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Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (novel)Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: The Intimate Diary of a Professional Lady (1925) is a comic novel written by American author Anita Loos. The story primarily follows the escapades and dalliances of a young blonde flapper in New York City and Europe. It is one of several novels exploring the hedonistic Jazz Age published that year that have become famous—including F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and Carl Van Vechten's Firecrackers.
Originally published as a series of short sketches known as "the Lorelei stories" in Harper's Bazaar magazine, the work was published in book form by Boni & Liveright in 1925. Although dismissed by critics as "too light in texture to be very enduring," Loos' book was a runaway best seller, becoming the second-best selling title of 1926, and printed throughout the world in over thirteen different languages, including Chinese. By the time of Loos' death in 1981, the work had been printed in over 85 editions and had been adapted into a popular comic strip, a 1926 silent comedy, a 1949 Broadway musical, and a 1953 film adaptation of the latter musical. The book earned the praise of many writers including Edith Wharton who dubbed it "the great American novel."
Loos wrote a well-received sequel, But Gentlemen Marry Brunettes, in 1927. Several decades later, Loos was asked during a television interview in London whether she intended to write a third book. She facetiously replied that the title and theme of a third book would be Gentlemen Prefer Gentlemen. This remark resulted in the interview's abrupt termination.
Plot
A kiss on the hand may make you feel very nice, but a diamond and sapphire bracelet lasts forever.
A blonde flapper named Lorelei narrates the novel in the form of a diary, complete with spelling and grammatical errors. Born in Little Rock, Arkansas,
Lorelei has been working in Hollywood movies where she meets Gus Eisman, a Chicago businessman whom she calls "Daddy." He installs her in a New York City apartment, visiting her whenever he is in town and spending a small fortune "educating" her. He pays for gowns from Madame Frances, jewelry from Cartier, dinners at the Ritz, and tickets to the Ziegfeld Follies. During this time, she continues seeing other men. She meets a married English novelist named Gerry Lamson, who frowns upon her liaison with Eisman. Lamson wishes to "save" her from Eisman and begs her to marry him. Not wishing to forgo an upcoming trip to Europe paid for by Eisman, Lorelei spurns Lamson and insists his highbrow discourses bore her. Meanwhile, Lorelei is dismayed that her friend Dorothy Shaw wastes her time with a struggling littérateur named Mencken, who writes for a dull magazine when she could be spending time with the wealthy Edward Goldmark, a film producer.
Lorelei and Dorothy set sail for Europe on the RMS Majestic. Lorelei is distressed when she learns that Bartlett, a former district attorney who is now a U.S. Senator, is also aboard the ship. She tells a sympathetic Englishman about how she met Bartlett. She recounts a dubious backstory in which a lawyer once employed her as a stenographer, and she shot him to defend her virtue. During the trial, which Bartlett prosecuted, Lorelei gave such "compelling" testimony that the all-male jury acquitted her. The skeptical judge bought her a ticket to Hollywood so that she could use her acting talents to become a star. The judge also nicknamed her "Lorelei" due to her siren-like personality. Conspiring with the Englishman, Lorelei exacts her revenge upon Bartlett by seducing him and revealing confidential information about his senatorial activities.
Dorothy and Lorelei arrive in England where they are unimpressed with the Tower of London as it is smaller than "the Hickox building in Little Rock." They are invited to a soirée where English aristocrats are selling counterfeit jewels to naive tourists. Lorelei encounters an elderly matron who is selling a diamond tiara. Lorelei casts her eye around the room for a wealthy man to buy it for her and settles on Sir Francis Beekman, whom she calls "Piggie." With flattery and the promise of discretion due to his matrimonial status, she persuades him to buy the tiara.
Interior illustration by Ralph Barton.
In Paris, the duo are more excited by jewelry shops than by the "Eyeful Tower." Meanwhile, Beekman's wife confronts Lorelei in Paris and threatens to ruin her reputation if she does not return the tiara. Dorothy intercedes on Lorelei's behalf and notes that Lady Beekman's threats are hollow since Lorelei has no reputation to destroy. The next morning, the flappers are confronted in their hotel suite by a French lawyer and his son acting on behalf of Lady Beekman. Impressed by the women's beauty, the French father and son dine with the flappers and charge all expenses to Lady Beekman. Lorelei has a replica made of the tiara and—by playing the father and son against each other—she keeps the real tiara and sends them away with the fake one.
Eisman arrives in Paris and, after shopping trips with Lorelei, he departs for Vienna. He puts Lorelei and Dorothy on the Orient Express where she encounters Henry Spoffard, a staunch Presbyterian, prohibitionist, and moral reformer who delights in censoring movies. To gain his trust, Lorelei pretends that she is a reformer too and claims that she is trying to save Dorothy from her sinful lifestyle. At this point, Lorelei is two-timing both Eisman and Spoffard.
In Vienna, Spoffard is concerned about Lorelei's mental health and insists she meet a "Dr. Froyd." Freud fails to psycho-analyze her because she has never repressed her inhibitions. Later, Lorelei and Dorothy dine at the Demel Restaurant where they overhear Spoffard's mother being warned about Lorelei's reputation. Fearing her past will be revealed to Spoffard, Lorelei intercepts him and retells her past in a sympathetic light. Spoffard weeps at the moral outrages which Lorelei has supposedly endured and likens her to Mary Magdalene. Meeting his mother, Lorelei claims to be a Christian Scientist and that drinking champagne is encouraged by her religion. They become inebriated together, and Spoffard's mother decides that Christian Science is a more preferable religion than Presbyterianism. Lorelei gives her a cloche hat but, since Spoffard's mother has an Edwardian hairstyle, Lorelei bobs the woman's hair for the hat to fit. Their meeting is a success. Soon after, Spoffard proposes marriage to Lorelei by letter. Unlikely to marry him, Lorelei plots to use this letter as future evidence of breach of promise and thus obtain a financial settlement from Spoffard's family.
When she returns to New York City, Spoffard gives his college ring to her as an engagement present. Vexed by this inexpensive gift, Lorelei nonetheless lies that the ring pleases her. Bored in New York, Lorelei plans a debutante ball. She invites members of high society but also invites a gaggle of Follies chorus girls and a number of bootleggers with ties to organized crime. The riotous ball lasts three days until the police raid the party and arrest the guests. Disaster is forestalled when Dorothy wins over a sympathetic judge.
Tiring of Spoffard, Lorelei plots to end her engagement by embarking upon a shopping spree and charging it all to Spoffard. Helping to nudge Spoffard towards breach of promise, Dorothy reveals Lorelei's purchases to Spoffard and informs him that she is pathologically extravagant. Meanwhile, Lorelei meets Gilbertson Montrose, a movie scenario writer to whom she is attracted. Montrose advises her that it would be wiser to marry Spoffard so that he could finance Montrose's new movie and so that she could star in the lead role. Lorelei decides she will marry Spoffard while pursuing a clandestine liaison with Montrose. She rushes to Penn Station and finds Spoffard. She claims her extravagance was faked to test Spoffard's love. Remorseful, Spoffard vows to marry her and to finance Montrose's film.
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