written about Elinor Glyn at all, which is kind of a weird omission.

The information I’ve been able to gather online suggest that Glyn’s only remaining claim to fame is that she was the person who first called sex appeal “It”. In fact, she wrote the book that the Clara Bow movie It was adapted from. She was well known as a writer of romance novels — you know, the intensely passionate, deeply felt kind. She also wrote some less serious ones, like the The Visits of Elizabeth, but those are only slightly less racy.

Her most sensational novel, Three Weeks, inspired a short poem:

Would you like to sin
With Elinor Glyn
On a tiger skin?

Or would you prefer
To err
With her
On some other fur?

Three Weeks is kind of hysterical, and since I’ve read it a couple of times, it’s the one I can most easily talk about without going back and rereading it. It is the story of a young Englishman, Paul Verdayne. He’s very young and beautiful and all that, but his mind is unformed and he has no appreciation of, you know, culture.