Ellen Pall -- Biography

In a dim, roomy apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side, a small, pale woman sits at a desk in a cluttered study and, in such morning light as is reflected off the brick wall opposite her window, peers at the screen of a computer.
Soon, followed by a little dog, she stands up and goes into the kitchen. Here, she pours herself a cup of tea. She returns to the office and stares at the screen again, while the dog curls up in an armchair.

At some point, both woman and dog go to the adjoining bedroom, where the dog jumps on the bed while the woman tries to make it. They then return to the computer, to look at the day's work so far. Desperate, reminding herself that anything is better than nothing, the woman types in a sentence or two, walks to the kitchen again, empties the dishwasher, then repairs to her study, this time taking a tangerine. She types in a few more sentences, dreams of lunch, and wonders what on earth made her think she could write whatever she is supposed to be writing. This goes on for hours, and it would be hard to say which, to the outside observer, would be more interesting: the woman, whose name is Ellen Pall, or the dog (whose name is Shobai).

Eventually, the woman's son comes home from school; later, her husband turns up. At various times in her life (see Who's Who or Contemporary Authors below, for statistics and details), this woman has sat and wondered why she thought she could write a mystery novel (“Corpse de Ballet” and “Slightly Abridged,” see “Mystery Novels”, a literary novel ("Back East" and "Among the Ginzburgs," see "Literary Novels") or another article (usually about the arts for the New York Times, see "Journalism") or, long ago, a Regency romance ("See Regencies").

She is currently wondering how to end a brief autobiographical sketch.

Frequently Asked Questions

from

PALL, Ellen Jane 1952-
(Fiona Hill)

PERSONAL: Born March 28, 1952, in New York, NY; daughter of David B. (a scientist) and Josephine (an artist; maiden name, Blatt) Pall. Education: Attended University of Michigan, 1969-70; University of California, Santa Barbara, B.A., 1973. Religion: Jewish.

CAREER: Teacher of French in Glendale, CA, 1974; writer, 1975--.

MEMBER: Phi Beta Kappa.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Back East, David Godine (Boston) 1983.
Among the Ginzburgs, Zoland Books (Cambridge, MA) 1996.

NOVELS; UNDER PSEUDONYM FIONA HILL

The Trellised Lane, Berkley (New York City), 1975.
The Wedding Portrait, Berkley, 1975
The Practical Heart, Berkley, 1975.
Love in a Major Key, Berkley, 1976.
Sweet's Folly, Berkley, 1977.
The Love Child, Putnam (New York City), 1977.
The Autumn Rose, Putnam, 1978.

SIDELIGHTS: Ellen Pall first made her mark in the publishing world with the Regency romances she wrote under the pseudonym Fiona Hill; nearly ten years later, she won the respect of critics with novels published under her own name. She began her literary career after graduating from college, when her father agreed to support her financially for six months while she tried to write and sell a novel. Knowing that she could not complete a "serious" work of literature during that time, she determined to write a historical novel--specifically, a Regency romance. Pall described the genre in a New York Times Book Review article about her work: "Regency romances are a sunny and compact genre in which a lady and a gentleman meet, form indifferent opinions of each other, banter for 200 pages or so, kiss and agree to marry. They take place in the better drawing rooms of England and are written in a dense, slang-ridden version of the diction of their period, the years from 1811 to 1820 when the Prince Regent, the future George IV, reigned in place of his mad father--the eponymous Regency.... As much comedy as romance, a Regency makes its tickling assault on the imagination, not the senses."

In five months, Pall had finished her first book, which was soon published as The Trellised Lane. She hoped that her father would be sufficiently impressed to subsidize her work on a more serious novel. He was not. "Far from being moved to extend his literary patronage, he proudly, briskly, firmly and finally congratulated me on my good fortune in entering so congenial a profession, wished me luck and considered our joint experiment complete," she confided in the New York Times Book Review article. In order to support herself, she began another Regency. "Soon--alarmingly soon--writing Regencies was the only thing I really knew how to do," she confessed. The genre flourished, and "Fiona Hill" was soon promoted from paperback to hardcover. Pall, who was growing bored with her lucrative work, explained that "this meant my manuscripts had to be twice as long. Feeling like the girl in 'Rumpelstiltskin'--whose reward for having spun a room full of straw into gold was a larger room full of straw--I wrote on."

