This Creative Late Bloomer Just Keeps Plodding On

     I'll bet there are a lot of women -- especially those now in their seventies, eighties and nineties -- who will relate to the London Guardian's story of Rose Hilton who has an art show at London's Messum's Gallery, on view now until April 16.

      At first glance, Rose Hilton would appear to be a classic Late Starter: Someone who always wanted to create but was held back by family or work obligations.

Rose Hilton. Photograph: Jim Wileman for the Guardian

    Or in her case, held back by an overbearing husband who already was a celebrated artist.

    "I'm the painter in this set-up," Roger Hilton told Rose when they were married in the Sixties.


     This, despite the fact that Rose had attended the Royal College of Art and graduated with honors, despite the fact that she had won life drawing and painting prizes and a scholarship to Rome, despite the fact that she had taught at England's Sidcup Art College (where one of her students was Rolling Stone Keith Richards), despite the fact that she had had her work included at a gallery show in London. Now married to a famous artist, Rose's job became raising the Hiltons' two sons, Bo and Fergus, and putting up with Roger.


      An alcoholic who was at times downright mean (he would read her diary entries and leave nasty comments, such as "balls" and "fucking lie"), Roger Hilton was a handful, but he also was a brilliant painter. And he eventually did come around. In the last years of their stormy marriage when Rose tentatively started painting again, he even offered her some constructive criticism. In turn, Rose took care of her husband when he fell desperately sick.


     But wait. Roger died in 1975. Rose was only 43 years old. She no longer had the excuse of a husband holding her back. Her children, who both became artists themselves, were supportive. Why did it take her decades to finally earn a living from her art work? 

"Something to Keep the Balance," by Andrew Lambirth

     
      "I suppose I have been a slow developer," she told a Western Morning News interviewer two years ago when, at 78, she had a solo exhibition at the Messum (her first there was in 1991 when she was 60),


      Okay, now I'm thinking Rose Hilton is more accurately categorized, in my lexicon of late bloomers, as a Plodder: an artist who needed time to hone her skills to get good.


     Yes, her marriage interrupted her art career. For nearly ten years, she was unable to paint full time. But even those years were not entirely lost ones for her development as an artist. While with Roger, she took notes when he made comments about his art and observed his process to gain insight into her own. Then for three decades after his death, she worked diligently to find her own creative voice. Thirty-three years after Roger's death, she had a retrospective at the Tate St. Ives.  


     We can't always blame outside forces for our inability to create -- or on our lack of creative success. Sometimes the person holding us back the most is ourselves. Rose has painted now for more than 50 years, intermittently at times, more ferociously at others.  But most importantly, she's kept at it, despite the interruptions, despite her doubts. And she has learned well to use the time when she is unable to create.


    A painting in Rose's current exhibit at the Messum's is a great illustration of both her perseverance and constant openness to inspiration. Depicting the time when she was waiting hand and foot on her bedridden husband, it's called "Taking Things to Roger." 


   In 2009, Andrew Lambirth published a book about Rose Hilton; "Something to Keep The Balance" is about Rose's life, her loves (including Roger) and her struggle to find her own artistic identity. The "something" of the title is art. As Rose puts it, "It's all about how I carried on painting."


   I'm reminded of that saying by Samuel Beckett: "I can't go on. I go on." It's all about plodding on.










    

     

THOSE LITERARY LATE BLOOMERS ON HUFFPOST: WHAT'S THE BACKSTORY TO THEIR SUCCESSES?

     This week on HuffPost Zoe Tristka posted 10 of her favorite late bloomers -- Literary Late Bloomers: Great Authors Who Took A Little Longer  -- and asked readers to vote for their favorites. I have always been a sucker for these lists of late-in-life successes (usually hoping to see someone on them who is a little older than I am, of course). I imagine many readers will weigh in on which johnny-come-lately (or joannie-come-lately) inspires them the most. I know I am not alone in loving to hear about late bloomers.

     But I always crave to hear the backstories of these successes.

     Among the writers Zoe has chosen as her favorite late bloomers are four who were first published in their late thirties -- Wallace Stevens, Joseph Conrad, William Burroughs and Anthony Burgess. Some may not consider the late thirties to be late at all for literary success, but if you are in your twenties, it does seem a long way off. Three more men on the list -- Charles Bukowski, Henry Miller and Raymond Chandler -- all had to wait until their forties to hit the big time. None of them would have made the New Yorker's infamous 20 under 40 list.

       The three women on Zoe's list are all late late bloomers: Laura Ingalls Wilder, who  published her Little House on the Prairie series in her 50s; Harriet Doerr who published a prize-winning first novel at age 74, and Toyo Shibata who at 99 is on Japan's bestseller list, thanks to her first book of poetry, appropriately entitled "Don't Lose Heart" (see "Grandma next door" poet a Japan bestseller at 99).

