Along with Louise Brooks’ own book, Lulu in Hollywood, the one other book each and every fan of Louise Brooks must read is the 1989 biography of the actress by Barry Paris. It is outstanding, and deeply rewarding. It is thoroughly researched, beautifully written, and empathetic. This is Louise Brooks, warts and all. As New York magazine stated, this book is “not simply a summary of movie plots and love affairs but a serious work of film and social history.” Prepare to be immersed.
Louise Brooks, by Barry Paris, was first published in the United States in October 1989 by Alfred A. Knopf. It was quickly followed by a look-alike hardback edition published in the United Kingdom in January 1990 by Hamish Hamilton. A softcover edition was published in the United States by Anchor, also in late 1990. It’s front cover matched the front cover of the hardback, except for the addition of a quote from the Boston Globe, “Louise Brooks, with her sardonic riddling gaze, has become one of the icons of movie history.” In the U.K., the book was published in a similar looking softcover edition by Mandarin. It featured a quote from the Sunday Times, “Elegantly and engrossingly written.” The back of the U.K. softcover contains descriptive text along with the iconic David Levine caricature of the actress. (Notably, the U.K. edition was distributed to Australia, New Zealand, and elsewhere.) The Barry Paris biography was also published in Europe. The book was translated into French by Aline Weil and published by Presses Universitaires de France (PUF) in 1993. The next year, it was translated into Spanish by Aurora Echevarria and Claudio Lopez de Lamadrid and published by Circe Ediciones, which is based in Barcelona. Besides Spain, this Spanish-language edition is available in Central and South America.
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| Alfred A. Knopf United States, 1989 |
Presses Universitaires de France France, 1993 |
Circe Spain, 1994 |
University of Minnesota Press United States, 2000 |
Barry Paris first became interested in Louise Brooks while working with her brother, Theodore, on the Wichita Eagle. In 1969, Paris was hired as the newspaper’s film critic. Theodore, who covered oil and gas for the Kansas paper, challenged the young writer. According to a 1989 article in the Eagle, Theodore placed a photo of Brooks in front of the Paris and said, “If you call yourself a film critic, what do you know about silent film? What do you know about Louise Brooks?” Paris admitted he knew little about Brooks, adding “I had no idea it was his sister.” Because of his friendship with the Brooks family, Paris was given access to the actress’ letters, unpublished writings and diaries — one for nearly every year from 1921, when she was 14, until her death at age 78 in 1985. They had been preserved by her nephew, Dan Brooks. These letters, journals and unpublished manuscripts contained an enormous amount of information.
“The fact that she was from Wichita was not the attraction,” Paris noted in the 1989 article. “I knew Theodore and his family…. But I will never forget when he first showed me her picture. That amazing face! Those eyes under that Prince Valiant bob! I was fascinated. . . .” Paris never met Brooks in person, although he talked with her on the phone a number of times. “Theodore was so hard of hearing that I sometimes helped him with calls to her,” Paris remembered.
Theodore Brooks’ challenge of Paris in the early 1970’s led, eventually, to Paris being contracted to write a biography of the actress following her death in 1985. (In between, Kenneth Tynan published his famous profile of Brooks in the New Yorker, while other film historians and archivists, like James Card, spurred a renewed interest in the actress.) Good things take time, and it took Paris until 1989 to complete his 550 page manuscript, which grew and changed while he wrote it. One 1986 newspaper article referenced the book’s early working title, Every Little Breeze: The Life of Louise Brooks. A few years later, when advance copies were issued by Knopf in early 1989, the book’s title had changed to Louise Brooks: Her Life, Death, and Resurrection. Upon publication, the title was changed once again. This time it was shortened, simply, to Louise Brooks.
