A Serious Lady

Jane Bowles fascinates me. Her stern, unsmiling face in pictures by VanVetchen. Her circle of admirers. Her brief but impactful career.

While her entire list of work consists of one novel, one play and six short stories she was lauded by literary greats such as Tennessee Williams, John Ashbery and Truman Capote. She was considered a “writer’s writer” and yet, she is nearly unknown to the general populous.

Her book Two Serious Ladies, published in 1943 was met with mostly odd and uncomprehending reviews, and while she made several frustrating attempts, Jane never finished another book. The critics weren’t much kinder to one play that appeared on Broadway in 1953. In the Summer House was lauded by some and completely misunderstood by others – much like Jane herself.

While I find her a fascinating author, and have enjoyed her work, I must admit that her life and the circle of companions she travelled in just as much if not more fascinating. I first stumbled upon Bowles when I was reading “The February House” a few years ago. Once of my favorite non-fiction books, it tells the story of a period of time just before WWII in Brooklyn. A group of artists, including Gypsy Rose Lee, Carson McCullers, Paul & Jane Bowles, W.H. Auden and George Davis took up residence at 7 Middagh Street, a shabby brownstone, and busied themselves with creativity while playing host to a cavalcade of interesting folks from the children of Thomas Mann to Salvador Dali (who almost died in their study during a botched experiment with a diving suit) and his sullen wife Gala.

Jane married Paul Bowles in 1938. To be strictly honest, as one never knows what goes on behind another’s door, it seems to have been more a marriage of convenience, though they appear to have truly cared for each other. Jane was homosexual and the two lived fairly separate sexual lives. Paul was a well known classical composer, and Jane worked with him on several pieces while living in New York together and then in Tangiers, where Paul lived through much of the 1950s.

Jane’s life as an author was very brief; she always experienced difficulty writing, but by the 1950s things were made worse by alcohol and prescription drugs. Some blame her writers block on jealously of her husband Paul-who began writing after editing her book. Rumor had it that she felt that Paul had stolen her glory, but this isn’t a widely accepted belief.

In 1957 Jane suffered a major stroke at the age of just 39. The stroke left her with impaired vision and acute aphasia. While she tried to overcome the challenges of her impairments, she was unable to complete any more work after the stroke. Just ten years later, her mental and physical health had deteriorated to the point that Paul was forced to place her in a psychiatric hospital in their then home of Malaga, Spain. A year later she was moved to the Clinica de los Angeles in Malaga. She was released in 1968 and returned for a few months to her home in Tangier, where she visited her favorite bar (the Pergola) every day. Sadly, she had to be placed back into care in 1968 and stayed in a convent hospital until her death in May of 1973.