Product Description

The full-length biography of the outspoken leader of the Arts and Crafts Movement

During an intense period of technological innovation early in this century, a movement dedicated to simple living began to take shape. An unknown cabinetmaker, Gustav Stickley, became the most vocal spokesperson in America for this quirky revolution in aesthetics known as the Arts and Crafts Movement. This book traces Stickley's wide-ranging artistic career that sought to integrate social theory, political commitment, and aesthetic design. Stickley believed utility, simplicity, and beauty—exemplified in high quality craftsmanship—were the keys to an ideal life, and thousands of Americans bought both the product and the notion. Stickley's is a story of a movement that exerted tremendous influence on furniture, pottery, metalwork, jewelry, bookbinding, leatherwork, and architecture. But his story is also one of classic collision, when the ideals of a simple life clash with those of a complex fate.

• Includes rare photographs of Stickley's works
• Features Stickley's own renderings for his early designs

BARRY SANDERS (HOMETOWN?) is Professor of English and the History of Ideas at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA. He is the author of A is for Ox and co-author of ABC: The Alphabetization of the Popular Mind and The Sacred Paw: The Bear in Nature, Myth, and Literature.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2270742 in Books
• Published on: 1996-04
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 192 pages

The publisher, John Wiley & Sons
A compelling biography of Gustav Stickley, once an unknown cabinetmaker, who became the most vocal spokesman in America for the quirky revolution in aesthetics known as the Arts and Crafts Movement. Chronicles the progress of Stickley's wide-ranging artistic career in which he sought to integrate social theory, political commitment and aesthetic design. Stickley's story is the story of a movement that exerted tremendous influence on furniture, pottery, metal work, jewelry, bookbinding, leatherwork and architecture. Includes photographs of rare works along with his renderings of early designs.

Back Cover Copy
"It's a complex fate, being an American." — Henry James

A Complex Fate offers the first full-length look at Gustav Stickley, who rose from unknown cabinetmaker to the most vocal spokesman in America for the early twentieth-century aesthetic revolution that became known as the Craftsman Movement. In the face of the Modern Age, Stickley espoused the values of the medieval craftsman, influencing the design of furniture, pottery, metalwork, jewelry, bookbinding, leatherwork, and architecture. Author Barry Sanders chronicles the progress of Stickley's wide-ranging career, from his rise to fame and wealth to his ultimate financial ruin. Rare photographs and renderings of Stickley's designs enhance this compelling portrait of the man and his work.

It was a time of enormous upheaval in America. Sweeping and convulsive changes spilled into the new century in every conceivable shape: electric lights, overhead railways, airplanes, automobiles, the Ashcan school of painting, jazz, and Henry James. Yet, in the middle of this time of intense innovation, a movement dedicated to simple living began to take shape. It became known as the Craftsman Movement, and an unknown cabinetmaker, Gustav Stickley, became its most vocal spokesman, and in many ways, its embodiment.

A Complex Fate chronicles Stickley's life and career—a career marked by the same contradictions that characterized America's transition from a largely rural society to a modern, technological one. He regarded himself as a modern, yet espoused a philosophy that celebrated simplicity, community, and skilled manual work. His furniture itself, at first glance simple, stark, and hand-built, was nevertheless mass-produced and regarded as thoroughly modern by a public eager to buy it.

In this, the first full-length profile of Stickley, we follow his rise to staggering wealth, wide popularity, and enormous influence on the design of furniture, pottery, metalwork, jewelry, book-binding, leatherwork, and architecture. We see the power of his charisma and uncommon ego, his plans for rural crafts schools, and his messianic drive to spread the message of artisanship, community, and honest, unalienated labor. We watch, too, as his ambitions and contradictions finally become overwhelming, leaving him a bankrupt and broken man.

A Complex Fate is the robust portrait of a man whose talent, nerve, and savvy have left a lasting imprint on design in America, and whose life offers us a window on the roiling tumult of a society on the brink of a new age.

About the Author
BARRY SANDERS is Professor of English and the History of Ideas at Pitzer College in Claremont, California. He is most recently the author of Sudden Glory: Laughter as Subversive History and A Is for Ox: Violence, Electronic Media, and the Silencing of the Written Word."

Customer Reviews

Much needed for research, etc.
If you collect items or information on Stickley, buy this book. It has extensive end notes and a fine bibliography, which makes it an outstanding piece of reference material. I'm an information junkie, and in my opinion, A COMPLEX FATE is worth owning if only for the doors it will open to additional information -- an outstanding resource.

A Complex Fate
This is a bad book. Not because it's written badly - it's not. It's really a good read. But you cannot tell fact from fiction. Barry Sanders was an early Stickley collector and I think this book was written in the 1970s but found no publisher. Now with the craze on all things Stickley it surfaces. His research is dated and in many cases supplanted by much newer information. The footnotes indicate he has read Mary Ann Smith's groundbreaking book Gustav Stickley: The Craftsman and yet he states as fact many things that are the opposite of what Smith writes, and footnotes, in her book. Sanders' research is poor and he does not separate fact from his own speculation in the text. Readers should refer to Smith (though dated) and to Marilyn Fish's continuing series of books for the latest accurate information. Please see my review in the Winter 1999 issue of Style 1900 magazine for more details on Sanders and Fish books.

Behind the Craftsman: Stickley the man
I have spent the last year reading much of what is available about the life of Gustav Stickley and the Arts and Crafts Movement in America. Unfortunately, there are precious few volumes that attack the subject with any hard investigation. Mr. Sanders' book is easily a step in the right direction. I was very pleased to discover a host of information that was hitherto completely ignored or missed by other authors. It is not a book about his furniture, it is a book about the man. There are too many books available that stress the former to ignore the latter. Further, Sanders does not treat his subject with the typical sentimentality of other biographers. In fact, in sometimes Sanders goes too far in pointing out Stickley's contradictions (at one one point making the tenuous comparison between Stickley and men such as Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken). Stickley is never painted in a completely pleasing light. This is a far cry from the Stickley rhetoric so often repeated by those in his new following which is always very positive. At times there are gaping holes in Sanders' research, but I would like to point out that the author's honesty at not claiming to be able to completely pin down his subject is somewhat refreashing. After all it can be very disconcerting realizing an author is leaving out all mention of certain facts and connections to save face rather than owning up to some small defeats. Sometimes what an author doesn't say speaks volumes. It must be remembered that Stickley was not a Statesman or President, he was a furniture manufacturer, publisher and businessman. Therefore, there is not a enormous treasure trove of information just waiting to dissected and interpreted by latter-day scholars. Sanders does the right thing by taking Stickley's own words (printed in his catalogs and his Craftsman magazine) to help desribe his philosophy and interests. His other research is rather exhaustive and his references wide-ranging. The book is also well footnoted. Most importantly, it is well written. It covers many years and a lot of dates and factoids but it remains very readable to the end. It should not be considered the last word on Stickley but it does fill in where others have left off. Bankrupt by 1916, Stickley's own empire crumbled and he went on to live in relative obscurity. Today, everything he created is seen as among the very best in early Modernism and his design influence can be seen in a myriad of disciplines. His furniture comands astronomical prices at auction and homes reflecting his Cratsman ideal ( "Craftsman" has even become a catchall word to desribe almost any small bunglow built during the time) are sought after in nearly every major American city. He has converted a huge new following of devotees nearly a century after his first furniture was produced. Furniture manufactures rake in huge profits by copying his older designs (just as they did in the first part of the century) and Mission furniture is again very much in vogue. All this from a poor, second generation German immigrant from Wisconsin. A "Complex Fate"? Without a doubt.