In 1903 Frank Lloyd Wright designed a home in Oak Park for Edwin and Mamah (May-muh) Cheney. Frank and Mamah fell in love and ended up leaving their spouses and children to be together.
Loving Frank draws upon documents written by Mamah, writings by and about Frank, newspaper articles, and writings of the period to put together a picture of their time together.
Nancy Horan tries to capture the voice of a woman who was a wife, mother, lover, suffragette, an intellectual...a woman trying to find herself and her voice in a time when women were barely allowed a voice need mind control over their own destiny.
This is a work of fiction that weaves in fact where ever possible. Did the conversations written here between Mamah and Frank happen? Maybe, who knows, but they feel real, and that is Horan's intent. Why did these two people leave their families to be together? What is more important, love, self, children, spouse?
There were times I cringed at the choices Mamah and Frank made. But one thing was clear, they loved each other so deeply, often times so intwined they couldn't see where one ended and the other began.
In among the fictionalized aspects of the story there are some interesting facts about Wright's architectural work in Oak Park and the home he built to live in with Mamah in Green Springs WI, his personality, and his money troubles. Now I am left feeling curious about them both and want to know more.
While not always sympathetic or likable they were real and made choices that many had to live with. It was a chance to see the ripples their stone made in the pond.
(Finished June 26, 2015)
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