Little Gloria… Happy at Last, Signed to Truman Capote
[Signed to Truman Capote] Goldsmith, Barbara. Little Gloria… Happy at Last. First Edition. 1980. Book and dust jacket are both in very good condition—the signature page shows discoloration. Book is signed in purple felt tip marker, “To Truman—Best wishes, Barbara Goldsmith.” Laid in is a slip indicating that this was part of lot 1054 in the “The Private World of Truman Capote” sale organized by Bonhams in 2006.
The Little Gloria referred to in this title is the woman we now remember as just plain Gloria—Gloria Vanderbilt, one of the most famous women of her era and the mother of CNN anchorman Anderson Cooper. The Big Gloria of the story was Gloria’s mother, Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt, who, with her identical twin Lady Thelma Furness, were among the most glamorous and fast-living members of 1920s-era café society. Big Gloria married a Vanderbilt heir, an older man who had dissipated both his health and fortune, making her a penniless "wealthy" widow, dependent on Little Gloria's large trust fund to keep her in caviar and champagne. Twin sister Thelma was in the U.K., married to an English lord but carrying on an affair with the Duke of Windsor (then styled as the Prince of Wales), soon to be broken up by her good friend Wallis Spencer. The twin sisters’ stories converge in a much-publicized custody battle for Little Gloria, with Gloria and Thelma on one side and Little Gloria’s aunt, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, on the other, all covered in fascinating detail in this book by the well-regarded Barbara Goldsmith. This is an interesting association copy. Gloria Vanderbilt and Truman Capote were longtime friends but had a terrible falling out after he wrote about her dismissively in “La Côte Basque, 1965.”
“And there were signs that this child who had been unwillingly dragged into the spotlight of celebrity had, while hating it, had begun to crave the drug of fame. Her mother told reporters that her daughter had become enamored of the publicity attendant upon her every action. When she was taken to shop in the village, little Gloria pointed at the crowd that had gathered and exclaimed, ‘Look mother, my public!’”
--Barbara Goldsmith