The Listener

by

Taylor Caldwell

The Listener

by Taylor Caldwell

Copyright © 1960

Copyright renewed

mobi digital edition Copyright 2012 by eNet Press Inc.

All rights reserved.

Published by eNet Press Inc.

16580 Maple Circle, Lake Oswego OR 97034

Digitized in the United States of America in 2012

Revised 201208

www.enetpress.com

Cover designed by Eric Savage; www.savagecreative.com

ISBN 978-1-61886-416-1

Taylor Caldwell, christened Janet Miriam Holland Taylor Caldwell, was born in Manchester, England on September 7, 1900, into a family of Scottish background. Her family descended from the Scottish clan of MacGregor of which the Taylors are a subsidiary clan. In 1907 she emigrated to the United States with her parents and younger brother. Her father died shortly after the move, and the family struggled. At the age of eight she started to write stories, and in fact wrote her first novel,
The Romance of Atlantis
, at the age of twelve! (although it remained unpublished until 1975). She continued to write prolifically, however, despite ill health.

Taylor Caldwell was also known by the pen names of Marcus Holland and Max Reiner as well as her married name of J. Miriam Reback. Her works include
Dear and Glorious Physician
, a novel detailing the exploits of Saint Luke,
The Listener
, written about a mysterious altruistic individual who lends an ear where it is needed, and
Dynasty of Death
, a saga about a family of munitions makers.

In 1918-1919, she served in the United States Navy Reserve. In 1919 she married William F. Combs. In 1920, they had a daughter, Mary (known as ‘Peggy’). From 1923 to 1924 she was a court reporter in New York State Department of Labor in Buffalo, New York. In 1924, she went to work for the United States Department of Justice, as a member of the Board of Special Inquiry (an immigration tribunal) in Buffalo. In 1931 she graduated from the University of Buffalo, and also was divorced from William Combs.

Caldwell then married her second husband, Marcus Reback, a fellow Justice employee. She had a second child with Reback, a daughter Judith, in 1932. They were married for 40 years, until his death in 1971.

In 1934, she began to work on the novel
Dynasty of Death
, which she and Reback completed in collaboration. It was published in 1938 and became a best-seller. ‘Taylor Caldwell’ was presumed to be a man, and there was some public stir when the author was revealed to be a woman. Over the next 43 years, she published 42 more novels, many of them best-sellers. For instance,
This Side of Innocence
was the biggest fiction seller of 1946. Her works sold an estimated 30 million copies. She became wealthy, traveling to Europe and elsewhere, though she still lived near Buffalo.

Her books were big sellers right up to the end of her career. In 1979, she signed a two-novel deal for $3.9 million. During her career as a writer, she received several awards:
The National League of American Pen Women
gold medal (1948);
The Buffalo Evening News
Award (1949);
The Grand Prix Chatvain
(1950).

She was an outspoken conservative and for a time wrote for the John Birch Society’s monthly journal
American Opinion
. Her memoir,
On Growing Up Tough
, appeared in 1971, consisting of many edited-down articles from
American Opinion
.

Around 1970, she became interested in reincarnation. She had become friends with well-known occultist author Jess Stearn, who suggested that the vivid detail in her many historical novels was actually subconscious recollection of previous lives. Supposedly, she agreed to be hypnotized and undergo ‘past-life regression’ to disprove reincarnation. According to Stearn’s book,
The Search of a Soul - Taylor Caldwell’s Psychic Lives
(1973), Caldwell instead began to recall her own past lives - eleven in all, including one on the ‘lost continent’ of Lemuria.

In 1972, she married William Everett Stancell, a retired real estate developer, but divorced him in 1973. In 1978, she married William Robert Prestie, an eccentric Canadian 17 years her junior. This led to difficulties with her children. She had a long dispute with her daughter Judith over the estate of Judith’s father Marcus; in 1979, Judith committed suicide. Also in 1979, Caldwell suffered a stroke, which left her unable to speak, though she could still write. (She had been deaf since about 1965.) Her daughter Peggy accused Prestie of abusing and exploiting Caldwell, and there was a legal battle over her substantial assets.

She died of heart failure in Greenwich, Connecticut on August 30, 1985.

1938
DYNASTY OF DEATH

1940
THE EAGLES GATHER

1941
THE EARTH IS THE LORD’S
: A Tale of the Rise of Genghis Khan

1941
TIME NO LONGER

1942
THE STRONG CITY

1943
THE ARM AND THE DARKNESS

1943
THE TURNBULLS

1944
THE FINAL HOUR

1945
THE WIDE HOUSE

1946
THIS SIDE OF INNOCENCE

1947
THERE WAS A TIME

1948
MELISSA

1949
LET LOVE COME LAST

1951
THE BALANCE WHEEL

1952
THE DEVIL’S ADVOCATE

1953
MAGGIE - HER MARRIAGE

1954
NEVER VICTORIOUS, NEVER DEFEATED

1955
YOUR SINS AND MINE

1956
TENDER VICTORY

1957
THE SOUND OF THUNDER

1959
DEAR AND GLORIOUS PHYSICIAN

1960
THE LISTENER

1961
A PROLOGUE TO LOVE

1963
GRANDMOTHER AND THE PRIESTS

1963
THE LATE CLARA BEAME

1965
A PILLAR OF IRON

1965
WICKED ANGEL

1966
NO ONE HEARS BUT HIM

1967
DIALOGUES WITH THE DEVIL

1968
TESTIMONY OF TWO MEN

1970
GREAT LION OF GOD

1971
ON GROWING UP TOUGH

1972
CAPTAINS AND THE KINGS

1973
TO LOOK AND PASS

1974
GLORY AND THE LIGHTNING

1975
ROMANCE OF ATLANTIS
(with Jess Stearn)

1976
CEREMONY OF THE INNOCENT

1977
I, JUDAS
(with Jess Stearn)

1978
BRIGHT FLOWS THE RIVER

1980
ANSWER AS A MAN

Dedicated with all humility

to

THE LISTENER

For who listens to us in all the world, whether

he be friend or teacher, brother or father or

mother, sister or neighbor, son or ruler or

servant? Does he listen, our advocate, or our

husbands or wives, those who are dearest to us?

Do the stars listen, when we turn despairingly

away from man, or the great winds, or the seas or

the mountains? To whom can any man say —

Here I am! Behold me in my nakedness,

my wounds, my secret grief, my despair, my betrayal,

my pain, my tongue which cannot express my sorrow,

my terror, my abandonment.

Listen to me for a day — an hour! — a moment!

lest I expire in my terrible wilderness, my lonely

silence! O God, is there no one to listen?

*****

Is there no one to listen? you ask. Ah yes,

there is one who listens, who will always listen.

Hasten to him, my friend! He waits on the hill for you.

For you, alone.

Seneca