The first biography of the iconic woman whose name stands for good manners, Emily Post tells the story of a woman who steadfastly recorded the shifting, tumultuous historical epochs that shaped her-and that she helped shape. From the excesses of the late nineteenth-century Gilded Age, through the horrors of World War I, to the transformations of the Roaring Twenties that gave birth to her magisterial Etiquette, Emily Post unfailingly took the measure of her era. A Baltimore blue blood with a populist heart, she helped the masses live the American Dream with her hugely popular book, which has been continuously in print for over eighty-five years. "[The] absorbing study of a keenly perceptive ethicist second only to Eleanor Roosevelt in the immensity of her influence…Claridge greatly deepens our appreciation for Post's achievements and brings forward the impressive woman behind the do's and don'ts." "A rich, almost novelistic portrait of a woman [who] embodied the dramatic changes that transformed American society." "Claridge does an excellent job putting Emily Post's life and work in historical context…Claridge also shows how Etiquette served as a guidebook for the middle and immigrant classes as they strove to take their share of the American dream…Perhaps nothing shows the continuing popularity of Emily Post's work more than its status as the second most-stolen book in the New York public library system for much of the 20th century. Claridge's Emily Post is not only a fascinating look at a woman who managed to conquer many worlds in her time, it is also a social biography of the changing face of the United States during the twentieth century."
