Meryle Secrest - Shoot the Widow: Adventures of a Biographer in Search of Her Subject

ALSO BY MERYLE SECREST

Between Me and Life: A Biography of Romaine Brooks

Being Bernard Berenson

Kenneth Clark: A Biography

Salvador Dal

Frank Lloyd Wright

Leonard Bernstein: A Life

Stephen Sondheim: A Life

Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers

Duveen: A Life in Art

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

Copyright 2007 by Meryle Secrest Beveridge

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. www.aaknopf.com

Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Secrest, Meryle.
Shoot the widow : adventures of a biographer in search of her subject / Meryle Secrest.
1st ed.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-307-49786-4
1. Secrest, Meryle. 2. BiographersUnited StatesBiography. 3. Women biographersUnited StatesBiography. 4. Washington (D.C.)Biography. 5. Bath (England)Biography. I. Title.
CT 275. S 4268 A 3 2007
920.72dc22

[B] 2006048868

v3.1

For my husband,

who taught me to find the fun in sometimes unfunny situations,

and for

Uncle Reggie, Reginald Doman, who knew that already

The first rule of biography: shoot the widow.

Justin Kaplan

Illustrations are courtesy of the author unless otherwise credited.

Kenneth Clark in Civilisation

Jane Clark

Saltwood

Olive Doman

The Circus, Bath. Watercolor by A. Woodroffe, c. 1820

Milsom Street, Bath, in Jane Austens Day. Watercolor by A. Woodroffe, c. 1820 (authors archive)

Royal and Lansdown Crescents. Plate, A. Watts (authors archive)

Kenneth Clark, 1979

Kenneth Clark as patron of young artists

Kenneth Clark and Queen Elizabeth in wartime

Kenneth Clark with second Lady Clark

Kenneth Clark with first Lady Clark

Alan Clark, wife Jane, and Kenneth Clark at the Garden House

Len Linley

Kenneth Clarks grave

Berenson in midlife (i Tatti)

I Tatti, 1901 (authors archive)

Schoolgirl

City of Bath Girls School

Student body

Duveens expert (i Tatti)

Author and mother on the Aquitania

Father, Albert Doman

Author and Canadian boyfriend

Bernard Berenson with Nicky Mariano (i Tatti)

Bernard Berenson in old age (Derek Hill)

Ronald W. J. Cocking and John Diefenbaker

Author at work

The glory days of Hamilton

Salvador Dal (Photofest)

Salvador and Gala at Cadaqus (Photofest)

Romaine Brooks on Capri

The young Romaine

Heir to a fortune

John Ellingham Brooks

Matthew and Judith Huxley

Roland

The lost painting (John Fothergill)

Romaine and Gabriele dAnnunzio

Dining room at 20, rue Jacob

Frank Lloyd Wright in the prime of life (authors archive)

Olgivanna with Frank Lloyd Wright (authors archive)

Unity Chapel

View of Taliesin

Frank Lloyd Wright and apprentices (authors archive)

Leonard Bernstein (authors archive)

Stephen Sondheim (Photofest)

Herbert Sondheim (authors archive)

One of Herbert Sondheims creations (authors archive)

Sondheim and Bernstein (Library of Congress)

Lee Remick (authors archive)

Richard Rodgers (Photofest)

Mary Rodgers with father (Photofest)

Dick and Dorothy Rodgers (Photofest)

Rowlandsons Comforts of Bath, 1798 (authors archive)

Lansdown Place East after the bombing of Bath, 1942

Before I became a biographer I used to write interviews for the Washington Post and one day I was sent along to interview Kenneth Clark. The British art historian, who was also a celebrated lecturer, author, university professor, gallery director, patron, collector, social lion and courtier, was at the height of his fame as star of the television series Civilisation. A wide international audience had, as it were, fallen in love with him. Roses were practically being thrown at his feet and further accolades would follow his disarming, self-revelatory memoir, Another Part of the Wood.

I found him in Georgetown at the home of the founding director of the National Gallery of Art. David Finley was, by then, a small, shrunken and noncommittal figure who, I would belatedly discover, had locked away forever secrets of the art world acquired during a lifetime of firsthand observation. It was 1969. Clark entered the room as if he had stepped out of a picture frame, looking exactly right. He was in his sixties and still handsome, with even features, a beautifully shaped head and an expansive brow. The amiably goofy Bertie Wooster, hero of P. G. Wodehouses comedies, who employs the frighteningly erudite Jeeves, was wont to explain that his butlers brainpower came from eating fish and the way his head stuck out at the back. As I recall, Kenneth Clark preferred lamb or roast beef and Yorkshire pudding to fish, and the only thing that ever stuck out at the back was his hair. For me, the essence of penetrating intelligence is exemplified by the forehead, and his was as serene and sweeping as any I had seen. I took particular note of what the British would call his keen gaze, so full of energy and expression, and the way he caressed one of his hosts delicate alabaster objets. There was something curiously familiar about him. But the fact that I had just viewed all thirteen episodes of Civilisation must explain why I seemed able to predict his movements, gestures and shades of expression.

Roses thrown at his feet: Kenneth Clark in Civilisation ()

Before Clark became a television performer and national icon, as David Cannadine called him, he had been Keeper of Fine Art at the Ashmolean, director of Londons National Gallery, Slade Professor of Fine Art at Oxford, chairman of the Arts Council and Independent Television Authority, as well as the author of books on art and artists, including works on Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, Piero della Francesca, and The Nude. He talked freely and fluently and, after I sent him the article, wrote to thank me. This seemed to call for a magazine piece. I persuaded Smithsonian magazine to let me interview him again, which wasnt too difficult. The following summer I flew to England to visit the Clarks in their castle outside Hythe in Kent.

It was a Saturday morning, and Lord Clark met me at the station. Lady ClarkJanewas having her hair done. We would pick her up and then go to Saltwood Castle for lunch. I had dressed for the occasion in my latest affectation, what James Laver would have called a Robin Hood outfit, complete with tunic and matching pants. My host met me in Scottish tweeds, a green velour hat and matching suede shoes. (Jeeves would have taken a very dim view of the shoes.) I could not have looked any more out of place if I had been carrying a bow and arrow, but Lord Clark, his manners as always faultless, rose above it.