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Clara and Mr. Tiffany: A Novel
 
 

Clara and Mr. Tiffany: A Novel [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

Susan Vreeland

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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 432 pages
  • Publisher: Random House (Jan 11 2011)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1400068169
  • ISBN-13: 978-1400068166
  • Product Dimensions: 16.9 x 3.8 x 24.3 cm
  • Shipping Weight: 703 g
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #174,599 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Product Description

Review

PRAISE FOR SUSAN VREELAND

Clara and Mr. Tiffany

“The book brims with fascinating information about Tiffany's glassmaking and about New York as its gilded age gives way to a more progressive era. ...Vreeland's ability to make this complex historical novel as luminous as a Tiffany lamp is nothing less than remarkable.” — Washington Post
 
“Vreeland's writing is so graceful, her research so exhaustive, that a reader is enfolded in the world of Tiffany and Driscoll….fascinating.”  —  Los Angeles Times
 
“Vreeland offers a fascinating look at at turn-of-the-century New York City.” — People Magazine (4 stars)
 
“[H]ot as a glass factory…Give Vreeland credit for shedding light on a little-known slice of women’s history.”  —  USA Today
 
“You’ll never look at a Tiffany lamp or window the same way.” —  Daily Candy National  “Weekend Guide”
 
“Fascinating.”— Newark Star Ledger
 
“Vreeland has done a good job describing the tensions within the business and between creative artistry and a desire for a personal life… An interesting book about a woman deservedly rescued from obscurity.” —  Fredericksburg, Va. Free Star
 
“If you’re a fiction reader, you are going to want to pick up at least one of these early 2011 novels.”  —  The Christian Science Monitor, “5 Novels for the New Year”
 
“The author of Girl in Hyacinth Blue here imagines a woman torn between art and love in a novel based on the real-life creator of the iconic Tiffany lamps.” —  O Magazine, “10 Titles to Pick Up Now”
 
“Who knew Tiffany’s iconic lamp was designed by a woman? Perfect fodder for historical novelist Vreeland, who travels back to New York City’s Gilded Age to imagine how it all unfolded.”  —  Good Housekeeping

 
“Vreeland brings 1890s Manhattan to vibrant life…Vivid descriptions of window and lamp production will surely bring readers a new appreciation for stained glass.  And Clara’s battles for the rights of her female workers and for artistic originality versus mass production are compelling, as is her complicated relationship with Mr. Tiffany.  This charming woman is a memorable heroine and, just as Clara’s art enhanced the images of nature that it depicted, Vreeland’s illuminating vision of Clara’s story is a pleasure to experience.”  -  BookPage
 
 
 "As sparkling and alluring as the lost story of the woman who created the famed Tiffany glass lamps, Clara and Mr. Tiffany is a masterpiece of a novel.  In it fin de siècle New York jumps to life in all its gaudy and heartbreaking grandeur and opportunities.  As much a character study of a city and a time as of a woman, Susan Vreeland shows us the new technology that enabled people to craft the magnificent lamps so sought after today, and the artist’s eye of Clara Driscoll  that brought them to perfection."
-- Margaret George
 
 
“For the first time in my long life of reading novels, Susan Vreeland made me cry over the glory
of women's work. Clara and Mr. Tiffany is a noble and necessary book, lest we allow ourselves to
be ignorant of the struggle, courage, and vision of women who have come before us. Readers will never look at a Tiffany lamp or window in the same way again.”
      --Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab's Wife and Adam & Eve





Girl in Hyacinth Blue

 
“[A] beautifully written exploration of the power of art.”—Parade
 
“Stunning . . . haunting.”—San Francisco Chronicle
 
Luncheon of the Boating Party
 
“A masterwork.”—The San Diego Union-Tribune
 
“Vreeland takes the big, bold brush-strokes of Renoir’s personal and artistic oeuvre and displays them with her usual vividness in this eponymous novel. . . . Sensual and provocative.”—Baltimore Sun

“The book brims with fascinating information about Tiffany's glassmaking and about New York as its gilded age gives way to a more progressive era. ...Vreeland's ability to make this complex historical novel as luminous as a Tiffany lamp is nothing less than remarkable.” — Washington Post
 
“Vreeland's writing is so graceful, her research so exhaustive, that a reader is enfolded in the world of Tiffany and Driscoll….fascinating.”  — Los Angeles Times
 
“Vreeland offers a fascinating look at at turn-of-the-century New York City.” — People Magazine (4 stars)
 
“[H]ot as a glass factory…Give Vreeland credit for shedding light on a little-known slice of women’s history.”  — USA Today
 
“You’ll never look at a Tiffany lamp or window the same way.” — Daily Candy National  “Weekend Guide”
 