The Barry Paris biography of the actress was published in the Autumn of 1989. Its hallmark is the considerable amount of research that went into its writing, research anchored in the author’s access to Brooks’ unpublished manuscripts, letters, journals and notebooks. Besides its full telling of Brooks’ life — including the later years when she was living as a near recluse in Rochester, New York, the Barry Paris biography also contains an appendix noting the errata (errors) in Lulu in Hollywood, as well as a chronological bibliography of articles by Brooks, a filmography, numerous acknowledgements, a bibliography, notes, an index, and more — including more than 130 photographs and drawings. It is truly a geek’s scholar’s delight.
Paris’ book sold well, and was widely reviewed and widely praised. Film critic Leonard Maltin proclaimed the book the film biography of the year. He wasn’t alone. Writing in the Washington Post, John Simon stated, “Paris has researched and reported faithfully every aspect of Brooks’s life. The story he tells is fascinating not only for what it says about Brooks, but also for its generous sidelights on the whole jazz-and-flapper age.” The novelist Angela Carter also praised the book, as did the sci-fi & fantasy author Fritz Leiber, Jr. And so did the noted cultural critic Greil Marcus, who wrote, “Paris is superb, every detail opening onto another plane or almost subliminally doubling back to an incident charted a hundred pages earlier, the full weight of Brook’s exile coming home with increasing power, right to the end of her life. The second half of the book is riveting: complex, subtle, noisy, finally quiet. You don’t care that Paris can’t solve ‘the mystery.’ You care that a woman lived a life that made it.”
However, there were those who thought it all too much. Some asked why it was that a relatively minor actress (which Brooks was) deserved a major biography? Others used their reviews to point a finger at Brooks’ personal shortcomings, like her drinking. If you’re interested, the LBS website contains an annotated bibliography of the book’s many positive and few negative reviews. Some of these reviews are linked, and may be read online. This biography bibliography may be found HERE.
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| The front of the 6″ x 9″ promotional card. | The reverse of the 6″ x 9″ promotional card. | An uncorrected proof of the book. |
Pictured above is a rare promotional mailer issued by Alfred A. Knopf around the time the Barry Paris book was first published. It was gifted to the LBS by Barry Paris at the time I first met the author, in May, 1998. I was then living in San Francisco, and Paris came to town on assignment for Vanity Fair magazine. He telephoned, and insisted that we meet for dinner at a place of my choosing. Naturally, I choose what was then one of the hottest restaurants in town, Restaurant LuLu. I kid thee not. We both came away with treasured LuLu caps, courtesy of the management, caps made all the more special when LuLu closed a few years back. (I do miss their garlic mashed potatoes.)
The second time we met was in the year 2000. The Barry Paris biography of Louise Brooks had remained in print for nearly a decade. (This was long before eBooks kept everything in print for ever.) However, sometime in 1998 or 1999, it and Louise Brooks’ own book, Lulu in Hollywood, fell out of print. In response, the Louise Brooks Society started a grass roots campaign to bring both titles back into circulation. The LBS created and hosted an online petition which was signed by hundreds of fans. The LBS also reached out to just about anybody it could at the book’s publisher, Knopf / Random House, including editors, publicists, and sales reps — all in an effort to convince someone / anyone to reissue the book. The LBS campaign eventually succeeded when the rights to the biography were acquired by the University of Minnesota Press, which was developing a strong line of works on film history.
Louise Brooks was reissued by the University of Minnesota in the fall of 2000. The book’s copyright page contains a statement, “The University of Minnesota Press gratefully acknowledges the assistance of Thomas Gladysz, director of the Louise Brooks Society in the publication of this book. The society website can be found at www.pandorasbox.com.” In November of that year, as an extraordinary thank you for these efforts, the press sent Barry Paris to San Francisco for a special event to mark the republication of the book. That event was held on Brooks’ birthday, November 14th, at the Booksmith, a bookstore where I then worked. An appreciative crowd turned out, including a few of Brooks’ Bay Area relations, and we sold a good number of books. (Click HERE to read archived notes on the Booksmith event.) It was a memorable happening, and once again Paris’ outstanding book was making its way into the world with a whole new look. Like Lulu in Hollywood, it has remained in print since.
