DURANT, Ariel

Born Ida Kaufman, 10 May 1898, Proskurov, Russia; died 25 October 1981, Hollywood Hills, California

Daughter of Joseph and Ethel Appel Kaufman; married William J. Durant, 1913

Ariel Durant emigrated with her mother, three sisters, and one brother to New York City in 1900 and became a naturalized citizen in 1913. She attended public schools and the Ferrer Modern School in New York. At the latter institution she fell in love with her twenty-seven-year-old teacher, William James Durant. The couple were married in a civil ceremony in 1913, when Ida was fifteen years of age. In 1927 Ida Durant was affectionately and informally renamed Ariel by her husband because, he claimed, "she was as strong and brave as a boy, and as swift and mischievous as an elf." Ariel later became Ida Durant's legal name.

After the publication of The Age of Napoleon (vol. XI) in 1975, the U.S. Senate, on a motion by Senator Hubert Humphrey, voted the Durants a scroll of recognition and applause. The French government presented them with two medallions in appreciation of their recording of French civilization and, in January 1977, Ariel and Will each received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Durant herself received several honorary doctoral degrees; in 1965, she was named Woman of the Year in Literature by the Los Angeles Times.

Ariel and Will's marriage in 1913 launched a dual career as the two began collaborating on the series The Story of Civilization. Volumes I, III, and V (Our Oriental Heritage, Caesar and Christ, The Renaissance) were dedicated to Ariel, but Will alone was named as the author. In his introduction to The Age of Reason Begins (vol. VII, 1961) Will noted that Ariel's contributions to the series had become so substantial that both their names had to appear on the title page. In succeeding years, Ariel coauthored with Will four additional volumes: The Age of Louis XIV (1963), The Age of Voltaire (1965), Rousseau and Revolution (1967), and The Age of Napoleon (1975).

In their dual autobiography, Ariel characterized her work on the early volumes of The Story of Civilization—Our Oriental Heritage and The Life of Greece—as serving the subsidiary but immensely important function of organizing and classifying Will's material. In addition to performing these tasks, Ariel began, with volume IV, The Age of Faith, to gather data for the manuscript. She describes how, while collating material for The Age of Faith, an enthusiastic interest in the history of the Middle Ages was awakened within her. Ariel was largely responsible for encouraging Will to overcome his antipathy for this historical period and for convincing him of the need to portray the medieval Jews in a full and lively manner.

Published materials about the couple stress the importance of Ariel's contribution to the entire Story of Civilization series. While she initially served largely as a proofreader and moralelifter to Will, by 1961 Ariel was coauthor of the seventh and Pulitzer Prize-winning volume. Ariel is credited with checking Will's tendency to romanticize women's roles in history, and, in 1965, Will asserted in an interview that Ariel was certainly capable of finishing the rest of their work (volumes X and XI) alone.

The Story of Civilization series is generally regarded as good, solid popular history. The writing style is genial and relaxed; the series is, on the whole, reliable and thoroughly researched. Certain volumes have been criticized for some factual errors and for a fondness for anecdotes which can blur perspective. The work is recognized, however, as a massive universal history, one carrying Western civilization from its very beginnings through the Age of Napoleon.

The reader who wishes to encounter the personality of Ariel would be well advised to read Will and Ariel Durant: A Dual Autobiography. In this work, Ariel speaks for herself, and the reader is able to compare her views with Will's, since each writes separate and clearly delineated sections. Ariel's strength, wit, and astonishing candor about all matters, especially the sexual, infuse the portions written by her. Her accounts of her married life, including times of crisis and conflict, reveal her to be an independent woman with a refreshing sense of humor and perspective.

Readers of a feminist bent might be wont to criticize Ariel for the apparent submersion of her unique identity in her husband's life and work. It is true that if one concentrates exclusively on The Story of Civilization, Ariel, however unfairly, certainly seems to play a secondary role in the evolution of this work. The reader who consults the autobiography, however, will find an astonishingly complex and assertive woman who, from her early youth, exhibited an unusual sensitivity to women's needs, problems, and struggles.

In the first chapter of the autobiography, entirely written by Ariel, she recounts her childhood allegiance to her mother, Ethel Appel. Ariel's comments about her mother's personal ambitions reveal a sympathy for the struggles of this immigrant woman who helped support a family by selling newspapers but who ultimately chose an independent life of her own. Ariel tells, with sensitivity and candor, how her mother, worn out by childbearing and ignorant of contraceptives, discouraged her husband's attentions and caused a lasting alienation between them. After absorbing the radical views of lecturers and reading Ibsen's A Doll's House, Ethel Appel cried, "Am I never to have any freedom, never a day of happiness or rest?" Ariel's mother then moved from the family apartment and established a separate residence and, soon, a full life of her own. Ariel we are told, "was the only one in the family who sympathized with her."

Ariel, asserts that her mother was "stranger than fiction… aggressive and strong" and that she, Ariel, takes after her mother alone. The strength and determination of Ariel are implicit in The Story of Civilization's evolution and explicit in her portions of the autobiography. The full dimension of Ariel's remarkable personality will only be revealed, when the papers of the Durants are opened for general scrutiny.

Bibliography:

Johnson, D., Practical History: A Guide to Will and Ariel Durant's The Story of Civilization (1990).

Other reference:

Life (18 Oct, 1963). National Review (16 Jan. 1968). NYT (7 May 1968). Reader's Digest (Oct. 1969). Time (13 Aug. 1965). Will and Ariel Durant: The Famous Historians Discuss Their Life and Career with James Day (audio cassette).

—SUSAN E. SIEFERT