Dorothy Dodds Baker (1907–1968)
Author of Cassandra at the Wedding
About the Author
Works by Dorothy Dodds Baker
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1907-04-21
- Date of death
- 1968-06-17
- Gender
- female
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Missoula, Montana, USA
- Place of death
- Terra Bella, California, USA
- Places of residence
- California, USA
- Education
- Whittier College
University of California, Los Angeles (BA|MA) - Occupations
- novelist
language teacher
scriptwriter - Relationships
- Baker, Howard (husband)
- Awards and honors
- Guggenheim Fellowship (1942)
Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship
American Academy of Arts and Letters Academy Award - Short biography
- Dorothy Dodds was born in Missoula, Montana, and grew up in California. She attended Whittier College before transferring to the University of California, Los Angeles. After graduation, she traveled in France and then married Howard Baker, a poet, in 1930.
She taught French and Spanish in a private school in Oakland, California but then went back to UCLA to earn her master's degree in French in 1934. In 1938, she published her first novel, Young Man with a Horn, loosely based on the life of Bix Beiderbecke. It was adapted into a successful film in 1950. The novel was a hit and Dorothy Dodds Baker won a Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Subsequent books included Trio (1943) Our Gifted Son (1948), and Cassandra at the Wedding (1962), which she said was based on her own two daughters.
In 1967, she co-wrote the script of "The Ninth Day" for television's Playhouse 90. She died of cancer at the age of 61.
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Discussions
148. Cassandra at the Wedding by Dorothy Baker in Backlisted Book Club (March 2022)
Reviews
Cassandra At the Wedding by Dorothy Baker was originally published in 1962. It has now been re-published by the New York Review of Books Classics Series and made available to today’s audience. This is an intense story about the relationship between two twin sisters, one of whom is about to get married.
Cassandra has returned to her childhood home to attend her twin’s wedding to a nice, young doctor but she is determined to make her sister call the whole thing off. The book has more than one narrator and I really enjoyed Cassandra’s voice. She’s intense, funny and smart with a definite dark side to her personality. Although her selfishness can seem cruel at times, she was quite likeable. When her twin, Judith became the narrator, I was surprised that I also enjoyed her thoughts and words as well as she definitely has the calmer, more sober personality of the two but she knows and recognizes Cassandra’s darker side.
It is obvious that Cassandra is a lesbian although that fact is never definitely declared in the book. The lesbian overtones are quite subtle which I suspect has a lot to do with the times that the book was published. The family seems to acknowledge and accept Cassandra as she is although Cassandra herself seems to be struggling at times. Cassandra at the Wedding is beautifully written, darkly witty, clever and atmospheric. Dorothy Baker strikes me as a very accomplished author who knows how to write comedy. She also trusts her readers to understand and draw their own conclusions and so doesn’t lay everything out on a platter.… (more)
Cassandra has returned to her childhood home to attend her twin’s wedding to a nice, young doctor but she is determined to make her sister call the whole thing off. The book has more than one narrator and I really enjoyed Cassandra’s voice. She’s intense, funny and smart with a definite dark side to her personality. Although her selfishness can seem cruel at times, she was quite likeable. When her twin, Judith became the narrator, I was surprised that I also enjoyed her thoughts and words as well as she definitely has the calmer, more sober personality of the two but she knows and recognizes Cassandra’s darker side.
It is obvious that Cassandra is a lesbian although that fact is never definitely declared in the book. The lesbian overtones are quite subtle which I suspect has a lot to do with the times that the book was published. The family seems to acknowledge and accept Cassandra as she is although Cassandra herself seems to be struggling at times. Cassandra at the Wedding is beautifully written, darkly witty, clever and atmospheric. Dorothy Baker strikes me as a very accomplished author who knows how to write comedy. She also trusts her readers to understand and draw their own conclusions and so doesn’t lay everything out on a platter.… (more)
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Statistics
- Works
- 4
- Also by
- 2
- Members
- 1,002
- Popularity
- #25,741
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 30
- ISBNs
- 35
- Languages
- 5
- Favorited
- 1
Also I love books that are about incredibly specific parts of California, which this book delivers perfectly.… (more)