FERBER, EDNA

Ferber, Edna: translation

(1887-1968)

   Born in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the novelist also wrote several popular plays. The Eldest (1920), her first solo effort, failed, but as a collaborator she fared better. In collaboration with George V. Hobart she wrote Our Mrs. McChesney (1915), a sturdy vehicle for Ethel Barrymore. With Newman Levy, she wrote $1200 a Year (1920). Ferber's fruitful collaboration with George S. Kaufman resulted in Minick (1924), The Royal Family (1927), Dinner at Eight* (1932), and Stage Door* (1936), all of which garnered critical acclaim, long runs, and popular motion picture versions. Show Boat (1926), her durable novel of itinerant performers on the Mississippi River, became a celebrated Florenz Ziegfeld Jr.-produced 1927 musical with a score by Jerome Kern and lyrics and libretto by Oscar Hammerstein II.* Another Ferber novel, Saratoga Trunk (1941), was adapted into a 1959 musical. Two later collaborations with Kaufman, The Land Is Bright (1941) and Bravo! (1948), were less successful.

Ferber, Edna: translation

(1887-1968)

   American novelist. Born in Kalamazoo, Michigan, she worked first as a journalist. Her works include Show Boat, Giant, So Big, Dawn O'Hara, The Girls, Cimarron, Come and Get It and Saratoga Trunk. Together with George S. Kaufmann, she wrote a number of plays.