“Turn. Magic Wheel.”Most turn of the century novel fanatics have never heard of the author Dawn Powell. In fact, most people during her time hadn’t heard of her. Powell is a writer who far exceeded the typical literature of her time. Her writing style is very modern and uses more than one point of view in order to add complexity and depth to the story. Most of her work was not truly discovered for its value until long after she had passed away in the sixties which is a shame because, in my personal opinion, she should have been endlessly praised for her writing. In Turn, Magic Wheel, first published in 1936, Powell tells a story of gossip, lost love and the bloody world of publishing in New York. We are introduced to an aspiring young writer, Dennis Orphen, on the verge of publishing a groundbreaking novel about the life of his best friend, Effie Callingham, who is wife to a notorious author. As the story continues, Effie’s failed marriage is depicted in detail and the memories of her husband grow so strong, they cause him to be an active character despite his absence. Orphen and Effie fight the ruthless New York social scene together as Orphen starts to realize the ethical repercussions from authoring a tell-all Book about his closest friend. At the back of my copy, there was even discussion questions that questioned whether he was ethically correct in publishing this story which I thought was a really interesting aspect to consider. It reminds me of the humanity behind all gossip publishing and whether or not publicly profiting off the stories of another person’s life is morally sound. How is it that our society is so fascinated with the lives of the rich and famous, even to a point of where a person’s life can become totally destroyed from the private information that is spread. In the case of Orphen’s book, it actually ends up benefiting Effie that people now know the secret of her husband leaving her because she comes to realize that it was never really a secret at all. At first, however, the readers feel sorry for the old little Effie because here is her personal heartbreak written and sold for profit. While reading this, I found myself to be making comparisons between the society of the 1930’s and today’s society and it seems that there isn’t much of a difference. We read books like this and judge the characters for being money hungry and thirsty for the lives of the upper class, however, we still do the same thing today. Look at our television with shows such as Keeping Up with the Kardashians or even just the Entertainment News channel in general. Our society is fascinated with the lives of those in the upper classes. This seems to be a concept ingrained into human nature now because if we look back a couple hundred years, the lower classes were always interested in the lives of the wealthy. Why is this? Because we all want what we can’t have. Powell’s book draws on this notion beautifully with Orphen because he is determined to posses the name of a famous author as well as desperate to keep the love of a married woman. Both of these are something that is out of reach to Orphen which makes him only more insane in trying to gain them. One of the aspects of Powell’s writing is that she is able to look right into the core of human flaws and make them seem fabulous. With the character of Effie, the readers are exposed to her most embarrassing flaws as we learn about her fifteen year separation from and possible obsession with her husband, and yet it seems that by the end of the novel Effie becomes a role model character. These types of dark and distinctly human qualities become paired with the glitz of the times and emotional sympathy which makes readers fall in love with Powell’s characters. 

The subject of Powell’s work is quite interesting in itself, though. During her life, her work was never really recognized for its worth. Her novels were published and reviewed along with the thousands of others that were bombarding the shelves which caused it to fall through the cracks of recognition. It has been only in our recent decade that Powell’s work is being rediscovered through the determination of Columbia grad, Tim Page. His belief in her work has pushed him to purchase all of her discovered diaries and post them on the internet. Originally, his intention was to sell them at auction but he quickly found that there were no interested parties. So, there begins the journey once again of getting the literary universe to recognize the genius of Dawn Powell. Currently, her books are only published through Zoland Books which is a small imprint company of Steerforth Press. This limits the audience to which Powell’s books are encountered by however, it is still a push in the right direction to have her work reissued at all. In my opinion from just reading one of her novels, I find Powell to be a great literary giant that history has allowed to slip through its fingers. Hopefully, though, not for much longer.

 Current Music: Murder in the City- The Avett Brothers.