#49: Shameless and Shameful Fiction: reintroducing Elinor Glyn

Content warnings: Discussion of book banning, divorce, adultery, Post Partum Depression and chronic illness.

For a woman who was so incredibly influential on the genre of romance and the early Hollywood, Elinor Glyn has been relegated to the shelves of history. Let's bring this incredible woman, mother, and author back to the limelight today.

The majority of the research for this episode was done thanks to the book Inventing the It Girl: How Elinor Glyn Created the Modern Romance and Conquered Early Hollywood by Hilary Hallet (2022)

Questions/Comments/Concerns? Email us at [email protected]!

Raging Romantics Book List

Books by Elinor Glyn we mention:

• The Visits of Elizabeth (1899/1900)
• The Reflections of Ambrosine (1901/1902)
• Beyond the Rocks: A Love Story (1906)
• Three Weeks (1907)
• When The Hour Came/His Hour (1909/1910)
• The Reason Why (1911)
• Halcyone (1912)
• The Contrast and other Stories (1913)
• The Point of View (1913)
• The Sequence (1913)
• Three Things (1915)
• The Career of Katherine Bush (1916)
• Letters From Spain (comp. 1924)

Other Books:

• Vanity Fair (Becky Sharp is the heroine)
• Fanny Hill by John Cleland
• Flame and the Flower by Kathleen Woodiwiss
• Life's Too Short by Abby Jimenez
• Behind the Screen by Samuel Goldwyn

Sources:

• "The Case for Bodice Ripping/Don't Call Them Trash" (Atlantic Article, Gilbert, 2022)
• "Meet Elinor Glyn, "Shocker of Grandmothers" and Founder of the Modern Sex Novel" (Hallett, 2022)
• "Elinor Glyn" (Women Film Pioneers Project, 2013)
• "Elinor Glyn" (Britannica.com)
• "Elinor Glyn Recognized "It" Before Anyone Else -Because She Had "It"" (Welch, 2022)
• "Belle Époque or the "Beautiful Age" in France" (Wilde, 2019)
• Philip Alexius de Laszlo's painting of Elinor Glyn 1912