Picture of author.

Dawn Powell (1896–1965)

Author of Dawn Powell: Novels, 1930-1942

30+ Works 2,885 Members 57 Reviews 15 Favorited

About the Author

Includes the names: daw powell, dawn powell

Image credit: Library of Congress

Works by Dawn Powell

A Time to Be Born (1942) 272 copies
The Locusts Have No King (1948) 267 copies
The Wicked Pavilion (1990) 259 copies
The Golden Spur (1962) 185 copies
Turn, Magic Wheel (1997) 153 copies
Angels on Toast (1940) 149 copies
The Happy Island (1998) 77 copies
Come Back to Sorrento (1998) 69 copies
Dance Night (1999) 65 copies
Dawn Powell at Her Best (1994) 65 copies
The Bride's House (1998) 41 copies
Four Plays by Dawn Powell (1999) 20 copies
The Story of a Country Boy (2001) 15 copies
Can't Catch Me (1994) 12 copies
A cage for lovers (1966) 6 copies
Complete Novels 2 copies
Downtown Ladies (1994) 2 copies
Whither 1 copy
Powell Dawn 1 copy
Cafè Julien (2015) 1 copy

Associated Works

The Assassin's Cloak: An Anthology of the World's Greatest Diarists (2000) — Contributor, some editions — 550 copies
Americans in Paris: A Literary Anthology (2004) — Contributor — 297 copies
Writing New York: A Literary Anthology (1998) — Contributor — 275 copies
Short Stories from The New Yorker, 1925 to 1940 (1940) — Contributor — 201 copies
The Norton Book of Personal Essays (1997) — Contributor — 142 copies

Tagged

$E11 (9) 1940s (9) 20th century (45) 20th century literature (34) AGW (9) American (50) American fiction (26) American literature (140) biography (12) classics (10) Dawn Powell (24) diary (22) ebook (13) fiction (450) hardcover (11) humor (16) letters (16) Library of America (113) lit (9) literature (75) LOA (47) memoir (11) New York (51) New York City (44) New York fiction (9) non-fiction (13) novel (127) NYC (19) Ohio (22) omnibus (13) own (10) read (27) rory-gilmore-book-club-list (9) satire (56) short stories (9) to-read (220) toread1 (14) unread (19) USA (18) women writers (18)

Common Knowledge

Birthdate
1896-11-28
Date of death
1965-11-14
Burial location
Hart Island, New York, New York, USA
Gender
female
Nationality
USA
Birthplace
Mount Gilead, Ohio, USA
Place of death
New York, New York, USA
Places of residence
Mount Gilead, Ohio, USA
New York, New York, USA
Shelby, Ohio, USA
Education
Lake Erie College
Occupations
freelance writer
film extra (silent films)
screenwriter
radio personality
novelist
short story writer (show all 8)
playwright
diarist
Short biography
Dawn Powell was born in Mount Gilead, Ohio. She had a difficult childhood and ran away to the home of an aunt at age 13. She lived there while attending high school and went to Lake Erie College for Women in Painesville, where she wrote stories and plays, acted in college productions, and contributed to and edited the college newspaper. She graduated in 1918. and moved to New York City's Greenwich Village. She was an active member of the artistic scene there, often using it in her novels and plays. She never became a really popular writer in her own lifetime, and most of her works were out of print by the time of her death. However, they've since undergone a revival and she is now considered an underappreciated comic and satiric genius.

Members

Reviews

It’s a masterpiece, plain and simple.
 
Flagged
Mark_Feltskog | 6 other reviews | Dec 23, 2023 |
This is my introduction to the sublime world of Dawn Powell, and I wish that this book's publisher--Steerforth Press--had dedicated more time to giving it a proper copyediting. I don't know what goes into the production process when a book is reprinted, but repairing spelling and syntax faults seems like as good a place as any to prioritize. Though this book is rife with spelling errors, I cite for you this unintentional howler, marring an otherwise stunning sentence:

"...in the corner tottered a huge rococo wardrobe closet decorated with life-size Cupids chipping off like old love itself, the loose doors popping open at the sound of any bell or automobile horn as if to allow refuse [sic!] for half a dozen secret lovers instead of for the the costumes packed within."

Ms. Powell's manuscript, I am confident, used refuge rather than refuse. Why go to the trouble of publishing this fine novel in a handsome trade paper edition, then not bother to edit it for this kind of glaring error?

Steerforth has apparently reprinted the bulk of Dawn Powell's oeuvre (although some of her books have also been published in superb Library of America editions, a treatment they richly deserve), so I expect if I want to read Dance Night, I'll suffer similar incompetence.

That said, this is an excellent book, evocative of its place and time, and written, as cited above, in excellent prose. Highly recommended.
… (more)
 
Flagged
Mark_Feltskog | 4 other reviews | Dec 23, 2023 |
Now I am left wanting to know what is going to happen to these characters next! Will Amanda be a success?

Very amusing look at the life of an ambitious woman, originally from a small Midwestern town, in New York City in the time just before the United States entered WW2 (1939-1940).
 
Flagged
leslie.98 | 6 other reviews | Jun 27, 2023 |
Set in the 40's in New York City, this is the story of vanity, pride, and greed. A young woman from a small town becomes the famed wife of a famous publisher; her friend from her home town has been jilted by a lover comes to New York and takes a job at the publishing company.

This is basically the story of people using each other. Very dated.
 
Flagged
maryreinert | 6 other reviews | Nov 21, 2022 |

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Statistics

Works
30
Also by
6
Members
2,885
Popularity
#8,880
Rating
3.9
Reviews
57
ISBNs
68
Languages
4
Favorited
15

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