Much Laughter, a Few Tears : Memoirs of a Woman's Friendship With Betty MacDonald and Her Family

by Blanche Caffiere, b/w Illustration (Illustrator)

Here are Blanche Caffiere's warm-hearted, humorous recollections of her friendship with Betty MacDonald, author of The Egg and I and the endearing Mrs. Piggle Wiggle stories, and Betty's zany, loving family. With an astonishing eye and ear for detail - not to mention a near-perfect memory - Blanche Caffi ere takes us on a joyful ride through decades of friendship, from Roosevelt High School girlhood frolics to young motherhood and careers, from divorce and illness to the hardships of World War II. Whatever happiness and tribulation they experienced, Betty MacDonald and her family lived life to the fullest, and Blanche Caffiere has captured it all in Much Laughter, A Few Tears .

159 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1992

Reviews

[Penny Grubb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Against expectation, I loved this book. I didn’t think I would before I started it. Indeed I was a couple of chapters in before I realised quite how good it was going to be. Like many Betty Macdonald fans, I imagine, what I wanted from this book was some insight into Betty Macdonald’s life. Having just read one of Mary Bard’s books with the same motivation and been disappointed, and having read a review of Blanche Caffiere’s book which dismissed it as self-indulgent irrelevance, my expectations were low. They shouldn’t have been. That review was rubbish.

Blanche Caffiere writes well, tells the story of how her life interwove with the Bards in general and Sydney, Betty and Mary in particular. I know that Betty Macdonald spun her story partly at the behest of her publishers (Bob for example in the final version of The Egg and I was painted essentially as a good guy; the wives routinely used as punchbags by drunken husbands were people she knew and not her); her leaving her husband was a brief but dramatic sequence at the start of Anybody Can Do Anything – Blanche tells what sounds like a more likely scenario: Mary Bard drove out to the farm at a time she knew Bob would not be there and helped Betty to pack before driving her and her two daughters back to the family home in the city.

In fact one of things that Blanche Caffiere’s account does is to paint Mary Bard as the truly amazing person she clearly was. It does likewise for their mother Sydney including the story of how she came to be called Sydney. Their unique qualities come across in Betty Macdonald’s accounts, although not in Mary’s own writings, but Sydney was her mother, Mary was her sister; there’s an element of ‘she would say that, wouldn’t she’ when it’s Betty. From Blanche it comes across differently.

Blanche Caffiere tells her own story as well as that of her interactions with the Bards, but partly because her own story was largely influenced by Mary and Betty, and partly because she tells it well, it drew me in. I became interested in what happened to her as well as what happened to Mary Bard (in a way I hadn’t when reading Mary’s writing) and of course, Betty.

An absolute must for genuine Betty Macdonald fans.

[Laurie]

I learned of this book from my friend Paula Becker, who has researched and written about Betty MacDonald. Paula had the good fortune to meet and befriend Blanche Caffiere in her final years.

I recommend Much Laughter, a Few Tears for readers interested in Seattle history and the life of Betty MacDonald and her sister, Mary Bard. Caffiere tells delightful stories of the sisters and their mother, Sydney Bard. I enjoyed reading about daily life in Seattle in the teens and 20s. Caffiere and MacDonald entered the brand new Roosevelt High School as juniors, and this book details high school hijinks (powered by the extensive streetcar network that existed at the time).


Here is an essay by Paula about her friendship with Blanche Caffiere. If you are interested in Betty MacDonald, look her up on HistoryLink; Paula has written a number of interesting articles, including photos of MacDonald's homes in Seattle and Vashon.

Caffiere, Blanche (1906-2006): An Appreciation
by Paula Becker
http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?...

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Betty MacDonald, author of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and The Egg and I and have read them years ago but now with the internet I have been able to find more books about her and this book details her life and friendship with the author. I thought this book would be just so-so but I really enjoyed this book, it was well written and a fast read. This is not just about MacDonald, Caffiere talks about her life, her family and life in Washington State. It was also a peek to what life was like during and after the depression and before TVs and computers. This book was not readily available at a lot of libraries but thank goodness for inter-library loan-I got this from a state 1400 miles away but it is also available to buy online.

[Barbara Mader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Memoir by a woman who knew the Bard family (Betty MacDonald, nee Betty Bard), who came to interest me in her own life as well. I was also interested in reading about life in Seattle and other areas of the Pacific Northwest in the '20s,'30s, and '40s. This is not superbly well written by any means, but I enjoyed it, and am impressed by the way these women seemed to grab life by the throat--very different personalities from my own.

I have read this before but don't remember when.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is only for die-hard fans of Betty MacDonald, of which I am one. Although she died much too young, this memoir provided insight into her life and personality. The insight provided by this book makes me love The Egg and I even more.

[Jean]

Vashon

[Quanti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Líbilo a bavilo, i když jsou to jen takové historky a epizodky. Fanynky Betty MacDonald si s klidem můžou přidat hvězdičku... a nikdo jiný to nejspíš číst nebude :)