Ten years passed before Pall published a novel under her own name. When it happened, many reviewers rated Back East an unqualified success. It tells the story of Melanie Armour, a commercial songwriter who, after twelve years on the West Coast, leaves Los Angeles to return to her family in New York. She falls in love with a teenaged homosexual actor and, in another plot strand, visits her family's farm in Maine, where she enters into long-standing emotional struggles with her mother and brother. "Surprise follows surprise in the life of a a heroine one cares about and wishes well," found a Publishers Weekly reviewer. A Library Journal contributor declared that "vivid characters coupled with a tightly structured plot...make this novel a pleasurable and moving experience." A Kirkus Reviews writer voiced some reservations, however. Describing Melanie's narration of the story as "arch but crisply stylish," the reviewer went on to say: "Unfortunately, first-novelist Pall gives relatively little space here to the promising family-material--which, treated so skimpily, emerges as contrived, caricatured, and unaffecting. Weak, unfocused debut-fiction, then--but Pall's prose, though often just glib or smug/cute, is precise, shrewd, and brightly amusing enough to suggest better novels to come."

Pall's next novel, Among the Ginzburgs, again focused on family dynamics. In this book, a diverse group of siblings gathers at their old summer house to meet with the father who deserted them years before and who is now dying of leukemia. A Library Journal reviewer complained that "it is hard to feel too deeply for these characters," but other commentators, including Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein, were much more enthusiastic. Pointing out that much of the book consists of dialog, Wasserstein went on to say in the New York Times Book Review: "It's not the talk that gives this novel its honesty, but the insights that Ms. Pall...has about unspoken family ties. In dissecting the family's motivations, she breaks down her dramatic structure and is free to examine with absolute acuity the ever-expanding and contracting familial pull of brothers and sisters, husbands and wives." A Publishers Weekly critic was also emphatically positive, writing, "There are no villains or heroes in this perceptive, poignant examination of family," because Pall "digs deep to expose the sweetness and vulnerability that are at each one's core." She "puts a clever and always gentle twist on scenes that in less able hands would be cliched and melodramatic. Dialogue, characterizations, setting--all ring true in this mature, gracefully realized work."

Ellen Pall once told CA: "Why does anyone become a writer? I became a writer because I was moved by the things people do not say. I became a writer to impress my father. I became a writer because I could become a writer. I became a writer because I wrote well. I became a writer because writing became me."

BIOGRAPHICAL/CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Horn Book, December, 1983, p. 740.
Kirkus Reviews, July 15, 1983, p. 784.
Library Journal, September 1, 1983, p. 1721; April 1, 1996, p. 119.
New York Times Book Review, April 30, 1989, p. 1; June 2, 1996, p. 24.
Publishers Weekly, July 22, 1983, p. 118; April 22, 1996, p. 61.
Washington Post Book World, July 14, 1996, p. 6.

from

PALL, ELLEN JANE, writer; b. N.Y.C., Mar. 28, 1952; d. David B. and Josephine H. (Blatt) Pall; m. Richard Holmes Dicker, July 12, 1986; 1 child, Benjamin. BA, U. Calif., Santa Barbara, 1973. Freelance writer for several jours., 1987-; staff assoc. Bread Loaf Writers Conf., Middlebury, Vt., 1986; instr. UCLA-Ext., 1980-83; adj. Asst. Prof. Fordham U./Coll. at Lincoln Ctr., N.Y.C., 1990-93. Author: (under pen name Fiona Hill) The Trellised Lane, The Wedding Portrait, The Practical Heart, Love in a Major Key, Sweet's Folly, The Autumn Rose, The Love Child, The Stanbroke Girls, 1981, The Country Gentleman, 1987, (as Ellen Pall) Back East, 1983, Among the Ginzburgs, 1996; contbr. Articles to N.Y. Times Mag., N.Y. Times Arts & Leisure, New Yorker Mag., Chgo. Tribune, Washington Post; book reviewer. Shane Stevens fellow Bread Loaf Writer's Conf., Vt. 1983. Mem. Am. PEN (freedom to write.com.).

My Sister In Disguise from The New York Times Magazine, March 30, 1997, Sunday.

URBAN TACTICS; Imaginary People In Real Gardens from The New York Times City Section, May 6, 2001, Sunday.

In the Grasp of Romance: My Life as Fiona Hill from The New York Times Book Review, April 30, 1989, Sunday.

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