Katharine Hepburn
By: Barbara Leaming.
Edition: 1st American ed.
Publisher: Crown Publishers
Published: 1995
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 549
Subjects: Hepburn, Katharine, 1907-2003; Hepburn, Katharine, 1907-2003 -- Family; Houghton family; Motion picture actors and actresses -- United States -- Biography
Genres: Biography.
First sentence: A little over fifty years ago, the superintendent of Prospect Lawn Cemetery in the village of Hamburg, New York, looked up in astonishment as the door to his office flew open and Katharine Hepburn swept in.
Description: At last, the definitive biography of Katharine Hepburn - the story she herself has never told. Hollywood has produced many stars, but no one compares to Katharine Hepburn. She is the last of the great ones: a celebrated actress, a brilliant personality, an original. In more than sixty years of public life, countless men have fallen in love with her, women have admired her, and yet only a handful have ever known the real Kate.

What drove Katharine Hepburn? Why was she so loved? How could such a fiercely independent woman have given up her life to one man - Spencer Tracy - to the point of curling up on the floor outside his hotel room while he drank himself into unconsciousness behind a locked door?

Barbara Leaming has discovered thousands of never-before-seen documents that finally illuminate the mystery of this enigmatic, fascinating woman. Growing up in a family shadowed by suicide and madness, young Kate was unaware of her family's tragic history until the day - she was thirteen - she discovered her brother hanging dead in an attic. His death - and the heritage that might have explained it - was never talked of again, leaving Kate with unresolved questions that have haunted her ever since.

It is a love story - though not the one you would expect. It is also a family story that brings alive three generations of fearless women, personal and political crusaders who shaped the history of women in our century.
Notes: Includes index.
Table of contents: title: Illustrations
pagenum: viii; title: Family Tree
pagenum: x; title: Prologue
pagenum: 1; label: Katharine Hepburn
title: Part One
pagenum: 3; label: Katharine Hepburn
title: Part Two
pagenum: 197; title: Acknowedgments
pagenum: 494; title: Notes on Source
pagenum: 498; title: Index
pagenum: 515