Carnac the Magnificent

Carnac's Folly [Carnac]
Gilbert Parker
Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1922

352 pages

Carnac Grier is the second son of Quebec lumber baron John Grier. Unlike elder brother Fabian, and much to his father's consternation, he has no passion for the business. Carnac seems so different from the rest of the family; he's not exactly a black sheep, but there is cause for concern. You see, since an early age the boy has devoted himself to art. He both paints and sculpts. We're told that art is everything to him, though this isn't entirely true. Carnac is also interested in politics, and will one day defeat one of the province's most accomplished and powerful politicians to take a seat in the Legislative Assembly. There's also pretty Junia Shale, of whom he's quite fond. Here she is accompanying Carnac on the campaign trail:

Junia is smart as a whip, as recognized by John Grier. He would've hired her in a moment had she been born male. The girl shows more interest in the family business than Carnac ever does. Yet, there will come a time when, through his own pigheadedness, John puts the firm in some jeopardy. Carnac will help his father and prove himself adept in righting the ship, but then return to his art. John will never forgive his son for that.

Carnac's Folly is not Parker's finest novel. Those who make it to the end will remember it – perhaps not – as a story of a strong-willed young man whose path is guided by his nature. Like other Parker novels, the ending is neatly tied up, and yet I was confused.

What exactly was Carnac's folly?

Was it his pursuit of a career in art, thus foregoing a share in the family business worth millions? Did it have something to do with his impetuous decision to run for election against the most formidable foe in the province? Or might it be something I missed about his relationship with Junia Shale.

I think it's worth noting the title Carnac's Folly is exclusively American. In Canada and the United Kingdom, the novel appeared as simply Carnac.

Returning to the issue at hand, what was Carnac's folly?

The front flap of my Lippincott first American edition provided the answer:

By a strange piece of folly, Carnac's career is almost wrecked and and his love for beautiful Junia Shale brought to naught. While Junia wonders and waits, Carnac struggles desperately against the consequences of his act and also unknown to himself against a family heritage of hate.

Got it.

Early in the the novel, Carnac leaves his Montreal family home and sets out to make something of himself in New York. He takes a studio near Washington Square, befriends other artists, and begins painting scenes of the Bowery and the city's nightlife. To paraphrase the omniscient narrator, life was nearly as continental as was possible in a new country.

One day, while walking along Broadway, he saves a young woman from certain death by pulling her from the path of an oncoming streetcar. She is Luzanne Larue, "a fascinating girl with fine black eyes, black hair, a complexion of cream."

Luzanne looks to befriend her rescuer, as I expect is common in these sorts of situations. For his part, Carnac recognizes that what with her black eyes, black hair, and complexion of cream, Luzanne would make a very fine subject for a very fine portrait.

Luzanne Larue, as imagined by illustrator Walter Lauderback. 

With her father Isel's permission, the two share many an enjoyable morning together, Luzanne sitting with hair down and neck bared as Carnac stands at his easel. When comes the day the portrait is completed, Luzanne grows wistful. She is by now very much in love with Carnac and wants him for a husband. Her father, a French national who lives in exile after having conspired to overthrow the government, sees great benefit in having so well positioned a son-in-law. And so, he conspires with a pal to trick the artist into marriage.

Their scheme is laughable, but as it worked I won't be sharing it here. Who knows what damage that could cause.

 

Because alcohol is involved, Carnac at first has no idea what's going on. Fortunately, he sobers up enough to recognize the conspiracy before it, um, achieves consummation. He abandons his bride outside the Manhattan hotel at which they were to have spent their first night together, never to see her again. The following morning, he consults a lawyer who informs him that the whole thing is too much to be believed.

Because it is.

Carnac's marriage to Luzanne hangs over much of the rest of the novel. He worries that it might be discovered and used against him during his electoral run. More than this – much more than this – it affects his relationship with Junia. She has loved Carnac since they were childhood playmates, and cannot understand why he is now so troubled and aloof. 

Why won't he share?

It's a question that women have echoed throughout the centuries.

Bloomer:

"Every woman has an idea where a man ought to make love to her, and this open road certainly ain't the place."

Trivia: The Lippincott front flap errs in referring to Carmac Grier as "Carmac Greer." The rear flap pitches The Gland Stealers by Bertram Gayton, a "comedy of to-day" about a grandpa who believes monkey glands provide the elixir of life.