“Fascinating.”— Newark Star Ledger
 
“Vreeland has done a good job describing the tensions within the business and between creative artistry and a desire for a personal life… An interesting book about a woman deservedly rescued from obscurity.” — Fredericksburg, Va. Free Star
 
“If you’re a fiction reader, you are going to want to pick up at least one of these early 2011 novels.”  — The Christian Science Monitor, “5 Novels for the New Year”
 
“The author of Girl in Hyacinth Blue here imagines a woman torn between art and love in a novel based on the real-life creator of the iconic Tiffany lamps.” — O Magazine, “10 Titles to Pick Up Now”
 
“Who knew Tiffany’s iconic lamp was designed by a woman? Perfect fodder for historical novelist Vreeland, who travels back to New York City’s Gilded Age to imagine how it all unfolded.”  — Good Housekeeping
 
 
“Vreeland brings 1890s Manhattan to vibrant life…Vivid descriptions of window and lamp production will surely bring readers a new appreciation for stained glass.  And Clara’s battles for the rights of her female workers and for artistic originality versus mass production are compelling, as is her complicated relationship with Mr. Tiffany.  This charming woman is a memorable heroine and, just as Clara’s art enhanced the images of nature that it depicted, Vreeland’s illuminating vision of Clara’s story is a pleasure to experience.”  -  BookPage
 
 
 "As sparkling and alluring as the lost story of the woman who created the famed Tiffany glass lamps, Clara and Mr. Tiffany is a masterpiece of a novel.  In it fin de siècle New York jumps to life in all its gaudy and heartbreaking grandeur and opportunities.  As much a character study of a city and a time as of a woman, Susan Vreeland shows us the new technology that enabled people to craft the magnificent lamps so sought after today, and the artist’s eye of Clara Driscoll  that brought them to perfection."
-- Margaret George
 
 
“For the first time in my long life of reading novels, Susan Vreeland made me cry over the glory
of women's work. Clara and Mr. Tiffany is a noble and necessary book, lest we allow ourselves to
be ignorant of the struggle, courage, and vision of women who have come before us. Readers will never look at a Tiffany lamp or window in the same way again.”
      --Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab's Wife and Adam & Eve

Product Description

Against the unforgettable backdrop of New York near the turn of the twentieth century, from the Gilded Age world of formal balls and opera to the immigrant poverty of the Lower East Side, bestselling author Susan Vreeland again breathes life into a work of art in this extraordinary novel, which brings a woman once lost in the shadows into vivid color.

It’s 1893, and at the Chicago World’s Fair, Louis Comfort Tiffany makes his debut with a luminous exhibition of innovative stained-glass windows, which he hopes will honor his family business and earn him a place on the international artistic stage. But behind the scenes in his New York studio is the freethinking Clara Driscoll, head of his women’s division. Publicly unrecognized by Tiffany, Clara conceives of and designs nearly all of the iconic leaded-glass lamps for which he is long remembered.

Clara struggles with her desire for artistic recognition and the seemingly insurmountable challenges that she faces as a professional woman, which ultimately force her to protest against the company she has worked so hard to cultivate. She also yearns for love and companionship, and is devoted in different ways to five men, including Tiffany, who enforces to a strict policy: he does not hire married women, and any who do marry while under his employ must resign immediately. Eventually, like many women, Clara must decide what makes her happiest—the professional world of her hands or the personal world of her heart.

Inside This Book (Learn More)
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com: 3.7 out of 5 stars (93 customer reviews)

134 of 136 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A Gilded Age slice of artistic life, Nov 28 2010
By Corinne H. Smith - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Clara and Mr. Tiffany: A Novel (Hardcover)
Pre-release customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program
Clara Driscoll (1861-1944) was an actual designer who worked for Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933) at the turn of the last century. This novel steps into her shoes as she creates designs with colored glass pieces and manages the all-woman studio that assembles signature Tiffany windows and lampshades. While the storyline traces this independent woman's days over the course of sixteen years, it also by necessity touches on some of the tensions of the times: the limitations in the rights of women; the difficulties of newly-arrived immigrants to the boroughs of New York; and the demands of trade unions and the administrative challenges they can cause. It juxtaposes Art against Commerce, raising the question of which one of the two is more important. This is a dichotomy the Tiffany company itself must face and must resolve in order to survive.

But at its core, this book is about an artistic woman who seeks value in her life and in her work. Clara tells her tale in the first person; and through her eyes, we are thus able to witness her personal and professional setbacks and successes. We meet the assortment of her fellow bohemians who reside in one particular Irishwoman's boarding house. As we take Clara's side and hope that she finds all of the external validation and the happiness that she deserves, we come to realize that her boss, Mr. Tiffany, is in search of those same satisfactions, too. The lingering question is: Will they both succeed?

