Tarkington's mothers

Alice Adams, like Seventeen, centers on someone very young who forfeits a lot of our sympathy by madly pursuing goals that are worthless and unattainable. William loves a severely vapid girl. Alice is desperately seeking a place -- and a husband -- among her city's upper crust, which seems to consist of a few cliquish rich families who barely tolerate her.

A few things make Alice's story much less funny, though it has its moments. 

She's older (22) and her life, unlike William's when his summer madness hits, is really stalled. Her family's not so well off as William's, and not nearly so well off as they pretend to be.

And her mother's just as silly as she is.

William's mother is calmly detached, except when his inamorata babbles baby talk to her and when he tries to buy a tux with a checkered past to wear to the big dance. (It was worn by a murderer at the time of the crime, his little sister reports, but the secondhand dealer got the bloodstains out.) When Dad's tux comes back from the tailor too small, she indirectly lets William know he can borrow it after all. Not that it solves all his problems . . .

Alice's mother, on the other hand, ramps up to the big dance by spending the whole day remaking one of Alice's dresses. Our heroine, meanwhile, is out raiding a public park for violets because she can't afford a corsage. (She gives her mother more sewing time by washing the dishes, and when she breaks a saucer she just sweeps the pieces under the stove.)

Mrs. Adams really believes her daughter belongs up there at the mansion, not in their own boring old lower middle class milieu. The other girls are just jealous of her. The rich girl Alice pushes herself on really is her best friend. If Mr. Adams had only taken some initiative . . . etc., etc.

William's mother asks Miss PRATT, as he calls her, over for iced tea and cupcakes. The only concession she makes to keeping up appearances is to send the yardman around back so he's not the first sight visible on the premises. Alice's mother asks gentleman caller Mr. Russell to an overambitious dinner party featuring "fashionable" Brussels sprouts and a temp waitress whom she tries to pass off as "our housemaid". This falls through when Alice's father has to ask his wife what the girl's name is. And of course, this all takes place on the hottest night of the year.

William's mother stands back and sees him through; Alice's mother tries to help, but just hurries her down the road to disaster.

It's not always fun being the sane one. But often it's Ma's job.