Object: An attractive book bound in red boards with four plates by American artist Walter Lauderback (aka Walt S. Lauderback; 1887-1941). The jacket illustration, which appears to have been tweaked from the hotel exterior scene above, better captures the mood.

Access: The American first edition, I purchased my copy earlier this year from a Michigan bookseller. Price: US$20. As is too often the case, I paid much more in shipping.

As I write, eleven Lippincott copies are listed online, beginning at US$5.00. The high end is held by a Nevado bookseller who offers a signed copy at US$214.50. Were it not for the US$47.50 shipping fee I'd recommend the former.

My edition can be read online here – gratis – thanks to the Internet Archive and the University of Toronto's Robarts Library.

Related post:

Susanna Moodie's Bloomers

The Ten Best Book Buys of 2024... and many gifts!

What a year! On day two, while returning from a grocery run in nearby Brockville, I stopped at a thrift store and found first editions of Gilbert Parker's The Judgement House and Pardon My Parka by Joan Walker. They set me back all of four dollars.

The Judgement House had been on my radar only two months, but I'd been looking for Pardon My Parka well before my 2022 tear through Walker's East of Temple Bar, Murder By Accident, Repent at Leisure, and the condensed Repent at Leisure. It completes my collection of her works. 

I arrived home from Brockville to find this gift from my friend James Calhoun my mailbox:

More on that below.

The strangest book buying experience occurred during a May visit from our daughter. She'd just moved to her first flat and was looking for inexpensive pots and pans, so the family set out for a favourite thrift store in Smiths Falls. During the drive I began talking about Jan Hilliard whose novel Miranda I'd set down to make the trip. I went on about her background, her rascal of a father, her art school education, what a good writer she was, and how unfair it is that she's so forgotten. When we got to the store, mother and daughter went off hunting kitchenware. I made for the books, where I found – within seconds – a first edition of Hilliard's The Salt-Box. I'd never before seen any of her books in a store. The copy doesn't have a dust jacket and is a library discard, but at 66 cents I shan't complain. It completes my collection of her works. 

That Judgement House, Pardon My Parka, and The Salt-Box didn't make this year's list gives some idea as to how good 2024 was in terms of book purchases.

This years top ten were bought from booksellers in Canada, Austria, England, Scotland, and the United States:

A Fair Affair
Paul Champagne

Winnipeg: Greywood, 1967

"A chilling mystery with a James Bond-Simon Templar flavour, and devilish spoof on Canadian politicians," says the cover copy.

We'll see.

Set around Expo '67, this was purchased after reading the disappointing So Long at the Fair.

The Woman Who Didn't
Victoria Cross

   [Annie Sophie Currie]

London: Lane, 1909

An 1895 novel written in response to Grant Allen's scandalous The Woman Who Did. I like Allen's novel, but understand that Victoria Cross was highly critical. 

I'm ready to hear her out.

Harsh Evidence
Pamela Fry
London: Wingate, 1953

Reviewed here in July, Fry's debut did not disappoint; I'd read The Watching Cat (1960), her second and last novel, so expectations were low.

This one is a murder mystery set amongst well-paid people working in Toronto's lucrative magazine industry. Different times. I grew jealous.

The Conquering Hero

John Murray Gibbon

New York: Grosset & Dunlap, [c. 1921]

Judging a book by its cover, I'm not sure this is for me. Still, Gibbon wrote Pagan Love (1922), which is easily the most unconventional and challenging Canadian novel of last century's 'twenties.

When I found this Gibbon book – signed – I leapt.

Three Weeks
Elinor Glyn
New York: Macaulay,

   [c. 1924]

A novel that would've appealed as a very young man. Don't know why I didn't buy it then, but I have it now... and in a photoplay edition!

It says everything about my reaction that I bought two other Glyns after reading it.

A View of the Town

Jan Hilliard
Toronto: Nelson, Foster &

   Scott, 1954

It's difficult to pace oneself with Jan Hilliard; she wrote only five novels. I'm saving A View of the Town, the only one I've not read, for next year. Seventy-year-old reviews suggest it is her funniest. By now, I feel I know Hilliard; much of that humour will be black.

