Wednesday, July 31, 2019

In The Bishop's Carriage (1904)





Author, Mariam Michelson, gives you a new way of reading a book. Instead of using a third person voice to introduce characters, she allows her main character, Nance Olden, to give you the rundown on all the folks. This style of having one character tell you about an encounter with someone and then repeat in her own voice what the person is saying, as if questioning their response or commenting on it, is brilliant. Confusing at first, but brilliant none the less.

Usually I don’t like hearing one character do all the describing and talking in a book, but this author won me over with her almost gossipy way of doing it. Also, the fact that she uses primarily one main partner to the main character, Maggie Monahan (Mag),  as primary receiver of her self-talking dialogues makes you feel as if you are part of their specially bonded friendship.

Nance and Mag grew up in “The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children” house, or as they called the loveless orphanage, The Cruelty. Nance and Mag become seasoned thieves and Nance hooks up with a brutish man (Tom) who uses her to help pull off his small-time crimes.

The story takes off immediately and you always find yourself rooting for Nance to come out on top of the many challenging escapades she finds herself caught up in. Her encounter “in the bishop’s carriage,” where she first meets the bishop, begins an enlightening and life changing jump off point for Nance. In the bishop she finds a loving fatherly type and in Nance the bishop finds a loving daughter. But circumstances and bad luck of the thief haunts Nance as she struggles with this newly discovered feeling of wanting to be a good girl for her fantasy-adopted father, or at least not let him find out who/what she really is.

Only after the brute Tom Dorgan, who Nance thought she loved, is sent away to sing-sing prison, does she consider changing her ways.

She’s a bad girl trying to do good, and once she realizes how much she likes being good, honest and trusted by others, she begins to blossom. Nance becomes a successful comedy star of the stage, using her mimicking ways to make satire of famous celebs of the day.

It’s almost as if Nance has traded in a bad thief for a good theatrical agent in Fred Obermuller. Fred shows Nance how to trust in him by trusting in her time and time again. Surprisingly, by the end of the book the two fall in-love and marry, something that might have been hinted at in the story but really couldn’t be seen coming.

Part of the story is Fred saving Nance and another part is Nance saving Fred. And all the while in between you’re hearing episode after episode of events being described and shared with Mag from Nance’s point of view.

Think I might have figured out how the author put together the story and came up with the title. I read online, the book originated from a short story printed in the newspaper titled “In the Bishop’s Carriage.” The short story consisted of only the first chapter. In the book the second chapter mentions Mag for the first time and The third chapter begins with:

“Oh, Mag, Mag, for heaven’s sake, let me talk to you! You must let me tell you. No – don’t call the other girls. I can’t bear to tell this to anybody but you.” Pg62

And there begins the uniqueness of “In the Bishop’s Carriage.” The two women are like childhood girlfriends who’ve grown to love and trust only each other. Though Mag never says a word herself, Nance gives the reader enough to know that Mag is one of those friends who listens well, rarely questions and is loyal in her commitment to secrecy. Not sure what Mag’s standing was with Nance while Tom was around, but with Tom out of the picture, Mag becomes Nance’s connection to her past orphanage childhood and hard life existence to this point.

Some of the memorable characters are the silken voiced Mr. Latimer, a wheelchair bound invalid who Nance encounters while escaping a theft. Mr. Latimer covers for Nance with the cops, shares with her some prophetic poetry, and enlightens her by questioning why she lives a life of lying and thievery when she seems to have so much talent for good. Mr. Latimer basically sets the moral stage for why one chooses good over evil. And if Mr. Latimer is the good shepherd, the wretched Edward was the snake in the garden. Edward’s criminal plot to marry the old spinster Dowager for her money was foiled by Nance, and from then on it is Edward who becomes Nance’s nemesis, trying to ruin her success throughout the story.

Twelve-year old Kitty the thief steals the purse of Nance and is then found sharing with other street-urchins candy and cake bought with Nance’s stolen money. Kitty reminds Nance of herself. Eventually Nance gains her trust and teaches Kitty a lesson in why not to steal.

The Trust was an interesting part of the story. The Trust being the monopolizing corporate entity of the theatrical business. It was the organization that Fred Obermuller had bumped heads with and felt he could never get ahead because of them. Nance pulls a great hustle on the Trust lead man Mr. Tausig, ending with the incriminating document that can bring down the Trust for what was then a big deal, with anti-trust laws going into effect to stop big business monopolies in industries like railroads, oil, etc…

All ends well in this book as Nance and Fred become successful world travelers and giving to the needy. At the end when Nance and the bishop meet where it all began, in the bishop’s carriage, you feel as if the story has come full circle and much more is understood about the journey. Then seeing Nance return to the Cruelty, bringing toys for the little kids as she almost faints from the bad memories. I believe it is Fred, knowing the nightmares the Cruelty has haunted Nance with, who helps her see that her doing this good charity work is making sure no more kids coming through the doors of the Charity will have to suffer like she and Mag did. In one stroke of good intentions, Nance was able to whisk away the dark, gloomy childhood thoughts imprisoned in her memory of the Cruelty, and replace them with a happy outlook for the kids now living there.



In the Bishop’s Carriage is a rags-to-riches story, a good-triumphs-over-evil story, a crime and mystery thriller story and a comedy. Author Miriam Michelson ranks on the level of the early suffragists members in the way she challenges convention and pits the wits of a smart woman against the custom and convention of a male dominated society.



Yes, I rooted from beginning to end for the kindly thief Nance Olden!

Book Notes

-        He looked like an unhealthy little frog, with his bald head, his thin-lipped mouth that laughed, while the wrinkles rayed away from his cold, sneering eyes that had no smile in them. Pg.214

-        The little fellow laughed. His is a creaky, almost silent little laugh; if a spider could laugh he’d laugh like that. Pg.215

-        The thing to do is to be humble if you can’t be arrogant. Pg.211

- your face is unprotected with eyes closed; like a fort whose battery is withdrawn. Pg.185




*    Three times I came across references to a black person(s). In a reflection of the times, the words used were not considered racist and offensive to many whites; but to most blacks they were racist and offensive then and continue to be today.:

-  "There I was seated in a box all alone, come to listen to the leading lady sing coon-songs. Pg. 175

-        Oh Mag, remember how we used to peep into those awful, imposing Board rooms! Remember how strange and resentful you felt – like a poor little red-haired nigger up at the block – when you were in there to be shown to the woman who’d called to adopt you. Pg.276




In The Bishop’s Carriage

By Miriam Michelson

Audio

Silent Film (lost)

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