Kay Thompson

Kay Thompson &
Hilary Knight

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kay Thompson

Kay Thompson (born Catherine L. Fink); (November 9, 1909 – July 2, 1998) was an American writer, singer, vocal arranger, musician, dancer, actress, and choreographer, best known for creating the famous Eloise children's books, which featured a comically naughty little girl living in the Plaza Hotel in New York City.

Thompson began her career in the 1930s as a singer and choral director for radio. Her first big break was as a regular singer on the Bing Crosby show, Bing Crosby Entertains. This would lead to a long career working in Hollywood musicals in the 1940’s, and eventually would take her to a major silver screen role in the movie Funny Face (1957).

Thompson, who lived at the Plaza Hotel in New York City while she worked in the film business, became most notable as the author of the Eloise series of children's books. She developed the Eloise character based on her childhood imaginary friend and alter ego, Eloise, and it has been often speculated that Thompson's goddaughter, Liza Minnelli, was a possible model for Eloise.

The four books in the series, each illustrated by Hilary Knight, are Eloise (Simon & Schuster, 1955), Eloise in Paris (Simon & Schuster, 1957), Eloise at Christmastime (Random House, 1958) and Eloise in Moscow (Simon & Schuster, 1959). All were bestsellers upon release and have been adapted into television projects. A fifth book, Eloise Takes a Bawth, was posthumously published by Simon & Schuster in 2002, culled from Thompson's original manuscripts once slated for 1964 publication by Harper & Row. However, in 1964 Thompson was burned out on Eloise; she blocked publication and took all but the first book out of print.

Thompson died at the age of 88 on July 2, 1998, in her Upper East Side penthouse, formerly owned by Liza Minelli.

ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR

Hilary Knight

Hilary Knight (born November 1, 1926) is an American writer and artist. As the illustrator of more than 50 books and the author of nine books, he is best known as the illustrator and co-creator of Kay Thompson's Eloise (1955) and its sequels, and has been creating art for seven decades.

Influenced by his artistic parents, Knight’s first drawings were featured in 1952 in magazines such as Gourmet and Mademoiselle. Two years later, he was introduced to the actress and singer Kay Thompson. Over the next few years, they collaborated on four books featuring Eloise, the six-year-old girl who lives in the Plaza Hotel.

IMAGE

Jonathan Becker for Vanity Fair

Following Thompson’s death in 1998, Knight drew and painted five more books featuring Eloise. Mr. Knight has illustrated over fifty books, nine of which he also wrote. Besides books, his work has included note and greeting cards, children’s fashion advertisings, illustrations for Cricket magazine, record album covers and posters for Broadway musicals.

Referring to his relationship with Kay Thompson, Knight has said:

“Kay and I were like parents to Eloise. We decided that we'd never make her older than six, and that we'd always keep the parents in the background. When you really study the book, you see that Eloise is somewhat wistful. And I guess my job now is to continue what Kay might have thought she was doing when she pulled the books in the first place—to protect Eloise.”