Miranda
Jan Hilliard
New York: Abelard-

   Schuman, 1960

My favourite read of 2024!

Given that I read two other Hilliard novels this year it was not an easy choice.

Morgan's Castle
Jan Hilliard
New York: Abelard-

   Schulman, 1964

The author's biggest selling novel – there was a Dell paperback edition – and I can see why. Where previous novels could get very dark indeed, Morgan's Castle is the only in which murder figures.

And more than one! 

Chipmunk
Len Peterson
Toronto: McClelland &

   Stewart, 1949

I once read a very enthusiastic review of this novel, but where?

I have no idea who wrote it or what was said, but it was so positive that I've kept an eye out ever since.

In the Village of Viger
Duncan Campbell Scott
Toronto: Ryerson, 1945

A controversial choice, perhaps, given the author, this is a more attractive edition than the very rare 1896 American first. The Ryerson edition didn't do a whole lot better, but this hasn't prevented certain critics from holding the collection aloft as highly influential. John Metcalf has proven otherwise.

This year saw a good many gifts to the Dusty Bookcase, beginning with the book that arrived on the second day in January:

The Winter of Time
Raymond Holmes
   [Raymond Souster]
Toronto: News Stand
   Library, 1949

Raymond Souster's third book and first novel, the poet drew something from his wartime experience in the writing, but it is no way autobiographical.

Thank God.

A gift from James Calhoun.

Late Spring
Peter Donovan
Toronto: Macmillan, 1930

A novel set in the Toronto art world by a Montrealer better known as "P O'D." Robertson Davies was an admirer, describing Donovan as "knowingly and intentionally and pointedly funny."

Another gift from James Calhoun, this is sure to be read in 2025.

Michelle Remembers
Michelle Smith and
   Lawrence Pazder
New York: Pocket, 1981

After I'd expressed frustration in being unable to find an affordable copy copy of this Satanic Panic classic, Brad Middleton of My Bloody Obsession sent two copies my way. This one is a first printing of the July 1981 first Pocket books edition.

The Gorilla's Daughter
Thomas P. Kelley
Toronto: News Stand

   Library, 1950

A book I will likely never own, but a book I've now read thanks to bowdler of Fly-by-Night who kindly sent scans and photocopies my way.

A tragic love story.

Finally, I received two large boxes of books from the West Coast sent by my friend Karyn Huenemann containing books by L. Adams Beck, Frances Brooke, Ralph Connor, Muriel Denison, Norman Duncan, Sara Jeanette Duncan, Muriel Elwood, F.T. Flahiff, Grey Owl, Nellie McClung, Frederick Niven, Frank L. Packard, George L. Parker, Gilbert Parker, Charles G.D. Roberts, and Duncan Campbell Scott.

Again, what a year! 

Related posts:

Whither the Canadian American Bestseller?
A Forgotten Novelist's Hidden Debut

Accidents Never Happen in a Perfect World

A Mid-Century Modern Country House Mystery

Three Weeks a Lady
Growing Up with Mother
A Mid-Century Modern Country House Mystery
A Nova Scotian Writes Ontario Gothic
A Poet's Pulp Novel
Thomas P. Kelley's Elusive Gorilla's Daughter

Gilbert Parker's Hollywood Ending

Being an addendum to last week's post on Gilbert Parker's The Money Master. 

Of the eighteen Gilbert Parker screen adaptations, The Money Master is the only one to be undertaken by the author himself. In his filmography, it follows closely behind Behold My Wife! (1920), a George Melford production based on the author's 1893 bestseller The Translation of a Savage.

That Behold My Wife! was Hollywood's second adaptation of the novel in seven years speaks to the author's popularity. A third adaptation followed.

But this post is about The Money Master... or not. The advertisement at the top of this post comes from an advert Paramount placed in the March 1921 edition of Motion Picture News.

Look for the asterisk.

cliquez pour agrandir

This was three months from release and still there'd been no decision as to the title. The film premiered on 26 June 1921 as A Wise Fool. Though it is preserved in the Library of Congress, I see no evidence that there has been a screening within living memory. What little I know of A Wise Fool comes through publicity shots and reviews, the former being surprisingly uncommon.

