October 30, 2024
The Center for Fiction paid tribute to the life and work of the late Rebecca Godfrey with her friends and collaborators, Leslie Jamison, David Ebershoff, and Megan Abbott.
Following the publication of her acclaimed true crime investigation Under the Bridge, Rebecca Godfrey turned her attention to the compelling story of bohemian socialite and art collector Peggy Guggenheim. Completed by Godfrey’s close friend and colleague Leslie Jamison after Godfrey’s death in 2022, Peggy is a blazingly fresh interpretation of a woman who defied societal expectations and lived life on her own terms. David Ebershoff, author of The Danish Girl, edited Godfrey and Jamison and collaborated with the latter to publish this richly imaginative new novel.
In Peggy, the sheltered daughter of two Jewish dynasties (the Guggenheims and Seligmans), finds her cloistered life turned upside down at fourteen when her beloved father perishes on the Titanic. His death prompts Peggy to seek a life of passion and personal freedom, and to believe in the transformative power of art. Readers follow her as she traverses the art worlds of New York and Europe, encountering sexism and anti-Semitism amongst the glamor. She becomes entangled with men who love her (and her money…) but underestimate her intellect, talent, and vision. Along the way, Peggy must balance her loyalty to her family with her need to break free from their narrow ways and the restrictions that come with vast fortune.
Jamison, Ebershoff, and Megan Abbott (Beware the Woman) came together for a moving and informative discussion about Godfrey’s legacy and to celebrate the publication of her final book.
Featured Book
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Peggy
By Rebecca Godfrey & Leslie Jamison
Published by Random House
Venice, 1958. Peggy Guggenheim, heiress and now legendary art collector, sits in the sun at her white marble palazzo on the Grand Canal. She’s in a reflective mood, thinking back on her thrilling, tragic, nearly impossible journey from her sheltered, old-fashioned family in New York to here: iconoclast and independent woman.
Rebecca Godfrey’s Peggy is a blazingly fresh interpretation of a woman who defies every expectation to become an original. The daughter of two Jewish dynasties, Peggy finds her cloistered life turned upside down at fourteen, when her beloved father perishes on the Titanic. His death prompts Peggy to seek a life of passion and personal freedom and, above all, to believe in the transformative power of art. We follow Peggy as she makes her way through the glamorous but sexist and anti-Semitic art worlds of New York and Europe and meet the numerous men who love her (and her money) while underestimating her intellect, talent, and vision. Along the way, Peggy must balance her loyalty to her family with her need to break free from their narrow, snobbish ways and the unexpected restrictions that come with vast fortune.
Rebecca Godfrey’s final book—completed by her friend, the acclaimed writer Leslie Jamison, following Godfrey’s death in 2022—brings to life the woman who helped make the Guggenheim name synonymous with art and genius.
Featuring
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Rebecca Godfrey
Rebecca Godfrey
Rebecca Godfrey (1967-2022) was an award-winning novelist and journalist. Her books include The Torn Skirt, finalist for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, and the award-winning true crime story Under the Bridge, a Disney+ limited series starring Riley Keough as Rebecca Godfrey. Godfrey earned her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and taught writing at Columbia University. Born and raised in Canada, she lived with her husband and daughter in Upstate New York.
Photo Credit: Brigitte Lacombe
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Leslie Jamison
Leslie Jamison
Leslie Jamison’s books include The Empathy Exams, The Recovering, the novel The Gin Closet, and the memoir Splinters. She teaches at Columbia University and lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Photo Credit: Grace-Ann Leadbeater
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David Ebershoff
David Ebershoff
David Ebershoff is the editor in chief of Hogarth, an imprint of Random House. He’s edited books that have won the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, History, and Biography and more than twenty-five New York Times bestsellers. He’s the author of the bestselling novels The 19th Wife, which was adapted for television, and The Danish Girl, which was made into an Oscar-winning film.
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Megan Abbott
Megan Abbott
Megan Abbott is the Edgar award-winning author of eleven crime novels, including You Will Know Me, Give Me Your Hand and the New York Times bestseller The Turnout, the winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Dare Me, the series she adapted from her own novel, now streaming on Netflix. Her latest novel, Beware the Woman, is now in paperback.
Photo Credit: Nina Subin