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| A scan of the author trading card created for the event. | A snapshot of Barry Paris (left) and LBS Director Thomas Gladysz. | My copy of the bio, which Paris signed “For Thomas – who resurrected me & LB the way Tynan did in The New Yorker!” | The limited edition broadside created for the Barry Paris talk & book signing. |
Despite its critics and a small handful of negative reviews, the Barry Paris biography has had a long and remarkable shelf life. The book has drawn many readers and fans, such as Julia Roberts, who at one time owned the film rights to the book. The Barry Paris biography is still being read and talked about today. In 2004, years after it was first published, the English actress told the that she was reading the book. And so did the Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Donna Tartt (The Secret History, The Goldfinch), who told the New York Times that she was reading the book in 2013. The year before, in 2012, Downton Abbey screenwriter Julian Fellowes told the London Observer, “I suspect the book that has haunted me the most this year was the life of that queen of the silent screen, Louise Brooks: A Biography (University of Minnesota), by Barry Paris. I have seldom read so lyrical a tale of self-destruction. When she was a girl, my mother used to be mistaken for Louise Brooks and so I have always felt a sort of investment in her, but I was unprepared for this heartbreaking tale of what-might-have-been.”
I read a lot of biographies. It is my favorite genre. The Barry Paris biography is the best biography I have read, or will likely ever read. It has had a profound impact on my life — admittedly, that may sound strange to some. It has also had a profound influence on this website — that should be obvious to anyone who reads the book. The Barry Paris biography is the Bible of Louise Brooks fandom. Strangely, there are a few fans out there who dish this extraordinary book — even though most everything they might know about the actress comes from it.
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Barry Paris (born February 6, 1948) is an author and journalist based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was the editor-publisher of the Prairie Journal in Wichita, Kansas from 1972–1974; feature editor of The Miami Herald from 1979–1980, and critic/reporter at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from 1980–1986 and 1997–2020. His articles have appeared in the New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Washington Post, Art and Antiques, and elsewhere. Besides his biography of Louise Brooks, Paris co-authored Tony Curtis: The Autobiography (1993), and authored highly regarded biographies of Greta Garbo (1995) and Audrey Hepburn (1996). He wrote Song of Haiti (2000), the story of Larry and Gwen Mellon and their hospital in Haiti. Paris has also contributed to various books, and edited and wrote the preface to Stella Adler on Ibsen, Strindberg, and Chekhov (1999) and
Before his biography of Louise Brooks was published, and after, Barry Paris wrote a handful of articles about the actress, each of which make for interesting reading. Here is a checklist of the most significant pieces. I’ve linked to whatever I could. The piece not linked to may be accessible online through your local library. Besides his book and these articles on the actress, Paris scripted the Emmy-nominated documentary Louise Brooks: Looking for Lulu (1998). Like his biography, it is must viewing.
Paris, Barry. “Lost Girl shows Louise Brooks at zenith.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 20, 1984. *
Paris, Barry. “Natural actress remembered as artist.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, August 14, 1985. *
Paris, Barry. “Saturday Diary.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 16, 1985. *
Paris, Barry. “Lulu in Rochester.” American Film, September 1986. *
Paris, Barry. “Sincerely, Louise.” Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, November 19, 1986. *
— click here to read part one, and here to read part two
Paris, Barry. “Lulu and the Laundry Baron.” Washington Post, October 15, 1989.
Paris, Barry. “Our Wild Miss Brooks.” American Film, November 1989. *
— a 6-page illustrated article
Paris, Barry. “Lulu in silence. (Coda).” Opera News, April 2002. *
Paris, Barry. “Brooks Brought the Whole Package to Pandora’s Box.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 2, 2006. *
— click here to read part one, and here to read part two
Paris, Barry. “Silent classic Beggars of Life to be screened.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 9, 2013. *
Paris, Barry. “Can You Ever Forgive Me? rights an old literary wrong.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 9, 2018. *