The image above, from the August 1921 edition of Exhibitors Herald, features Carmen Barbille (Alice Hollister) serenading her daughter Zoé (Ann Forrest), suggests one difference between A Wise Fool and its source; in the novel, Carmine last sees Zoé as a young girl.

Apologies for the the spoiler.

Anyone considering The Money Master as an autumn read is advised to skip the rest of this post as I'll be comparing the plots of novel and film.

The Money Maker concerns Jean Jacques Barbille, the fortunate heir to generations of wealth grown in rural Quebec. He takes some of those riches to Paris, where he is not recognized as the man of importance he believes himself to be. As noted in last week's review, his reception outside the French capitol meets expectations, though this is to do with capital (apologies, again). On his return voyage aboard the Antoine, Jean Jacques meets the beautiful Carmen Delores and her ne'er-do-well father. The two are fleeing Spain on account of papa Sebastian backing the losing side in Spain's recent civil conflict. The Antoine strikes a submerged iceberg off the shore of Gaspé. Jean Jacques is rescued by Carmen and the two marry.

Flash forward thirteen years. Jean Jacques lives at the family home, Manor Cartier in the parish of St. Saviour's, with Carmen and their little girl Zoé. A happy soul, his passion for business has come to consume and he is taking family life for granted.

No, that's unfair. Jean Jacques dotes on Zoé, who loves him so much.

But what of Carmen?

Mme Barbille has been sneaking around with master carpenter George Masson, whom M Barbille had hired to construct a flume. Once the project is completed, the lovers plan to flee the parish.

George and Carmen as imagined by illustrator André Castaigne.

Jean Jacques discovers his wife's infidelity and confronts George. He has the perfect opportunity to murder his wife's lover, but does not. 

I won't go into their exchange except to say that it is the very best part of the novel.

George jilts Carmen. Though Jean Jacques forgives his wife, she disappears, leaving her daughter behind.

We flash forward again, this time to Jean Jacques' fiftieth birthday, where he realizes that Zoé has fallen in love with Gerard Fynes:

He was English – that was a misfortune; he was an actor – that was a greater misfortune, for it suggested vagabondage of morals as well as of profession; and he was a Protestant, which was the greatest misfortune of all.

Faced with Jean Jacques' disproval, the two elope. It's now Zoé's turn to disappear. 

Jean Jacques goes into a complete tailspin. The modest growth of his inherited wealth is reversed. The decline is hastened by his thieving father-in-law, a dishonest cousin, and a fire that destroys his flour mill. Rather than declare bankruptcy or accept financial aid from the widowed Virginie Poucette, he allows creditors to move in. All Jean Jacques manages to save for himself is a bird cage that had belonged to Carmen and Zoé's pet canary. With nothing to anchor him to St Saviour's, Jean Jacques leaves for Montreal where – quite by chance – he encounters Carmen on her deathbed. In her last moments, they reconcile. Our hero then sets out for the Canadian west, where there had once been a sighting of Zoé and her husband.

Because this synopsis is taking far too long, I won't go into Jean Jacques' attempted murder of Carmen's last lover, and will instead cut to the discovery that he has a granddaughter. The Protestant actor father is dead, Zoé died shortly after childbirth, and the baby is now with a wealthy woman who'd been unable to conceive.

I won't go into their exchange except to say that it is the very worst part of the novel.

For reasons both unclear and unconvincing, Jean Jacques leaves his granddaughter, never to see her again. He marries Virginie Poucette and lives his remaining years on three hundred and twenty acres of land "near the Rockies" he'd bought for Zoé decades earlier. 

I realize that was long. In rushing through the ending I kept pace with the novel.

The comparison with A Wise Fool will be much shorter because I haven't seen it – who has? – and so rely on century-old reviews. The most detailed, found in the 3 June 1921 edition of Variety, suggests that the film followed the plot of the novel quite closely up to the point at which Jean Jacques loses his fortune. This includes a scene in which he destroys the guitar left behind by the absent Carmen.

 

James Kirkwood as Jean Jacques Barbille.

As in the novel, after losing his wife, his daughter, his livelihood, and his possessions, Jean Jacques becomes something of a wanderer, his only companion being the caged canary. 

Had Parker read McTeague?

