The Writer on Murray Hill

MARY ELIZABETH TAYLOR

NE of the most characteristic of Sophie Kerr's hundreds
of short stories, ".Mrs. Mather," was published in 1927
in The Centjiry Magazine. It begins: "It was a fine
morning and .Mrs. Mather had a great deal to do." A simple and
direct opening by a writer whose greatest gifr «as narrative: tlie
ability to tell a story from the innumerable experiences she per¬
ceived and imagined in the world about her, and to carry the story
forward, often mainly by dialogue.

The heroine of "Airs. iMather," later anthologized in a book
about New York city life. As I Pass, O Manhattan, was an enter¬
prising old woman who li-s-ed mainly in the streets of .Manhattan
making her rounds to pick up a few coins or diversions here and
there. She was fascinated by the glimpses she had from the streets
of the life in beautiful brownstone town houses. In a similar house
on Murray Llill Sophie Kerr wrote many of the stories and novels
that were ro make her a successful and famous author. Mrs. Mather
speculated about the handsome paintings and elegant furniture
in such houses, and, longing to see some of tliis for herself, she
contrived to walk into one of these houses behind a delivery man
as preparations for a party were underway. She saw the entire
house, stayed overnight in one of the guest rooms, had breakfast
in bed served by a maid who thought she was an elderly aunt of
the owner, and then walked out back to the streets of New York
with a courteous good-by at the door from the housemaid.

I recall Sophie Kerr now, sixteen years after her death, most
vividly as the light-hearted luncheon hostess in her brownstone on
Murray Hill, bought decades earlier and furnished with the taste
of a connoisseur from the proceeds of her lucrative writings. The
perfectly proportioned rooms were lit by a subdued golden light
that seemed to come from tlie huge gilt-backed mirrors, among

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