The Bond

A riveting tale of love, art, sex, jealousy, and compromise based on one of the most famously liberated marriages of the early twentieth century

A leading literary figure of the Progressive Era, Neith Boyce wrote “The Girl Bachelor,” a popular and pioneering column in Vogue about life as a single woman in New York City. When Boyce—whose circle of famous friends included Carl Van Vechten, Eugene O’Neill, Mina Loy, Mable Dodge Luhan, Margaret Sanger, and Djuna Barnes—wed journalist Hutchins Hapgood, they vowed to make their life together a true union of equals: They would respect each other’s autonomy in everything from art to sexual desire, and could take other lovers provided their commitment to the marriage remained steadfast.
 
In The Bond, Boyce employs a thin veneer of fiction to document the ups and downs of such a radically open-minded relationship. Teresa, a sculptress, struggles to balance her artistic pursuits with her duties as a wife and mother, while her husband, Basil, finds his progressive beliefs about monogamy and sex severely tested when his wife becomes attracted to another man. A fascinating tale of one couple’s attempt to rewrite the rules of marriage, made all the more compelling by its basis in fact, The Bond remains as brave and forward-thinking today as when it was first published more than a century ago.
 
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