Tale of a City that Never Sleeps

“Here is the solidarity of good theatre people, Vivian: we try not to ruin each other’s shows, and we try not to ruin each other’s lives.”

The book starts with a letter by a woman Angela who writes to Vivian telling her that her mother has passed away! She further asks Vivian how come she knew her father. Vivian sighs and takes us through a journey of how she met Angela’s father.

“City of Girls” written by Elizabeth Gilbert starts with the protagonist’s narrative, a nineteen-year-old girl Vivian Morris, who has been sent to live with her aunt who runs a Theater company in New York.

The book starts with a different purpose and in between, we discover the New York life of a theatre company, the showgirls and relationships of theatre people through Vivian Morris’s eyes.

“You must learn in life to take things more lightly, my dear. The world is always changing. Learn how to allow for it. Someone makes a promise, and then they break it. A play gets good notices, and then it folds. A marriage looks strong, and then they divorce. For a while, there’s no war, and then there’s another war. If you get too upset about it all, you become a stupid, unhappy person— and where’s the good in that.”

Elizabeth Gilbert has introduced to us some of the finest characters in the book giving them a magnificent introduction. Gilbert is who she is because of her usage of such picturesque words in describing the characters, the polish of the words is so rare yet so simple that as a reader you feel as if you already know someone like this in your life.

Vivian Morris is an exquisite protagonist and while Gilbert knows what she has set out to write she never lets us forget the person Vivian Morris is.

“When I was younger, I had wanted to be at the very center of all the action in New York, but I slowly came to realize that there is no one center. The center is everywhere—”

“City of Girls” tells you a lot about the theatre scenes in New York in 1940. Gilbert has evolved stories of not just one person but each and every person who was a part of this historic story. For a theatre person like me, I could imagine myself getting lost in the intricacies of the New York scenes and the politics of all of it. So if you have done theatre, you will realize how detailed theatre life has been captured and written in the simple polished words by Elizabeth Gilbert.

This novel does not only talk about theatre life & Vivian Morris but of relationships and historic events too. We meet characters outside the theatre life, outside New York and learn so much more that happened around 1940. Elizabeth Gilbert deserves a round of applause for remembering every character, their introduction, their conflicts, their exits and making them stay connected to the crux of the Novel.

“But as we get older, we learn this sad truth: some things can never be fixed. Some mistakes can never be put right — not by the passage of time, and not by our most fervent wishes, either.”

As you will go through the novel you will slowly also notice that Gilbert has written this novel from a very personal space and the characters she has written and the incidents that have followed up are closer to her than you think.

Elizabeth takes us in her world and not just any world a world that has been stitched and sewed by her flawless researched writing and the amount of research that has gone into the writing of this novel marks the find of a remarkable writer. Her research for every character, every story, every timeline is tremendously outstanding.

“Sometimes it’s just true that other people have better ideas for your life than you do.”

“City of Girls” is a dramatic journey of a girl who lands in a city and tells the story of “City of Girls.” You can’t help but be engrossed in the book and don’t want to stop reading it. It’s not just the story, it’s her writing, her one-liners, the discoveries, the compassion in her writing that makes you closer to that time and you become a part of the book.

So don’t waste any more time. It’s hot on the shelves of every bookstore right now. Grab it while you can and savor the book till its last page. Have fun!

(Article Submitted by Sukaina, The Night Reader. Follow on Instagram: @thenightreader.28)