Loving Frank

disclaimer: Whoever wants to read this book don't read this post. Spoilers ahead!


About a year back I was visiting Delhi for some work at the university and catching up with old friends. At the airport I had bought a book called Loving Frank by Nancy Horan, the name Frank Lloyd Wright catching my attention.
Putting up with an old friend in her 'bachelor pad' I had a lot of time to my self while she was at work and I read my book. I had reached up to about half of the book when I left it at her place by mistake while leaving Delhi. I was almost killed of curiosity about how the book had ended but slowly I had forgotten all about it till recently when my friend reminded me of it.
I quickly did a google search and realized that the story is in fact quite a real portrayal of Frank Lloyd Wrights love affair with Mamah Borthwick Cheney.
I had loved what I had read of the book and I could connect with Mamah's emotional turmoil revolving around her children and lover and how she felt torn between them.
In the book Mamah was in constant anxiety over leaving her children and in doubt of her morality but very sure of her love for Frank.
In the end while she is living with Frank in Wisconsin with her children visiting her, she and her children are murdered by one of their domestic helps.
All the while I was reading the book there was a constant feeling of liberation in spite of myself.
The point of this post is that, Mamah Cheney had quite a difficult journey throughout the period she was with Frank, she had hardly seen her children who were beginning to forget her, she lost a dear friend while she was away at Paris, they faced scandal in their hometown, Frank had decided to leave her and go back to his children for a while and she left him for a while to go to the University of Leipzig. And her end came quite tragically. And through all of this, Mamah probably would've done things the same way if she was given another chance. That loving Frank made her do so many other things, from rediscovering herself to giving herself the opportunities that a woman is often scared to give herself.

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