Toyo Shibata, 99-year-old poet

     All these are interesting choices. But the members of this motley group took such very different routes to their late-in-life success I'm thinking that labeling them late bloomers need some refining.

     Some do fall into the classic late bloomer mold: They succeeded later in life because they were busy doing other things before they finally could turn to writing in earnest.  Let's call this group LATE STARTERS. Harriet Doerr was raising a family. Anthony Burgess worked as a teacher. Wallace Stevens was a lawyer.  Charles Bukowski worked in a post office. Raymond Chandler worked as a bookkeeper. Joseph Conrad was sailing on ships around the world.

     But some of these late bloomers weren't late to start -- they were writing all along. They just needed time to get good (or at least time to get sober).  William Burroughs and Bukowski come to mind. I'll call them the  PLODDERS.

      Henry Miller also was not really a late starter, but he wasn't a plodder either. Instead he falls into the classic LATE-TO-BE-RECOGNIZED bloomer category. He didn't need more time. It was the world that needed to catch up to him. His sexually explicit prose seems tame today, but it took him years to get his work published. When Tropic of Cancer was finally published in France in 1934,  it was banned in the U.S. as pornography and had to be smuggled into the country for years. Its 1961 U.S. publication triggered a series of obscenity trials until the book was finally declared a work of literature in 1964. Miller was by then 73.

      And then there are the ACCIDENTAL LATE BLOOMERS whose dabbling in a creative pursuit  pays off big time like a UTube video gone viral. Like Grandma Moses, they are not high brow artists, but their work touches a chord in masses of people. An unsuccessful journalist, Chandler only turned to writing pulp fiction as a means to make money when he lost his bookkeeping job. His phenomenally popular fiction led him to a screenwriting career. Laura Ingalls Wilder didn't begin write until her forties when she was inspired by her daughter Rose's career as an editor and ghostwriter to try her hand at it, also hoping to make a little money on the side. It was Rose who is said to have encouraged her to write down the stories of her childhood that make up the wildly successful Little House on the Prairie series.

       Tayo Shibata also is an accidental late bloomer. For years Tayo Shibata had been enjoying a beloved hobby: classical Japanese dancing. When her son urged her to find a pasttime that wouldn't be so hard on her back, she started to write poetry. Her first collection is reportedly written in a down-to-earth style (it hasn't yet been translated into English) to which the average Japanese can relate. Overnight, it hit the bestseller list, selling over  1.5 million copies.

     Here are my own favorite CREATIVE LATE BLOOMERS,  each representing a different category of late bloomers. Faithful readers of this site will note that I have discovered two more varieties since my earlier post, The Many Varieties of Creative Late Bloomers ):

ACCIDENTAL BLOOMERS, those who take up a creative activity as a hobby but are discovered to have great talent.
      Toyo Shibata. "A flower bloomed from a century-old tree," the 99-year-old told her fans after her first book of poetry hit the bestseller list in Japan, "and it's all because of your support. Now I have a souvenir to bring to the after-world and boast about to my husband and my mother there."

LATE STARTERS, those who dreamed of a literary career all their lives, but who were sidetracked by work or by family.
     Harriet Doerr. On a dare from her son, Harriet Doerr returned to finish her creative writing degree at Stanford University and won the National Book Award for her first novel, written for her class thesis, Stones for Ibarra. She was  74. She went on to write two more books, a second novel (at left), Consider this, Senora, published in 1993 when she was 83 and a collection of short stories and essays, Tiger in the Grass: Stories and other Inventions, when she was 85.

PLODDERS, those who needed time to get good.

     Ben Fountain, immortalized in Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker piece, Late Bloomers, took years to finish his first short story collection, Brief Encounters With Che Guevara. It was published to great acclaim in 2007 when Fountain was in his late forties. "Sometimes genius is anything but rarified; sometimes it's just the thing that emerges after twenty years of working at your kitchen table," wrote Gladwell. Fountain's novel, scheduled to be published in 2009, has yet to appear.

CRUSADERS, those who launch a creative career late in life in order to advance a cause or promote an area of interest
    Helen Prejean was 54 when she wrote Dead Man Walking, a book that inspired an Oscar-winning movie and turned Prejean, a Catholic nun, into sought after speaker on the subject of capital punishment.

LATE-TO-BE RECOGNIZED, those who are discovered late.
     Carmen Herrera sold her first painting at age 89, and now is considered a master of abstract art. Herrera wasn't slow to succeed; it was the world that was slow to recognize her.

