Fawn Brodie as an Accuser

The most influential and widely distributed interpretation of Joseph Smith’s involvement with plural marriage was written by Fawn Brodie in her 1945 biography No Man Knows My History.

Brodie's work is also censurable due to several weaknesses. Her excessive dependence upon published sources unavoidably skewed her interpretations. Virtually all of books and pamphlets printed by non-Mormons in the 1800s reflected the idea that Nauvoo polygamy arose because Joseph Smith was a womanizer. Clergy and anti-Mormons wrote numerous reports during that time period with that singular message. Any writer who, like Brodie, preferentially quotes printed documents will also reflect this view.

Only a few published materials in the 19th century defended Joseph Smith and less than a handful reported the historical unfolding of the practice. Excommunicated from the LDS Church, Fawn Brodie composed her biography without doing any research in the Church Historical Department, even though it holds the largest cache of pertinent documents, including hundreds of handwritten manuscripts written by participants.

Brodie's biographer, Newell Bringhurst wrote: “She speculated on Joseph Smith’s motives for entering and endorsing polygamy. She believed that he came to view monogamy as an intolerably circumscribed way of life.”[1] LDS historian Marvin S. Hill wrote: “With regard to plural marriage, where Brodie is so confident that the real Joseph Smith, the pleasure lover and sensualist, shows through, there is no evidence in his writings to suggest that he thought of it in other than religious terms. Had Brodie seen more of what is in the archives she might have hesitated before adopting her thesis of intentional fraud.”[2]

Charles L. Cohen, Professor of History and Religious Studies at UW-Madison, and Director of the Lubar Institute for the Study of the Abrahamic Religions, assessed: “Brodie’s insight that Smith’s life must have become sexually stale… rests on inference rather than evidence.”[3]

Undoubtedly the popularity of Brodie's biography is due to the impressive writing style and the prose she produced. In addition, her credentials are impressive. However, the greatest factor propelling her reconstruction among subsequent generations is undoubtedly that she presents a version of Joseph Smith that is appealing to readers who disbelieve his message.

[1] Newell G. Bringhurst, Fawn McKay Brodie: A Biographer’s Life, Norman: U. of Oklahoma, 1999, 88.

[2] Marvin S. Hill, "Brodie Revisited: A Reappraisal." Dialogue, A Journal of Mormon Thought, 7 (Winter 1972) 4: 76.

[3] Charles. L. Cohen, “No Man Knows My Psychology: Fawn Brodie, Joseph Smith, and Psychoanalysis,” BYU Studies, 44 (2005) 1: 67.