Now In November

On May 7th, 1935, President Nicholas Murray Butler of Columbia University announced: "For the best American novel published during 1934, Now In November, by Josephine Winslow Johnson." The place was the Commodore Hotel in New York City, the occasion was the annual award of the Pulitzer Prize. Johnson was just twenty-five at the time.

Now In November was published on September 12, 1934. It is the story of a drought, which destroys a midwestern farm in the midst of the Great Depression. It deals with the life of the Haldmarnes – three daughters, father and mother – on a small Midwestern farm which the father is working as a last resort in an effort to provide some security for his children. The story is set down from the point of view of Marget Haldmarne.

From Now in November first edition dust jacket:

She writes of her novel: "I wanted to give a beautiful and yet not incongruous form to the ordinary living of live – to write, as I once said, poetry with its feet on the ground. I have tried to make life into art instead of making art seem alive. I have tried to show things as they are, but to show more also: the underground part of life that is unseen, and the richness which, though visible, is not noticed. I wanted to sketch these characters in a sort of plain idyl, beautiful only insofar as life itself is beautiful."

To see a first edition of Now In November click here:

First Edition of Now In November

Josephine Johnson wrote Now In November while living in her mother's attic in Webster Groves, Mo. She remained on her farm in Webster Groves and completed a book of short stories under the title Winter Orchard. She married Grant G. Cannon, editor in chief of the Farm Quarterly, in 1942. They had three children: Terence, Ann, and Carol. She died on February 27, 1990, in Batavia, Ohio at the age of 79.