Designing a Lovely Story

Nancy Horan's Loving Frank is the historical fiction of Frank Lloyd Wright's life with his mistress, Mamah Cheney, told from her point of view. As one of the most recognized personalities of the Twentieth Century, Wright is probably the one name people could come up with if asked to give an example of an architect.

Horan's book goes beyond the architecture, it goes beyond the man himself. As the title implies, the novel is about loving Frank Lloyd Wright, and thus it is actually Mamah's story, a woman pretty impressive in her own right. Granted, this isn't a biography, being fiction extrapolated from what little writings we have left of Mamah's, but what we do get is a fairly convincing portrayal of a woman who gives up everything in order to be with the man she loves.

And I do mean everything. By having an affair with a married man, while being married herself, she entered into a scandal that was latched on by the newspapers in a way that would make our current paparazzi proud of the tradition they follow in. And, I won't say without reason.

What amazes me about the writing is how Horan somehow makes Mamah a sympathetic character. Sure, she's unhappy in her marriage, but it's not like her husband, Edwin Cheney, was abusive or an alcoholic or anything really negative. If anything, it's mostly because he's basically boring, while Frank is exciting. For that reason, she leaves her children behind with a friend (who subsequently dies, which must have been delightfully traumatic for the kids), and goes off to Europe to meet up with Frank.

Still, despite her selfishness, you never see her as cold-hearted. She agonizes about leaving her children – and her guilt is a constant throughout. She also has to deal with her sister being left in a rather untenable situation, living in the house with her husband and children, who are now being harassed by the press and berated from the pulpit. And, perhaps most troubling, is that she has to deal with the fact that Frank Lloyd Wright is, well, kind of a self-absorbed asshole.

I think what's so surprising is the time period. Because Frank Lloyd Wright was so ahead of his time, and because of the misnomer that is “Modernism,” I've always felt he was working much later in the century, certainly beyond World War II. But, apparently I'm a moron, because this is turn-of-the-century America, and as such, the depiction of the social situation – concerning divorce and women's rights in particular – is crafted in such a way that it is revelatory without shocking. Again, I think it's Horan's work, creating the lovely voice of Mamah,

This is not a happy story. The affair, while comprised of touching moments, never gets to culminate in a happily-ever-after manner. In fact, if it could have ended in a less satisfactory way (at least from Mamah or Frank's perspective), I'd be glad to hear it. Unfortunately for the story, Horan was dealing with history, and history, although mold-able, is comprised of facts (with the obvious caveats applied about the factual nature of history). But even in the sadness, there is beauty. Shifting in the end from Mamah to Frank, Horan writes:

“Frank opens his eyes. All around his bed, he sees crippled salvage from the fire—a rolled-up carpet reeking of smoke, the two chairs they used for sitting in front of the fireplace, both now missing legs. When he closes his eyes again, the memory is gone. What he does not know is that he will not be able to retrieve her again like that. He will try. He will say to himself, She loved to joke. She had a wonderful laugh. But he won't be able to hear it, not for a very long time.”

Behind every famous man is a remarkable woman, and Mamah, with Horan's help, gets her due.

I highly recommend.

I also want to note that the cover, a Frank Lloyd Wright stained-glass design in yellows, was a fantastic choice. In case you're interested, it was done by Archie Ferguson.