Pretty Tales for Tired People

by Martha Gellhorn

Three long short stories, much in the manner of Two By Two, and the title suggests just the right tone of facile sophistication with a talon they achieve. All three deal with middle-aged love and marriage, and love out of marriage, and marriage without love. A Promising Career of a benedict headmaster is foreshortened by an adulterous affair which, as it cools, is formally legalized, rapidly dissolved; he drinks, she bolts.... The Clever One who knew the ""exact price of success"" is Theodore As (c) her whose quick changes of countries and wives pay off well until he meets a woman who not only robs him blind but destroys him. The Rise and Fall of Mrs. Hapgood concerns the menopausal metamorphosis of a woman of fifty discarding her ""fatal niceness."" All provide a kind of temporal, feminine entertainment-- sort of like costume jewelry, fashionable and not really valuable.

Hardcover

First published March 11, 1965

About the author

Martha Ellis Gellhorn (1908-1998) was an American novelist, travel writer and journalist. She is considered to be one of the greatest war correspondents of the 20th century. The Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism is named after her.

Reviews

[Helen Noah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Outdated in an unpleasant way.
The insensivity of the 1960's and earlier times is striking in this collection of 3 short stories.
Be it gender issues, racial or antisemitic issues, the unreflected unconscious application of norms and values really is tiresome - if nothing else. There is nothing pretty about the accounts of stiff stereotype people believing themselves to be at the top of their game.
As an antropological testimony, the writing may be valid. One can only feel glad that yes, the times they are a'changing. There are new challenges to be faced and lived through, of course. But for heaven's sake wake up people and question just about everything you put value on.