The Variety reviewer was none too impressed, summing up all that follows in just two sentences:

 

In The Money Master, Jean Jacques comes upon Carmen in a hovel, not a nunnery. She dies within the hour. For all his years of searching, the desperate father never sees his daughter again. Zoé cannot return to him because she is dead. Her husband Gerald died a pauper. Their child is raised by a wealthy woman who refuses to let Jean Jacques so much as touch his granddaughter.

For the film, Parker cut the three deaths and the very existence of Zoé and Gerald's daughter. 

Would that we could see that film! I'm curious as to its depiction of life in rural Quebec, much praised in by American critics, and the character Virginie Poucette. Played by Californian Truly Shattuck, the Canadien isn't mentioned in so much as one review I've found.

Should be be concerned about Virginie?

Gilbert Parker knew what he was doing. As early as 1921, he recognized the Hollywood Ending.

I expect Virginie did just fine.

Related posts:

The Rise and Fall of a Peacock Philosopher
Behold the Translation of a Savage on Film!

The Rise and Fall of a Peacock Philosopher

The Money Master;
   Being the Curious History of Jean Jacques Barbille,

   His Labours, His Loves and His Ladies
Gilbert Parker

Toronto: Copp Clark, 1915
360 pages

I bought my first Gilbert Parker book at a library sale in the mid-eighties. By 1990, it was gone, though I have no idea where. My fault, of course. I'd paid it little attention because Parker himself wasn't paid much attention. His name had never once come up in university courses. The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature, then my bible, doesn't accord the man so much as one of its 1199 pages, despite popularity and critical acclaim (both now a century past).

I couldn't even remember which Parker I'd owned back then. What I did remember was an illustration and caption depicting a miserable man traveling to Quebec in the company of a beautiful woman who seemed intent on marriage. Imagine my surprise when in researching this recent read I came upon:

The image of the reluctant groom threw me because Parker depicts him as being extremely keen on marrying the woman in the funnel.

The fiancé, Jean Jacques Barbille, is heir to a fortune built over four generations. Having transformed these inherited riches into slightly greater riches, the Canadien has an idea to visit the land of his ancestors, where he expects to be recognized as a man of great importance. Paris disappoints, but folks in the nether regions appreciate his money and so accord deference. Satisfied, Jean Jacques sets off for home with purse depleted, comforted by the knowledge that his various endeavors, save one or two, are moderately successful. 

Whilst crossing the Atlantic aboard the good ship Antoine, Jean Jacques encounters Spanish Amazon Carmen Delores – she of the funnel – and Sebastian Delores, her father. They are on the run because papa – the sinister figure at the funnel's base – had been on the losing side of Spain's most recent power struggle. If anything, young Carmen suffered a far greater loss in that her lover Carvillho Gonzales was executed for his efforts:

Carmen had made up her mind from the first to marry Jean Jacques, and she deported herself accordingly – with modesty, circumspection and skill. It would be the easiest way out of all their difficulties. Since her heart, such as it was, fluttered, a mournful ghost, over the Place d’Armes, where her Gonzales was shot, it might better go to Jean Jacques than anyone else; for he was a man of parts, of money, and of looks, and she loved these all; and to her credit she loved his looks better than all the rest.

In short, Jean Jacques looks a lot like Carvillho Gonzales.

The Money Master is the twentieth book I've reviewed here this year. It follows James De Mille's The Cross and the Lily (1874) and Grant Allen's The Great Taboo (1890) in being the third to feature a shipwreck. Parker's takes place when the Antoine strikes an iceberg off the shore of Gaspé. Jean Jacques sees Carmen safely bestowed on a lifeboat, before giving up his spot to a crying fifteen-year-old boy. This he does, despite being not that strong a swimmer.

Fortunately, the Spanish Amazon is a strong swimmer. When her lifeboat overturns, she makes for a floating chair, and then uses that chair to save Jean Jacques from drowning.

James Cameron take note.

  

Jean Jacques and Carmen marry in the Gaspé, much to the disapproval of the gentle townspeople of St Saviour:

It was bad enough to marry the Spanische, but to marry outside one’s own parish, and so deprive that parish and its young people of the week’s gaiety, which a wedding and the consequent procession and tour through the parish brings, was little less than treason.

But what a story! The romance of it all is so great as to encourage the curious to travel as much as forty miles to catch a glimpse of the couple during Sunday mass. Carmen never corrects the presumption that she was saved by Jean Jacques and not the reverse. 