REPEAT BLOOMERS, those successful creative artists who fade away from the public eye only to stage a spectacular comeback late in life and bloom all over again.
     Debbie Reynolds. "Most people think I've died," she recently said during a lively appearance on The Talk. Nearly 80, for the past few years the unsinkable Hollywood legend has been crossing the country with a one-woman show. In June she will be auctioning off pieces of her vast collection of Hollywood memorabilia, including the headdress that once rival in love Elizabeth Taylor wore for her triumphal march into Rome as Cleopatra. If you can't be Elizabeth Taylor, at least you can own her clothes.

HYBRIDS, those who are successful early in life in one creative area and then, late in life, turn to a totally different creative field and succeed in that, too.
     Patti Smith. The Godmother of Punk is both in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and, at 64, a winner of the National Book Award for her memoir Just Kids. 

LATE BLOOMERS AT THE MOVIE

     "My father always said to me I would be a late bloomer," said screenwriter David Seidler, accepting the Academy award last night for best original screenplay.  The line got one of the biggest laughs of the night (not that there was much competition). At 73, he had aced his first appearance as a nominee, winning for "The King's Speech" and entered Oscar history: He's the oldest person ever to win that award.
  
     Seidler's acceptance speech was one of the classiest of the evening (okay, still not much competition). It was also the most touching.

     Seidler not only gave voice to those who, like him and the King of England, have had to struggle with a profound stammer. The silver-haired award winner for best original screenplay also gave hope to late-to-be recognized bloomers everywhere. "I believe I am the oldest person to win that particular award," he said, adding graciously. "I hope that record is broken quickly and often."

Movie poster for the "The King's Speech": Screenplay credit goes to award-winning late bloomer David Seidler

     Seidler wasn't the only late bloomer to show up on the Oscar stage last night.

     Director Kathryn Bigelow returned to hand out the best director award. Last year, at age 58, she, too, had aced her first nomination. Recognition had been a long time comin'.

     Bigelow originally wanted to be a painter. The daughter of a paint factory manager and a librarian, early on, she imitated the Masters, painting giant segments from their works. She studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and won a scholarship for the Independent Study Program at the Whitney Museum in New York, where her work was critiqued by Richard Serra.

    Moving to New York, she did a stint as a model, posing for a Gap ad. With towering good looks, she still looks the part.
  
     Her film career began when she saw a violent western called "The Wild Bunch" by Sam Peckinpah. "It was visceral," she told an interviewer. "Very, very visceral...you were just enraptured by this material." She enrolled in Columbia University's graduate film program where a professor gave her the word for what she had felt: scopophilia. Unlike painting, a film could make you physically feel what the characters were feeling. She was hooked.

     Her first film was a 20-minute experimental short she wrote, produced and directed as a Columbia student project. "Set-Up," which featured two men fighting as a voiceover discussed the nature of violence, set the tone for her future films. Moving to Los Angeles, she directed an art movie that introduced William Dafoe, made another movie starring Jamie Lee Curtis, dabbled in acting and married director James Cameron. The marriage was brief, but the two filmmakers collaborated on Bigelow's first financial hit, "Point Break," which introduced Keanu Reeves and starred Patrick Swayze. She continued to make feature films, one which was produced by her now ex-husband, and began to write and direct for television, working with such as heavy hitters Ralph Fiennes, Luc Besson, Lou Diamond Phillips, Sean Penn, Harrison Ford and Liam Neeson. But despite all these big name connections, few outside of the Hollywood inner circle knew her name.

   Until "The Hurt Locker." After 30 years of filmmaking, the world finally took notice. With "The Hurt Locker," a film starring relatively unknown actors, she returned to the subject of the nature of violence. The story of the Army's elite Explosive Ordinance Disposal unit during the Iraq war capped her the Director's Guild Award for Best Director, the first time a female director was honored by that group. A few days later, the film won Best Picture and Bigelow took home the Oscar for Best Achievement in Directing, the fourth woman to be nominated for that prize and only the second woman to win it. Only the Golden Globe directing award eluded her. That was won by her ex-husband.

     "There's really no difference between what I do and what a male filmmaker might do. I mean we all try to make our days, we all try to give the best performances we can, we try to make our budget, we try to make the best movie we possibly can. So in that sense it's very similar. On the other hand, I think the journey for women, no matter what venue it is -- politics, business, film -- it's a long journey,"
she told an interviewer.

     But Bigelow doesn't by a long shot hold the record for the oldest director to win the Oscar. That triumph goes to Clint Eastwood. In 2004, he took home the award for Best Achievement in Directing for "Million Dollar Baby."  He was 74. He had already won the award in 1992 for "Unforgiven" when he was a mere 62.