A Foreword by Richard Duffy

To the accurately estimated millions of readers who are familiar with Dorothy Dix’s understanding and interpretation of the plain facts of everyday life and also its enigmas, it may appear a presumption that one should attempt a foreword of explanation to make clear why a choice of her daily contributions to the press, not only in the United States and Canada, but also in farther regions of the world, should be deemed worthy of the more permanent shelter of book covers. But it becomes at once justifiable when we try to present a true account of the work of “The Little Lady of New Orleans,” as one of her oldest editors calls her. She herself confesses that, among the hundreds of letters she receives each day from men and women, young, adult and aged, there recur the questions: “Are you a real person, or only a newspaper syndicate name?” “Are you a man, or are you a woman?” “Are you married or single?” “Have you ever been married?” “If you have not been married, would you marry?” “If you have been married—and are not now—would you marry again?” “Have you any children? If so—are they boys or girls—and how many?” It must be emphasized that the questions above recorded are not asked by correspondents merely curious, who put the questions just to probe the author of the Dorothy Dix articles. Not at all, these questions are asked in letters revealing the puzzles of life that entangle the very writers who address Dorothy Dix. Before they make the simplest inquiry as to the trustworthiness of Dorothy Dix, they tell their own troubles in the way we all have of saying: “Of course what I have said to you is wholly confidential. Now let me know where you stand—I mean about absolute personal fidelity.” To a hard-boiled business man, or business woman, such a remark seems trite. Yet, we must remember that hard-boiled business persons run to the courts every so often to discover between themselves, at great expense, how personal fidelity, in gush and in fact, sharply contrast.

The self-styled hard-boiled people and the people who pretend they are less sophisticated than they are, look to Dorothy Dix for a way out of all their troubles. These two classes are to be reckoned with, because they are always telling their troubles to some confidant—the less known, the better. But the vast majority of the people who write to Dorothy Dix for counsel and guidance are profoundly sincere and earnest, not so much because they fear to be otherwise, but because they are so firmly persuaded of the sincerity and earnestness of life itself, when they look it square in the face and without pose of any kind. All and any of these correspondents of Dorothy Dix are struggling with their problems of how to make life livable. In the case of the young woman who has a good job and, at the same time, has a good home with her parents, the question arises whether she should marry the man she likes, and who on his part likes her, and then undertake to become a parent herself without a salaried job and without the safeguard of the home provided by her father and mother. On the other side there appears the problem of the young man, who would marry, but for responsibilities, psychological as well as financial, that make him stop, look and listen before he leaves a dependent father and mother unsupported.

We pass to the men and women who are actually married and suddenly discover that they are facing the real and inevitable conflict of life at home as compared with the daily battle of the business world. Some husbands are go-getters, but they do not get anywhere because their wives are shiftless as home managers, or because they are spendthrifts, and would always, without trying, spend twice as much money as any husband has, or can earn. Some wives are the best of helpmates, but are linked to husbands who simply cannot or will not achieve the quiet fame of a weekly pay-envelope which is the rock foundation of “Home Sweet Home.”

Some wives are afflicted with the disease of “social climbing.” They spend their days and nights proving to their husbands that for every dollar earned, it is better to spend two dollars, in order to take a chance at three, by inviting the Smiths to the theatre and to supper afterward. Such wives usually overlook the fact that the Smiths, with whom they would curry favor at great expense, are themselves spending two dollars for every one dollar gained on the principle that it is a good investment to obtain equal social standing with the Joneses.

Also to be encountered in this book are the varied specimens of husbands and wives who have become tired of each other and seek from Dorothy Dix guidance towards a way out of what they consider the morass of marriage. Then, too, we meet the father, or the mother, who is perplexed about the way children grow up nowadays—as tho the way children grew up has not always been a surprise to parents since the days of Romulus and Remus. To sum up, all dramatis personæ in the stupendous play of life, being enacted day in and day out, as we live, are brought on the world’s stage before us, not so much by Dorothy Dix as by themselves in the confidences they repose in her and the disclosures they make about themselves.

Despite this fact there never has been nor will there be anything merely approaching a betrayal of confidence by Dorothy Dix. She talks to the whole world of men and women, and their worries and concerns are so alike that all shadow of individual identity is lost. She talks to them, not from the pedestal of the highbrow, but from the average level of a human being, who herself has fought the grim battle of life—as may be learned from her personal statement, which immediately follows these pages. One of the most distinguished of living American novelists, on being shown a few letters in her day’s mail, asked:

“How many such letters do you receive a month?”

She replied: “It takes me from three to four hours each day to answer my correspondents—and then I have to write my articles besides.”

“Great Scott!” exclaimed the novelist. “You have more plots in a day’s letters than any hard-working novelist could invent in a year.”

But none of these potential plots is available even for the most prolific of story-writers, because they are not “plots” to Dorothy Dix, but sacred testimonies to the help the “Little Lady of New Orleans” has been able to render through many years to her ever-increasing number of friends and confidants.