When I first read about this book in The NY Times Book Review, I knew I had to have it. Having grown up on a steady diet of hearing about “Ragtime” and “The Girl on the Velvet Swing”, or how about how Clover Adams’s Memorial was on my mother’s must-see list, any book that covered any and all of that was something I needed to read. Thankfully, this did not disappoint.
Stan and Gus covers the working (and potentially sexual) relationship of Standford White and Augustus Saint-Gaudens, from their first meeting (White rushed into Saint-Gaudens’s studio after hearing the sounds of opera being sung), through their many collaborations (Boston Trinity Church, Madison Square Garden, The Memorial to Robert Gould Shaw and the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment, amongst others) and their inability to adhere to deadlines (especially Gus; he ran over them by years), to White’s shocking murder by Harry Thaw, over the former relationship White had with Thaw’s wife, Evelyn Nesbit (which had occurred prior to their marriage. Not that it mattered to Thaw (who was nuts) or Nesbit, who encouraged him, due largely to the unsubstantiated claims that the relationship started after White drugged and raped Nesbit. Nesbit apparently continued the relationship because a: her mother encouraged her to keep going to get ahead, and b: White could get her ahead. Then Evelyn turned 20, upon which he dumped her as being too old; so basically, some real charmers all around.)
This was actually an enjoyable read; informative without being dry, very entertaining, and well-written. Did not realize how incestuous and interconnected this group was (the Vanderbilts, the Astors, the Morgans, the Barrymores, Irving Berlin, Charles Dana Gibson, John Singer Sargent, General Sherman, R.L. Stevenson, Maxfield Parrish, the Tiffanys). Or that the world owes Parrish Blue to Saint-Gaudens basically starting an artists’ commune in Cornish, New Hampshire.
(Not my favorite painting of Parrish’s, but probably one of the ones that showcase his blues the best.)
Or how Henry Adams became aware of St. Gaudens’s work through his wife (Marion “Clover”) being the cousin of Phillips Brooks, the Rector of Boston Trinity Church, the first major collaboration White and Saint-Gaudens first worked on. (Brooks is also well-known for penning the lyrics to “O Little Town of Bethlehem”) Interesting, but not too surprising, how little of the book had to do with White’s murder or Saint-Gaudens’s death; they were both practically Postscripts. This book was about their working relationship and the great works they created; how those stopped being brought to the world is neither interesting nor important to this author. Love how both of their survivors destroyed papers in an attempt to bowdlerize (or sanitize) their memoirs. Mainly their extra-marital affairs, and the rampant homoeroticism of their relationship; actually, the largest thing sanitized was their bisexuality.
I did find interesting that the author of this book did his own mild sanitizing; in the Postscript he completely drops any mention of Gus’s illegitimate son Louis “Novy” Clark, son of Davida Clark, the woman who was the model for “Diana”, which was on the previous Madison Square Garden, and is the statue on the cover of the book. I would have mentioned it more, as Louis was apparently an adorable wunderkind toddler, while Gus’s son Homer (who he had with his wife), was a teenager that used to headbutt guests in the back. Which brings me to the part of Saint-Gaudens’s life that was just too cute for words; how he (Augustus) married a woman named Augusta, and his brother Louis (who he named his affair baby after) married a woman Louisa; I can not make this up. Did not know Stanford White designed the Washington Square Arch. Or that he was a womanizer that put even Leonardo DiCaprio to shame; at least DiCaprio keeps women around for an additional five years before deciding they’re shriveled-up old hags.
I am glad Saint-Gaudens stuck with doing Clover Adam’s memorial (which was named by Saint-Gaudens The Mystery of the Hereafter and The Peace of God that Passeth Understanding, but which was often called in the newspapers “Grief”) , because it is absolutely breathtaking, even if his sister-in-law went hysterical because it was a genderless, sex-less figure (it was based on a combination of a male lover of Gaudens who had died recently, and the Bodhisattva Kannon), and not an angel, or Jesus. Because angels now have genders?
This was taken by my mother on one of our trips to see the Memorial, located in Rock Creek Cemetery in Washington, D.C., and the surrounding area is very quiet and peaceful. Also buried there are Clover’s husband Henry, Edgar Allan Poe’s sister Rosalie, Alice Roosevelt Longsworth, Charles Corby (the inventor of “Wonderbread”), Eugene Allen (the inspiration for the 2013 movie, “The Butler”), Charles Francis Jenkins (Inventor of the television), Upton Sinclair, and Gore Vidal. Cemeteries are actually a healthy part of our vacations; we’ve seen Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglas, Bruce and Brandon Lee, Edgar Allan Poe, and this year we’re aiming for Emma Goldman and Belle Gunness.
One detraction to the book is that at less than 300 pages, it seemed more like a summation than a deep dive. But maybe that’s all the available research materials could cover. I am glad I read it, and would recommend it if you are interested in Gilded Age America, or where some of the pretty well-known pieces of Manhattan architecture came from, or who they were inspired by.