Good historical fiction introduces us to worlds we do not know firsthand. It teaches us history while it confirms for us the universality of the human experience. Author Susan Vreeland conveys these concepts well. Even her chapter headings reflect the storyline. Each title suggests either a hue of color or a still-life subject of focus. Everything here is about Art.

During my time with this book, I felt the need for more visual references of the stained glass artistry. The Tiffany window outline on the front book cover wasn't enough for me. So I checked out a few Tiffany coffee table books from a local library. When I paged through the exquisite and colorful plates, I could consider the people who created each one, and the many hours of work that both men and women devoted to those projects -- just as Clara and her Tiffany girls really did. Vreeland's book brings home the fact that inanimate objects include a human element whenever they are made by hand. I know I will look at Tiffany windows and lampshades differently from this moment on.

Susan Vreeland has once again revealed the people and the stories behind Art. "Clara and Mr. Tiffany" makes for compelling and enjoyable reading. It's a good story that happens to be based on fact. An Afterword defines which of the book's details were real and which ones were filled in by the author's imagination. The book reminds me somewhat of Nancy Horan's Loving Frank: A Novel, a book based on the relationship of Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick Cheney. And although this was my first foray into the novels of Susan Vreeland, I now want to go back and read a few of the others. I love books that help me understand "the rest of the story." Vreeland's volumes appear to do just that.

[Review is based on seeing the Advance Reader's Edition.]

87 of 93 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars Changed my mind about the book the more I read, Dec 3 2010
By Avid Reader - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Clara and Mr. Tiffany: A Novel (Hardcover)
Pre-release customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program
I had never read a book by Vreeland but was excited to read about Louis Comfort Tiffany (whose supposed works! I have always admired) so I jumped on this book. I was at first put off by the writing style and marked passages I thought clumsy and awkward, mostly passages that were there to teach the reader something about working with glass, but having these lecturing phrases in the mouths of the characters was rather offputting. Luckily I was quickly drawn into the drama of the women who worked under Clara's supervision and Clara's own artistic triumphs in creating some of Tiffany's most famous lamps. I ended up buying a pictoral book on these lamps and windows from Amazon and mean to buy the book for a friend ALONG with the picture book which I know will add much to the story since the creation of many of the lamps is discussed in detail.

I was much struck while reading this that many have wondered why there have not been more famous women artists, writers, composers, etc. Well, this woman was not known as the creator of these "Tiffany" lamps until letters she had written home were discovered very recently. That is the compelling part of this novel for me. I don't think I would have enjoyed this as much as I would if it had not been based on a real person's story and that person was a victim of her time - Tiffany's "girls" were not allowed to marry, if they did they lost their positions. They were certainly not allowed to form a union. The men's union at Tiffany worked hard to get them shut down and concessions had to be made to allow them to have a woman's workshop - this was early 1900s.

The joy of working with the colored glass, the characters, including gays, she boarded with, the glimpses into the immigrant slums, the incidentals of living at the time are all very interesting and strong points in the narrative. The weaker part for me was Clara's own personal story and interactions.

Another point driven home was art vs profit - Louis Comfort Tiffany was always in the red and had to be bailed out by his father Charles Tiffany of Tiffanys the jewelry store. The accountants were always looking for ways to make an easy profit basically telling Clara to stop designing the more expensive lamps - what a loss! There are so many Tiffany lamp imitations these days that the real exquisite beauty of the original lamps has been diminished. Do yourself a favor and read this book and go to the library and look at colored photos of the lamps Clara Driscoll created.

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars As capitvating as a Tiffany stained-glass window, Dec 17 2010
By SB "SB" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Clara and Mr. Tiffany: A Novel (Hardcover)
Pre-release customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program
This is one book I was truly sorry to see end. Clara will captivate you with her turn-of-the-century tale of the life of a newly "modern" woman. The book offers glimpses into several stages of her life - at the end of each ear Clara deftly turns the kaleidoscope for you and the image she's just painted shatters, only to be replaced by an equally detailed and artistic one on the next page. Not at all a stock "girl meets boy, loses boy, gets boy in the end" story, instead it's more of a "girl finds happiness and purpose, loses it, finds it again" tale. The men in her life are many and varied, but not romantic props - they are deep and complex, as are the varied relationships she has with them. It's the first time in a long time I've read a tale that explores the deep and satisfying relationship that can be part of a professional and artistic collaboration between two people - regardless of gender.

Like another wonderful book of the same era (Devil in the White City), the author also deftly includes snapshots of all the important happenings of the era - the Chicago World's Fair, the opening of the New York Subway, issues of immigration and organized labor, the first New Year's Eve to see an electric lighted-ball descend in Times Square...

You won't be able to put this one down!!!
 Go to Amazon.com to see all 93 reviews  3.7 out of 5 stars 

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