Butterfield 8 - John O'Hara

 

John O'Hara's Butterfield 8 might be a Depression Era novel, but it's not what most readers expect from a novel set in that period. Rather than focusing on the hopelessness of job loss, forced migration, starving families, etc. that so many other novels feature, O'Hara chose to see the Great Depression through the eyes a segment of society so wealthy that life went on for them and their friends largely as it  had before the Depression- despite the pain and suffering all around them. 

The book's main character is Gloria Wandrous, a jaded young woman who is determined to squeeze the most pleasure possible out of every day that she lives. Her face is so well known on the New York City speakeasy circuit by now that she has easy access to the booze inside them and to the rich men who frequent them. If she were honest with herself, Gloria would admit that these men see her as little more than a high-priced call girl, but Gloria Wandrous is seldom so honest with herself. Instead, she considers herself to be more of a consumer than a victim in the relationships she has with the men she meets around town. 

And why not? 

When we first meet Gloria, she is alone in a strange man's apartment after having spent the night with him there while his family is out of the city. After she realizes that her evening dress has been ripped beyond repair in the man's enthusiasm of the previous evening, and that she has nothing else to wear home, Gloria sees that he left her an apologetic note along with sixty dollars to buy a replacement dress (the equivalent of over $1,200 in 2024). That's all fine, but Gloria still has nothing to wear on her way home so she casually covers herself in a $5,000 mink coat belonging to the man's wife before leaving the apartment (the equivalent of  about $103,000 today). It's easy to see why Gloria sees herself as the "consumer" in the transaction.

That's the world Gloria and her lover, Weston Liggett, live in - and they are surrounded by people just like them. Sure, everyone knows someone who has been ruined by the Depression, and they all know the stories about those among them who have decided to take their own lives as a result. But for them, personally, a little belt-tightening is about all that's been required. The more callous among them have even benefitted from buying up the assets of former friends and associates for pennies on the dollar.

But Gloria, by the simple act of stealing one very valuable fur coat, may have just opened a can of worms with the potential to change all of that for her and those closest to her - friend and foe, alike. 

Butterfield 8 is an eyes-wide-open look at wealthy New Yorkers of the day. It strikes me as being every bit as bleak and despairing in its own way as novels that focus on the plight of working class families of the same time period. With one or two exceptions, there's just not a lot to like or respect about Gloria and her hedonistic friends. She might begin as more sympathetic a character than not, but will soon enough reveal her true nature in a racist rant directed at her mother's Black maid. Is Liggett the victim of an undeserved theft, or just a despicable man who deserves exactly what he gets? 

O'Hara's novel had to be much more shocking when published in 1935 than it is today. In it, O'Hara frankly addresses things like lesbianism, abortion, venereal disease, bodily functions, incest, rape, and blatant racism. He refuses to pull his punches. But reading it almost ninety years after its publication through more jaded eyes lessens its impact, and makes it near impossible to be much surprised by anything in it. In one sense, Butterfield 8 has morphed into well written historical fiction, and that's why it still has plenty to say today.