On the Sunny Side of the Street: The Life and Lyrics of Dorothy Fields

I have always loved "The Way You Look Tonight'" ever since hearing Fred Astaire sing it to Ginger Rogers. The lyrics are so subtle and elegant. I hated to finish this book as Fields was so accomplished as a a lyricist, entertainer and warm, giving, loving friend, colleague and parent. I was saddened and shocked to read of her all too sudden death at 69. What a talent! She deserved the Oscar for the above. Imagine a career began in the early 1930's and continued into 1970 with "Sweet Charity. I am also thrilled that the author included the lyrics to so many of Field's fabulous, intelligent and clever songs.

I enjoyed it enormously. Deborah Grace Winer is a fine writer and gives a wonderful picture of Doroth Fields and her life.Betty Corwin

Engaging & breezy biog of a pioneer female pop song composer. Ms Winer focuses more on Ms Fields' musical output & that's fine. ( Lots of good pix enclosed herein as well.)

This book is extremely superficial and obviously the author didn't do very much research. I also got the CD, An Evening with Dorothy Fields, that was recorded live in 1972 (highly recommended). Winer has quoted verbatim a lot of what is said on the CD without putting quotation marks around it. Winer's book tells virtually nothing of Fields' personal life apart from the occasional bombshell like "she was now married a second time since her first marriage had been from the very beginning a mistake acknowledged by both parties [that's a vague paraphrase]" or "now the mother of two children, Dorothy had to..." or later on, "her drinking, always a problem, had gotten worse." There is no elaboration on any of these points. But the book does provide a broad overview of her career, even though a few of her films may have gone unmentioned. I wanted to know more about the person who wrote those easy-to-sing and easy-to-remember lyrics. Writers and publishers take note: There really ought to be a more in-depth biography of Dorothy Fields. She is too important a figure of the 20th Century American cultural landscape to be ignored. THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET isn't much, but right now it's all we have. Until the definitive biography comes along, it will have to do.

Interesting life of one of the first WOMEN in the songwriting business to have success.

Very nice book at a good price.

When the Smithsonian issued a recording in honor of Dorothy Fields, the 22 selections that boasted her lyrics included "I Can't Give You Anything But Love," "I'm in the Mood For Love," "Never Gonna Dance," "On the Sunny Side of the Street," "Big Spender," and "If My Friends Could See Me Now." Even those few titles reveal (1) how many familiar lyrics she wrote, (2) how long a time period she was artistically active, (3) for how many media she wrote. Her first datable work is from1926, her last from 1973. A remarkable woman in what was after all a man's craft. Equally fascinating were her co-workers: Jimmy McHugh, Jerome Kern, Arthur Schwartz, Sigmund Romberg. And they are all here in Deborah Grace Winer's <On the Sunny Side of the Street: the Life and Lyrics of Dorothy Fields> (Schirmer Books, 1997). I did enjoy this book immensely and found it easy reading. What I missed was a sense of the personality around which this book is centered. Read about Dorothy Parker, for example, and you have a sense of what drove this artist. No such feeling comes from this book, in which the author has taken an objective view of the life and times of Fields and made little attempt to get "under the skin," so to speak. Perhaps I ask for the impossible since the author was not privy to any personal writings of her subject. But there are always friends who could have been mined for such information. Dorothy also tends to get a little lost for pages at a time as the personalities of other luminaries of the time are discussed. As fascinating as they all are, our interest wanders too often from the main character. Still I give this book 5 stars for what it does and not subtract for what I personally think it lacks. The illustrations are quite good, by the way, and the inclusion of many of her lyrics is a good thing.

I enjoyed this book; it is not a complicated story nor deeply written, but enjoyable.

Deborah Grace Winer ha compiuto un'opera pioneristica. Non mi risulta vi sia stata prima una ricerca su Dorothy Fields. Il Lavoro contiene testi e libretti per spettacoli per Broadway e adattamenti per Hollywood. E' un testo che si completa con immagini d'epoca che rendono pienamente l'idea dell "mood" di Dorothy Fields.

It's a good reading , but somehow without interesting details.It's a kind of a formal bio where you feel the real bits has been ignored.