Midnight Baby

by Dory Previn

Midnight Baby

Genres: Autobiography, Music, Biography Memoir, Nonfiction

246 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Dory Previn, born Dorothy Veronica Langan, was an American lyricist, singer-songwriter, poet and memoirist.

During the late 1950s and 1960s, she was a lyricist on songs intended for motion pictures and, with her then husband, André Previn, received several Academy Award nominations. In the 1970s, after their divorce, she released six albums of original songs and an acclaimed live album. Previn's lyrics from this period are characterised by their originality, irony and honesty in dealing with her troubled personal life as well as more generally about relationships, sexuality, religion and psychology. Until her death, she continued to work as a writer of song lyrics and prose.

Reviews

[Esther · Rating 4 out of 5]

So many of her songs are heartbreakingly evocative of pain and loss. I thought a lot of it stemmed from her marriage break up with Andre Previn when he ran off with Mia Farrow (she likes to gloss over that fact in her preachy sainthood). But her childhood was a complete mess. Dysfunctional parents, especially the father suffering PTSD from WW2 and paranoid about whether Dory is even his daughter, beating her mother and gah. The one outlet was the performing that was to help her escape and onwards to songwriting. Very bittersweet absorbing read. She's like a cult secret and I only discovered her because Jarvis Cocker chose one of her songs on Desert Island Discs about 10 years ago.

[max]

the writing style made it a little tricky to follow at times.
dory previn i would have saved you if i could!

[Ben Ballin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I must confess to being a great enthusiast for Dory Previn's music: her combination of quirky show tunes and confessional honesty may not be for everyone, but works well for me. Perhaps the nearest and best-known equivalent in pop music is Randy Newman, although his work often takes a more caustically satirical turn.
When I found out that she had published an autobiography, I thought it would prove an interesting read, and indeed has proven to be so ... and more. It opens with a stream-of-consciousness account of adult Dory having an emotional breakdown on a plane, before switching to the childhood events that created the seed-bed for that moment. And what a childhood! The series of traumas, suppressions, religious repression, and plain abuse that the young Dory Previn experienced is quite extraordinary ... not least at the hands of her war-traumatised and sometimes abusive father. Despite a lightness of touch (familiar to those who know her music), and narrating much of the book from Dory-child's perspective, it could easily be a case study from Alice Miller's "The Drama of Being A Child": a case study of how adults often unwittingly suppress childhood trauma, including sometimes in a misguided attempt to protect.
Not that this is in any way a textbook: it is an eminently readable, often funny, fast-moving tale of real relationships. Throughout, snippets of song lyrics are interspersed, as well as cuttings from local newspapers, encouraging the reader to re-interpret Dory Previn's musical work from this autobiographical standpoint. The autobiographical nature of much of that work is not exactly ever hidden, but just how dark the shadows are at work in a song like 'My Daddy in The Attic' quickly becomes brutally apparent.
Having read this soon after Alan Johnson's autobiographical account of his own tough postwar childhood, 'This Boy', there are some interesting comparisons to be made: the abusive father, scarred by war; the co-dependent protectiveness of other family members; coping and failing to cope; but also humour, resilience and survival.
For those who know Dory Previn's too-often-overlooked music, this book offers a fresh perspective, poignant contexts and new depth. For those who don't, it stands in its own right as an honest, accessible account of childhood trauma and survival, and is told with grace, skill and wit.

[Wendy Stockard · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sad story of a woman with a lonely childhood. Dory Previn is lauded as a singwriter. Of course, she's also Andre Previn's jilted wife. Her autobiography is introspective, but I did not enjoy her writing style.

[Kevin A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A remarkable memoir written in child’s voice about the trauma she underwent mostly at the hands of her shell-shocked, mentally unstable WWI vet father. Writing in a child’s voice — in prose and poetry — could have gone horribly wrong or rung false, but remarkably it works

[Rosie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a truly distressing read. I loved it, because I love Dory Previn's writing style. But I wouldn't recommend this to anyone unless you're very strong or a massive fan of hers.

[Allie]

You can definitely tell a lyricist wrote this. Due to the vague lines, I had to go back and re-read some of the chapters. It was heart breaking learning about her childhood.

[Liz Foreman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written in kind of a weird way, but interesting story. I probably liked her poetry better than her prose but an interesting autobiography.