Nome canonico: MacLane, Mary
Nome legale: MacLane, Mary Elizabeth
Data di nascita: 1881-05-02
Data di morte: 1929-08-06
Luogo di sepoltura: Fergus Falls, Minnesota, USA
Sesso: female
Nazionalità: Canada (birth)
USA
Luogo di nascita: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
Luogo di morte: Chicago, Illinois, USA
Luogo di residenza: Butte, Montana, USA
St. Augustine, Florida, USA
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Rockland, Massachusetts, USA
Great Falls, Montana, USA
Fergus Falls, Minnesota, USA
Istruzione: Butte High School, Butte, Montana, USA
Attività lavorative: writer
gambler
autobiographer
Relazioni: Irwin, Inez Haynes (friend)
Breve biografia: Mary MacLane was born in Winnipeg, Canada, and moved to the USA with her family at a young age. They went from Minnesota to Montana after the death of her father and remarriage of her mother. In 1902, at age 19, she published her provocative first book, which she entitled I Await the Devil’s Coming; her publisher changed the title to The Story of Mary MacLane. It became an international bestseller and brought her fame and financial independence. With the money, she lived a bohemian life first in Greenwich Village in New York City and then in Boston, before returning to Butte, Montana. In 1917, she wrote and starred in an autobiographical silent film called Men Who Have Made Love to Me. She published another book called I, Mary MacLane at about the same time. After years as a sensation, Mary MacLane sank into obscurity and died under mysterious circumstances at age 48.

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I Await the Devil's Coming (Neversink) di Mary MacLane

MacLane inspires me to let shit go and consider the bigger picture. Like "courting delinquency" and "welcoming the devil into my bed". Thanks for the pointers, Mary.

(But for real I love this and her. Laughed a lot. "Bring me my red sky!")

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hannerwell | 8 altre recensioni | Feb 24, 2024 |

I Await the Devil's Coming (Neversink) di Mary MacLane

An interesting look at teenage angst 100 years ago. I couldn't help but feel for this young woman. She was obviously creative and thoughtful but had no other outlet for her teenage energies besides her journal. I think she was very lonely while she wrote this.

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Carmentalie | 8 altre recensioni | Jun 4, 2022 |

I Await the Devil's Coming (Neversink) di Mary MacLane

Self-described as a “Portrayal”, this book shifts through so many different forms: memoir, autobiography, poetry, manifesto, journal, philosophical treatise and, dare I suggest, fiction, that I can’t adequately pin it to the styrene foam board. I doubt a lepidopterist had as restless a specimen. So, I must default: that’s what she said. Portrayal with a capital P. The fact that her chosen word for her work rhymes with “betrayal” can’t be just coincidence. Mary MacLane surely felt let down by somebody; and her Portrayal does not stint on this fact. By all of mankind. And so she reaches for the Devil . . .

“From people who persist in calling my good body ‘mere vile clay’; from idiots who appear to know all about me and enjoin me not to bathe my eyes in hot water since it hurts their own; from fools who tell me what I ‘want’ to do: Kind Devil, deliver me.”

Such hubris and self-abnegation; disgust and rejoicing; phlegmatic phrases with hypertension testing arterial walls: I am stunned by this woman’s persistent honesty. Or is it hyperbole? I honestly can’t tell.

“Out in the graveyard her child is forgotten. And presently the wooden headstone will begin to decay. But the worms will not forget their part. They have eaten the small body by now, and enjoyed it. Always worms enjoy a body to eat.
“And also the Devil rejoiced.
“And I rejoiced with the Devil.”

Just how bored was this woman? I mean, it was 1902 in Butte, Montana. The only person she speaks to outside of the Devil is an Italian immigrant: peddler of miscellany, misandry and self-preservation. And that’s the third time I used “self” as a prefix. That also can’t be coincidence.

“She suffered with the pain of a woman, young; and I suffer with the pain of a woman, young and all alone.
“And so it is.”

Fifteen years passed before Mary MacLane wrote her second memoir. She seemed to have experienced a fair bit of life, caused big enough splashes in puddles along the way, and yet died virtually unknown. Certainly unknown to me until a friend at a brewery showed me his copy. Yes, two men puzzling over the unique prose from a unique voice from a unique woman. Somehow, I think Mary would’ve appreciated that.

“But I am too young yet to think of peace. It is not peace that I want. Peace is for forty and fifty. I am waiting for my Experience.
“I am awaiting the coming of the Devil.”

Amen, dear lady. This forty-plus male agrees.… (altro)

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ToddSherman | 8 altre recensioni | Aug 26, 2017 |

I, Mary MacLane: A Diary of Human Days di Mary MacLane

…You were honest since you made no pretense of any kind to yourself. You took no gold that you did not logically, humanely, or shamefully earn. You were consciously and unconsciously above all subterfuge. You wrought no ruin nor error nor darkness upon your own spirit or any other. You deceived neither yourself nor anyone about you. The tone of your life was of sun-shining simplicity and cleanness. There was no greed in you. You saw your way of life before you and lived it without degradation, with a positive of strength.___Mary MacLane from I, Mary MacLane

Though there were moments, such as the example above, of the Mary MacLane of old, this sequel to her original diary failed in providing the power expected in her writing. Perhaps she had become a bit too enamored with herself and the instant fame and notoriety her first work afforded her. This offering seemed uninspired, and perhaps that had something to do with her return to Butte, Montana. Even so, nothing will lessen for me the importance of what Mary MacLane achieved in her first book. And this proves how difficult it is for a writer of note to go on and continue to remain vital. It is no wonder she faded from the public's eye, and no fault but her own.… (altro)

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MSarki | Apr 14, 2016 |

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