Jean Jacques Barbille is a man with "a good many irons in the fire." Given the opportunity, he'll sell you insurance and lightning rods. His inherited riches grow not by leaps and bounds, rather by unsteady steps as taken by a toddler.

He fancies himself first and foremost a philosophe. Though he never quite articulates his philosophy, Jean Jacques is quick to share that he spent a year at Université Laval. He carries with him a small volume titled Mediations on Philosophy, which he bought in Quebec before sailing for France.

Jean Jacques is an egotist and something of a dandy, all the while being a good man. He is kind, treats his workers well, forgives debts, and is generous toward the less fortunate. The man's greatest fault relates to the home. He is so taken with his reputation and many business concerns that Carmen feels neglected; this in turn results in the most interesting scenes I've read in an old novel this year...

And, you know, I've read twenty.

Carmen does not feature in the scene, though she does in the next, which is easily the second most interesting scene.

Reading The Money Master forty or so years after having first purchased a copy, I'm at a loss to explain how it is Gilbert Parker is so ignored.

Trivia: Adapted to the Hollywood screen in 1921 as A Wise Fool, the subject of the next week's post. 

Object: The first Canadian edition, it features seven illustrations by French artist André Castaigne, best known for having illustrated the first edition of Le Fantôme de l'Opéra. 'Tis a thing of beauty, purchased ten or so years ago in London, Ontario. Price: $2.50.

I'm also the proud owner of the Hutchinson's UK first edition, which I picked up in fin du millénaire Montreal for 30¢.

Sadly, it lacks its dust jacket (see below).

Access: The novel first appeared serialized in Hearst's Magazine (Aug 1913 - April 1914) and Nash's Magazine (Nov 1913 - Jul 1914).

As I write this, a Riverview, New Brunswick bookseller is offering a Very Good copy of the Copp Clark first edition at two dollars. There's no mention of a dust jacket, so I'm assuming that the bookseller believed it had none. Further west, a bookseller in Whitby, Ontario has a Canadian first with dust jacket!

The asking price is $100.

If you don't have the cash, consider the two dollar copy. It's a steal, particularly if you live nearby and can avoid shipping charges.

Before making your decision, consider Harper's American first with its unusual wrap-around jacket illustration, drawn from one of Castaigne's interior illustrations.

A bookseller in Portland, Oregon is offering this copy at US$35:

At the high end – US$350 – we have the Hutchinson UK first on offer from Babylon Revisited, a favourite bookseller. Must say that the cover illustration pales somewhat when compared to the work of Monsieur Castaigne.

Buyer beware, none of Castaigne's illustrations feature in the Hutchinson.

As always, print on demand copies are not to be considered.

Woodrow Wilson would agree.

Related post:

Acadian Driftwood
Of Cannibals and Christians
Gilbert Parker's Savage Novel
Behold the Translation of a Savage on Film!

Behold the Translation of a Savage on Film!

Being an addendum to the recent post on The Translation of a Savage by Gilbert Parker.

Hollywood has blessed us with twenty-three adaptations of Gilbert Parker stories. I've managed to see just one, but not for want of effort. This post concerns the three adaptations of The Translation of a Savage, Parker's 1893 bestselling novel. As I'm intent on getting through all three in one post, criticism and snide comments will be kept to a minimum.

Promise.

The Translation of a Savage

1913

A "short," but how short? Amongst lost silent films, Translation is so lost that even its run time is unknown. The Edison Films advert above from the May 1913 Moving Pictures World provides a glimpse of what we are missing. Do not be tempted by Newcombe's Necktie, it's The Translation of a Savage we're interested in here.

The description, "little savage" included, is in keeping with Parker's novel. The very same issue of  Moving Picture World issue provides this synopsis:

In Parker's novel, Greyhope, the Armour family home, is in Herefordshire, not Staffordshire; a minor, seemingly inexplicable change. Much more significant is the description of Lali as "the daughter of a primitive trapper" and not the offspring of an "Indian chief." The surviving credits include a character named "Henri - the Trapper," suggesting French Canadian or possibly Métis heritage. We may never know. What I do know is that in Parker's imaginings Lali never runs and hides in the hedges.

