LILLIAN
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At the start Lillian warns us, “The tales of former children are not to be trusted.” History is pliable in the hands of memory, and admittedly her father’s unmarried but unspinsterlike sisters, her stern and beloved nanny, and her mother’s money-obsessed brothers, who made Sunday dinners “full of open ill will,” are part fiction. But the way she remembers her past is more than mere entertainment: it reveals Lillian at various stages of her life, as a precocious child, a self-righteous young woman, an anxious first-time playwright, and finally a middle-aged woman afraid of her lover’s impending death. An incredibly intelligent, funny woman, she was also human: egotistical, proud, scared.
Lillian says her memories “are out of order, out of time,” and wisely Luce presents them that way, letting them bounce back and forth much as Hellman moved from place to place throughout her life. To accommodate her father, who “settled for life as a successful traveling salesman,” Lillian grew up living half of each year in New York and the other half in New Orleans, where she was surrounded by relatives offering colorful advice, like “Don’t revenge yourself until you’re as tall and as heavy as your aunt.” After meeting Hammett in Hollywood, Hellman moved with him to the east coast, where they lived on an island, on a farm, and in New York City. Though chronology and geography are scattered, Hellman’s story is cohesive because it’s populated throughout by her family, her writing, and Hammett.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Greg Kolock.
