Rhapsody

January 1, 2021
Kaplan's sweeping novel, spanning the years 1917 to 1937, portrays the life of Kay Swift, one of Broadway's first female composers, extracting her from the shadow of her colleague and lover, George Gershwin. Katharine Swift, who is renamed "Kay" by Gershwin, marries Jimmy Warburg for love, but the money doesn't hurt since he's the scion of a family of prominent Jewish financiers. The marriage is happy at first but, over time, gently implodes--mostly due to each partner's tolerance of the other's infidelity. Kay, a gifted classical pianist and conservatory star who met her husband while performing at his father's country estate, misses her professional career. But when she compares her labored compositions with those of her soon-to-be lover, Gershwin, she fears her music is just (George's term) "machinery." Eventually, she will achieve a degree of lasting renown--primarily as the tunesmith of the standards "Can't We Be Friends," and "Fine and Dandy." Abetted by its often omniscient narration and long passages of historical context, the novel seems intent on hewing as closely to nonfiction as possible. The history is engrossing, particularly to students of early Broadway--there's name-dropping aplenty in this and other cultural and political arenas. Gershwin seems to be friends with simply everyone who is anyone in the arts: Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, Langston Hughes, "Dick" Rodgers and "Larry" Hart, Fred and Adele Astaire to name only a few. The Warburgs' Upper East Side dinner parties also attract luminaries--"Dottie" Parker always has quips to offer Kay about men. Although Kaplan's propulsive style imparts a momentum of its own, narrative tension is all but absent--the Warburg marriage is not exactly a hell demanding escape, and Gershwin is not exactly a port in a storm. The many disquisitions, on topics as varied as the underpinnings of American anti-Semitism to the misappropriation of Black culture by well-intentioned Whites, are interesting and important, but they do interrupt the novel's flow. The characters' star turns are upstaged by the vastness of the set.

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March 1, 2021
1920s housewife Katherine Warbug, n�e Swift, had a wealthy, philandering husband, three beautiful daughters, and an aching desire to create provoking music. An encounter with George Gershwin alters the course of her life, propelling her on an intimate odyssey from domesticity to becoming renowned composer Kay Swift. Kaplan delicately stitches together the notes of Gershwin and Swift's nontraditional love song with the constant, glamorous hum of the Roaring Twenties playing in the background. Snappy dialogue and lush prose bring the Jazz Age to life as Kaplan takes readers from Harlem rent parties to the stage lights of Broadway. Many famous names play bit parts along the way, among them Langston Hughes, Duke Ellington, Dorothy Parker, and Fred and Adele Astaire. Kaplan also uses the historical setting and characters to briefly explore conversations about topics that remain relevant today, particularly antisemitism and the appropriation of Black culture by white people for artistic gain. A sumptuous fictional account of a complex real-life romance, this book will stick in readers' heads like the melody of a favorite ballad.

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