Oh, how I wish I could include an image of Lili "looking beautiful in the dress of a woman of to-day," but I've yet to find a single image related to this film.

Behold My Wife!

1920

A better title, would you not agree?

This second adaptation holds no ambiguity; Lali is an "Indian." Of all the material attached to the film, this lobby card is my favourite by far:

Here we see Lali, as portrayed by Mabel Julienne Scott. Are those foothills in the background? If so, they're far from the novel's "Hudson's Bay country" setting. I'll add that cacti aren't native to Manitoba, northern Ontario or  northern Quebec.

The most detailed description I've read is found within a Photoplay Magazine review (January 1921):

The "two-fisted surveying gang foreman" aside, everything fits with Parker's story.

What the reviewer picks out as the film's flaw is shared with the novel:

The only weakness the story reveals is in the lack of sufficient excuse for the English hero's determination to be revenged upon his family. He had little reason to believe they had conspired against him, which weakens his subsequent action and the effect of Lali's arrival in England.

I wonder what's going on here: 

Do you think that's meant to be a Navajo hogan? In Hudson Bay country?

Another lost film, alas. 

Behold My Wife!

1934

Not a lost film! In this final adaptation – I can't imagine that there will be another – the "Indian" wife is played by Sylvia Sidney, the New York-born blue-eyed daughter of Russian and Rumanian immigrants. I'm guessing I first saw her as Juno in Beetlejuice, though its just as likely that I caught Sidney in stray episodes of My Three Sons, Eight is Enough, Magnum, P.I., and WKRP in Cincinnati. Her final role was as Clia in the Malcolm McDowell fin de siecle reboot of Fantasy Island.

The 1934 Behold My Wife! owes so little to The Translation of a Savage that it is pretty much unrecognizable. In this telling, the story takes place entirely in the United States. Frank Armour is reimagined as Michael Carter (Gene Raymond), a sauced son of the East Coast leisure class. His family are overly concerned with appearance, and so conspire to break his engagement to perfectly nice stenographer Mary White (Ann Sheridan). She commits suicide, which is not the result they expected.

Michael is met with the awful news on what he'd thought would be his wedding day. Despite a hangover, he's sharp enough to recognize that his mother, father, and sister are to blame for the dive Mary took out of her apartment window. Michael sets off on a drunk driving tour of the United States, winding up in a New Mexico saloon, where he's shot – accidentally – by an Apache named Pete (Dean Jagger). Gentle beauty Tonita Storm Cloud, Pete's sister, removes the bullet, and gets off the best line: "My father sent me to school. I learned many things in college."

Somehow, Tonita falls in love with a man who is entirely unworthy. I've seen similar tragedies play out in real life.

If anything, Michael Carter is even more dislikable than Frank Armour. In Parker's novel, an inebriated Frank marries Lali upon learning that his fiancée has married another. In Behold My Wife!, alcoholic Michael – sober, for once – is much more calculating. He marries the woman who saved his life as a means of revenge over his fiancée's suicide. Like Frank, he insists that Lali wear "Indian" dress when meeting her new in-laws, then sinks several levels further in asking her to do the same for a formal soirée intended to introduce her to "society." Here Tonita appears in a Parisian evening gown proves charming, clever, and quite a wit, particularly when confronting prejudice. In short, she is a sensation. Michael is enraged, revealing his motivation in marrying her.

A remarkable scene, this is the film's climax. Others may disagree as there's still a murder to come.

Yes, murder.

As I say, this adaptation owes little to Parker's novel. It's a strange film, shifting abruptly between comedy, slapstick, pathos, and tragedy. The plot is absurd, but is held together by strong dialogue and Sylvia Sidney. I acknowledge my promise to keep criticism to a minimum, but her performance is so heartbreaking, when it is not comedic or endearing. Behold My Wife! and The Translation of a Savage have one important thing in common, that being that they are well-intentioned works with flaws flaws that become more evident with each passing decade.

Both Behold My Wife! (1934) and The Translation of a Savage are available – gratis – online.

I recommend them both.

For good or bad, they are part of our heritage.

Fun fact (personal): In the 1920 version, Lali's father, Chief Eye-of-the Moon, was played by Englishman Fred Huntley, who was born one hundred years to the day before yours truly!

Related post:

Gilbert Parker's Savage Novel