Sometimes You Have to Lie: The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy

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Leslie Brody

Sometimes You Have to Lie

The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy

Leslie Brody

$45 $15

Hardback

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English

Seal Press
09 February 2021

Biography; Biography: historical, political & military; Bargains

The protagonist and anti-heroine of Louise Fitzhugh's masterpiece Harriet the Spy, first published first in 1964, continues to mesmerize generation after generation of readers. Harriet is an erratic, unsentimental, and endearing prototype--someone very like the woman who dreamed her up, author and artist Louise Fitzhugh.

Born in 1928, Fitzhugh was raised in a wealthy home in segregated Memphis, and she escaped her cloistered world and made a beeline for New York as soon as she could. Her expanded milieu stretched from the lesbian bars of Greenwich Village to the dance clubs of Harlem, on to the resurgent artist studios of post-war New York, France, and Italy. Her circle of friends included artists like Maurice Sendak and playwrights like Lorraine Hansberry.

In the 1960s, Fitzhugh wrote Harriet the Spy, and in doing so she introduced ""new realism"" into children's books-she launched a genre of children's books that allowed characters to experience authentic feelings and acknowledged topics that were formerly considered taboo. Fitzhugh's books are full of resistance: to liars, to conformity, to authority, and even (radically, for a children's author) to make-believe. As a commercial children's author and lesbian, Fitzhugh often had to disguise the nature of her most intimate relationships. She lived her life as a dissenter--a friend to underdogs, outsiders, and artists--and her masterpiece remains long after her death to influence and provoke new generations of readers.

Harriet is massively influential among girls and women in contemporary culture; she is the missing link between Jo March and Scout Finch, and it's not surprising that writers have thought of her as a kind of patron saint for misfit writers and unfeminine girls. This lively, rich biography brings Harriet's creator into the frame, shedding new light on an extraordinary author and her marvelous creation.

By: Leslie Brody
Imprint: Seal Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 236mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 32mm
Weight: 560g
ISBN: 9781580057691
ISBN 10: 1580057691
Pages: 352
Publication Date: 09 February 2021
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Leslie Brody is a biographer, playwright, and professor of creative writing. She adapted Harriet the Spy for the stage in 1988 and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts award and a PEN America award for creative nonfiction. She has been an on-staff book columnist for Elle magazine. She lives in Redlands, California.

Reviews for Sometimes You Have to Lie: The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy

It has taken a really good spy, in Leslie Brody, to come up with the story we've been waiting to get our hands on for all our reading lifetimes. Sometimes You Have to Lie does the greatest honor to Louise Fitzhugh and her brilliant avatar, Harriet the Spy: It tells the truth. --Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked and Egg & Spoon Harriet the Spy, the creation of Louise Fitzhugh, was a tough, smart, vulnerable, funny, unsentimental, and deeply observant little kid who was a born writer, much like her creator, the wonderful Louise Fitzhugh. She was a heroine unlike any children's book heroine who preceded her. If you loved Harriet, if you still think about her from time to time, you will love this book. --Roz Chast, author of Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?