Olive Higgins Prouty – författare

Stella Dallas a pretty working class girl decides she wants more out of life than drudgery and work. She sets her sights on marry rich and she manages it. But she soon finds that marrying a rich man and keeping him are not the same things. Course and vulgar by upper class standards she is unable to bridge the cultural divide that separates them. When Stella and her husband inevitably divorce she shifts her ambitions to her daughter. But can she be any more successful at helping her daughter fit into that world than she was herself?

Stella Dallas has captivated audiences since it first appeared. It has been successfully adapted three times for the screen and once as a radio play and is credited with creating the modern soap opera. Barbara Stanwyck garnered an Oscar nomination for playing the title role.

First published in 1913, Bobby: General Manager is a domestic novel by Olive Higgins Prouty examining responsibility, family life, and the quiet authority of character.

Set within the rhythms of early twentieth-century American society, the novel centers on Bobby, whose role within the family extends far beyond the informal title she bears. Through subtle shifts in circumstance and expectation, Prouty explores how leadership often emerges not from position but from temperament. The narrative traces the pressures placed upon women in a changing social landscape, illuminating the balance between personal aspiration and familial duty.

Written before Prouty achieved wider recognition for later works such as Stella Dallas, this early novel reflects her enduring interest in emotional resilience and social expectation. Bobby: General Manager offers readers a thoughtful portrait of domestic authority and the understated strength required to sustain it. This Wilder Publications edition restores the text in a clear and carefully prepared modern format.

From the author of Now Voyager and Stella Dallas! Bobbie: General Manager is a perfectly enjoyable glimpse into the life of an upper middle-class teen age girl whose family has begun to struggle during the Gilded Age. At once funny, honest, and very well written.