In the years after World War I, Hurst became famous as an author of extremely popular short stories and novels, many of which were made into films. Her popularity continued for several decades, only beginning to decline after
World War II. Throughout her life, Hurst also actively worked and spoke on behalf of social justice organizations and causes supporting feminism and African-American civil rights, and occasionally supported other oppressed groups such as Jewish refugees (although she chose not to support some other Jewish causes), homosexuals, and prisoners. She was also appointed to several committees associated with President
Franklin D. Roosevelt's
New Deal programs.
Author In 1912, after numerous rejections, Hurst finally published a story in
The Saturday Evening Post, which shortly thereafter requested exclusive release of her future writings. She went on to publish many more stories, mostly in the
Post and in
Cosmopolitan magazine, eventually earning as much as $5,000 per story. Her first collection of short stories,
Just Around the Corner, was published in 1914, and her first novel,
Star-Dust: The Story of an American Girl, appeared in 1921. By 1925, she had published five collections of short stories and two novels, and become one of the most highly paid authors in the United States. By the late 1930s, critics no longer took her seriously and sometimes expressed frustration about the continued commercial popularity of her work in the face of bad reviews. In the post-World War II era, she was regarded as a popular author who wrote for and about the working classes. She became a favorite target of parodists, including
Langston Hughes, who parodied her racially themed novel
Imitation of Life as
Limitations of Life. Her own editor, Kenneth McCormick, described her as a "fairly corny artist" but a "wonderful storyteller". She was also called the "Queen of the
Sob Sisters". Hurst recognized that she was "not a darling of the critics" but said, "I have a vast popular audience — it warms me, like a furnace." with a dog in 1925 in New York The great popularity of Hurst's works gave her major celebrity status. Hurst also took steps to publicize herself for purposes of promoting both her writing and the activist causes she espoused (see
Social activism). In the 1920s, news media widely covered aspects of her personal life such as her unconventional marriage (see
Life and death) and a diet on which she lost 40 pounds. She was frequently interviewed about her views on subjects relating to love, marriage and family. For decades,
The New York Times continued to report regularly on Hurst's doings, including her walks in
Central Park with her dogs, her travels abroad, her wardrobe, and the interior decoration of her apartment.
Back Street (1931), Hurst's seventh novel, was hailed as her "magnum opus" and has been called her "best loved" work. Its main character, a confident, independent young
gentile woman, falls in love with a married Jewish banker and becomes his secret mistress, sacrificing her own life in the process and ultimately meeting a tragic end. Hurst's next novel,
Imitation of Life (1933), was also hugely popular. It is now considered her best known novel. It told the story of two single mothers, one white and one African American, who become partners in a successful waffle and restaurant business (modeled after
Quaker Oats Company's "
Aunt Jemima"
pancake mix) and have conflicts with their teenage daughters. Hurst's inspiration for the book was her own friendship with African-American author
Zora Neale Hurston. However,
Imitation of Life and the two films based on it provoked controversy due to their treatment of the African-American characters. These include a romanticized
mammy figure and a "
tragic mulatto" young woman who rejects her loving mother in order to
pass for white. Approximately 30 films were made from Hurst's fiction.
Back Street was the basis for three films of the same name in
1932,
1941 and
1961.
Frank Capra 's
Forbidden (1932) liberally borrowed elements from Hurst's novel without crediting her.
Imitation of Life was twice adapted for film in
1934 and
1959. It was also adapted by Joselito Rodriguez for the 1949
Mexican film
Angelitos negros ("Little Black Angels"). This was adapted again and released in 1970 in two versions: as a
feature film and as a
telenovela. Her short story "
Humoresque", published in 1919, was adapted as a
1920 silent film and as a
1946 film noir starring
Joan Crawford. A later story, "Sister Act", published in
Cosmopolitan in 1937, inspired the musical films
Four Daughters (1938) and the
Frank Sinatra vehicle
Young at Heart (1954). Hurst continued to write and publish until her death in 1968, although the commercial value of her work declined after
World War II as popular tastes changed. Her total publications over her nearly six-decade career include 19 novels, more than 300 short stories (63 of which were gathered in eight short-story collections), four plays produced on
Broadway, a full-length autobiography and an autobiographical memoir, numerous magazine articles, personal essays, articles (often unsigned) for various organizations to which she belonged, and screenplays (both independently written and collaborations) for several films.
Social activism (left) with Hurst in 1962 Throughout her life, Hurst was involved with many social activist groups supporting equal rights for women and African Americans, and occasionally assisting other people in need. In 1921, Hurst was among the first to join the
Lucy Stone League, an organization that fought for women to preserve their maiden names. She was a member of the feminist intellectual group
Heterodoxy in
Greenwich Village, and was active in the
Urban League. She volunteered as a regular visitor to inmates of a women's prison in
Manhattan. During
World War II she raised money to help Jewish refugees fleeing Europe, but in her earlier years was less supportive of other Jewish causes, saying in a 1925 interview that
Zionism "segregates us, raises barriers or creates race prejudice". Her attitude changed in the 1950s, and in 1963 she received an honorary award from the Zionist women's organization
Hadassah. During the 1930s and 1940s, Hurst was a friend of Eleanor Roosevelt and a frequent
White House visitor. Hurst was named chair of the National Housing Commission in 1936–1937 and appointed to the National Advisory Committee to the
Works Progress Administration in 1940. She was a delegate to the
World Health Organization in 1952. In 1958, Hurst briefly hosted a television
talk show out of New York called
Showcase.
Showcase was notable for presenting several of the earliest well-rounded discussions of homosexuality and was one of the few programs on which homosexual men spoke for themselves rather than being debated by a panel of "experts". Hurst was praised by early
homophile group the
Mattachine Society, which invited Hurst to deliver the keynote address at the Society's 1958 convention. ==Life and death==