Jerry - Jean Webster

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Résumé :
Wow. This is the funnest book ever! Ups, downs, and complete turn-arounds! This book is plot-twisty and a lot of fun to read. A LOT of fun to read. (Reviewer) About the author: Jean Webster, original name Alice Jane Chandler Webster, (born July 24, 1876, Fredonia, N.Y., U.S.-died June 11, 1916, New York, N.Y.), American writer who is best remembered for her fiction best-seller Daddy-Long-Legs, which was also successful in stage and motion picture adaptations. Webster adopted the name Jean while attending the Lady Jane Grey School in Binghamton, New York. In 1901 she graduated from Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, where she was a classmate and close friend of the poet Adelaide Crapsey. Webster, who was a grandniece of Mark Twain, showed an early interest in writing. While in college she contributed a weekly column to the Poughkeepsie Sunday Courier and at the same time started writing the stories that were collected in her first book, When Patty Went to College (1903). Webster soon followed with The Wheat Princess (1905) and Jerry, Junior (1907), both inspired by her extended visit to Italy; The Four Pools Mystery (1908), published anonymously; Much Ado About Peter (1909); Just Patty (1911), more stories about her first character, who was perhaps modeled on Crapsey; and Daddy-Long-Legs (1912), her most popular work. Daddy-Long-Legs, first serialized in the Ladies' Home Journal, became a best-seller when published in book form. It was a successful stage play (1914) in Webster's own adaptation, and a popular Mary Pickford silent film (1919). Daddy-Long-Legs was not only a successful piece of fiction but also a stimulus to reform the institutional treatment of orphans. In 1914 Webster published Dear Enemy, a sequel to Daddy-Long-Legs and also a best-seller. (britannica.com)

Biographie:
Alice Jane Chandler Webster (July 24, 1876-June 11, 1916), an American author whose works include Daddy-Long-Legs and Dear Enemy, used the pen name, Jean Webster. Her most well-known works include young female protagonists who are engaging and likable and who mature intellectually, ethically, and socially. Her books also contain just the right amount of humor, snappy dialogue, and subtly cutting social criticism to appeal to modern readers. The birthplace of Alice Jane Chandler Webster is Fredonia, New York. She was the oldest child born to Charles Luther Webster and Annie Moffet Webster. With her great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother all sharing a home, she spent her early years in a strongly matriarchal and activist environment. Her great-grandmother advocated for temperance, and her grandmother for women's suffrage and racial equality. Mark Twain's mother was his niece, and Alice's father was the business manager of the 1884-founded Charles L. Webster & Company, which later published many of Mark Twain's works. The company started out well, and when Alice was five, the family moved to a sizable brownstone in New York, along with a vacation home on Long Island. However, the publishing house encountered problems, and things with Mark Twain got worse and worse....