Streisand, Barbra. My Name Is Barbra. New York: Viking, 2023.

Wow! How do I begin?
 
Full disclosure: I’ve been a fan of Barbra Streisand since 1962 when I was fourteen, and, from the speaker of an AM radio, emanated this crystalline voice. It lifted me across the room like a wonderful fragrance. I thought, God, I’ve got to hear more of her. And so I did. Decades of albums later (most of which I own in one medium or another). I bought both the hardcover ($31) and the Audible version ($61) of this book, so you know I’m serious when I declare I’m a fan. Her work has always cost more than that of other artists, and I’ve always paid it. You get what you pay for, and her case it is great artistry.
 
This memoir might better be subtitled as an autobiography because it covers every minute, every inch of her life—album by album, show or concert by concert, and film by film. At first, I am a bit disconcerted, as I follow along in the hardcover, that she does not read the text word for word. Her prose is quite engaging—rich and varied. But she adds so many asides, creating more of a conversational tone in her book, that I’m grateful for the audio version, as well. It must have taken her months to make the Audible recording, and yet her voice never wavers (except by way of certain emotions); it sounds as if she recorded the 900+ pages (48+ hours) in one smooth session. This woman does nothing by half.
 
And perhaps that is the crux of Streisand’s book: She means to tell her own story her own way, after decades of being misrepresented and misquoted again and again. Myth Number One: Barbra is hard to work with. Nope. She quotes from directors, actors, and other professionals she’s collaborated with that because of her exacting nature, she is a joy to work with. Because she collects discerning individuals around her, she creates a fine synergy, by which the highest quality is sought after by all. Exceptions exist, like the late Ray Stark, producer, to whom Streisand is tied for her first five films. He is a lying, conniving person who cheats her in several ways, and she can’t wait to be free of him. In some ways (creativity mainly), her career does not begin until he’s nowhere near her career.
 
Myth Number Two: Barbra loves to perform. For the first time, I learn that every time she must appear before a live crowd to sing, the experience frightens her to death. She loves performing in the studio, making albums. She is deeply emersed when appearing in or directing a film. Yet, later in her career, she does “conquer her fears,” a line of dialog I borrow from her concert in New York’s Central Park (1967). Over time, she learns to trust her audience, to include them as a collective partner.
 
Myth Number Three: Barbra is a cold b———. You should read all the adoring notes, letters, and reviews that people write. You should hear of the friendships she develops with other actors, directors, musicians, artists, and professionals close to her. Marty, her agent (manager?), at ninety-something, is still with her. Renata, her personal assistant-housekeeper-chef-chauffeur has remained with her for over sixty years. You don’t retain that kind of loyalty by being unkind.
 
Then there is the personal. Barbra confesses (we’ve always guessed) how the loss of her father at an early age affects her entire life. She describes the rocky but loving relationship with a mother who, it turns out, is so jealous of her own daughter’s success that she often turns a cold shoulder to Barbra—even skipping an important performance in Las Vegas to play the slots with her friends. Barbra shares the details of the romances in her life (those whom she loved and those who loved her): Omar Shariff, Marlon Brando, and others not so well known. An entire chapter she devotes to her husband of twenty-five years: (hello, gorgeous) James Brolin.
 
Though she may have had an editor to help her shape the book (what published writer doesn’t?), Streisand’s prose, both conversational and formal at times, is her own. After all, the woman has written screenplay treatments, screenplays, and another book besides. (Songs!) Like everything else she does, Streisand approaches this book with love and exacting detail. If you like her at all, or if you are curious, pony up and either read or listen to the book (or both, as I did). You won’t be disappointed.
 
Oh, and as a bonus, whenever Barbra Streisand explains how a certain album is developed, she includes sound snippets from the tracks to demonstrate what she is talking about. Sublime. Sublime. Sublime. Sit in on the best master class ever!

Coming Next:
​TUES: A Writer's Wit | John Dufresne
WEDS: A Writer's Wit | Laura Lippman
THURS: A Writer's Wit | S. J. Perelman
FRI: My Book World | Jennifer Egan, Manhattan Beach

​Highsmith, Patricia. Edith’s Diary. New York: Atlantic Monthly, 1989 (1977).
 
An interesting interior novel. A middle-aged woman’s life is plagued with any number of problems, least of which is that her husband divorces her. At the same time, she keeps a diary that reflects a much happier version of her life—so much so that by the end, her behavior seems bizarre (at least to her ex-husband and others who think she should see a shrink). As a reader I never see the deterioration, however. I believe she’s merely frustrated with all that life has thrown at her.

Coming Next:
​TUES: A Writer's Wit | Karen Abbott
WEDS: A Writer's Wit | Edith Wharton
THURS: A Writer's Wit | Joe Conason
FRI: My Book World | Barbra Streisand, My Name Is Barbra

Chee, Alexander. The Queen of the Night. Boston: Houghton, 2016.

If there is any performance greater than a tour de force, I don’t know what it would be called, but this novel would surely fall under such a category. I’ve not been this stupefied by a contemporary novel for a long time. And so much to say about it!
 
This novel begins briefly in America, and it ends softly there. Lilliet (although she deftly goes by many names, as needed) is orphaned in her teens and flees the Midwest for New York City. There she (of course) is taken advantage of by men and for a short time earns money selling herself. But she manages to secure a job with a circus (in part by lying about her abilities) sailing for Europe. Her aim: to connect with her late mother’s relatives in Lucerne, Switzerland. In Paris, however, she makes an adequate living but then because of her singular voice becomes a singer: And again a prostitute. Then a lady in waiting. Then she is trained as an opera singer by an expert. She is wooed by a prince, a famous tenor, a young composer. She backtracks at times, vacating the world of opera, because her voice (determined by experts to be a falcon, a darker-toned soprano) is fragile. Throughout, one wonders how she remains disease- and pregnancy-free, a thought that crosses her own mind:
 
I somehow had been spared both marriage and children thus far, mostly as a condition of my class, but not entirely. I had been spared worse, as well—the clap, tuberculosis, smallpox, wasting—until now, I had given it little thought. Your health, when you have it, is invisible to you. I only thought of myself as lucky and that this was my only luck. But was I lucky? Or did I have a spiteful womb?” (336).
 
This self-reflection occurs more than halfway through the book, and Lilliet proceeds to remain marriage- and child-free (by her own desires, in spite of being in love with the composer). It is a comfortable and fortunate condition for her, and it is the author’s way of setting her up to experience an extraordinary freedom for a woman living in the middle of 19th-century France.
 
And it must be said that Lilliet is a true performer, not a poseur of some kind:
 
I studied Carmen as if I were in school again. I started a new notebook, like the one I kept for each of the roles in my repertoire. I always began learning my music by copying out the lyrics by hand, and I marked the music above them. My mornings before rehearsal were spent with a pencil and the blank pages of a journal that came with me to the rehearsal, where I made notes, writing down thoughts the director and the conductor gave as well. I translated the libretto in order to understand, as much as possible, what I sang and what, if anything, might come of it” (478).
            
Whew! And yet, Lilliet knows, as a woman, what her lot in life is:
 
In this world, some time long ago, far past anyone’s remembering, women as a kind had done something so terrible, so awful, so fantastically cruel that they and their daughters and their daughters’ daughters were forever beyond forgiveness until the end of time” (538). 
 
This thought ties to her very last act in the novel, one I shall not divulge, for it is key to understanding Lilliet and her plight, her ultimate place on earth, as she returns to the US and once again joins the circus (her operatic voice is ruined), Barnum’s circus. She has arrived back where she began what seems a lifetime ago.

Coming Next:
TUES: A Writer's Wit | Katherine Patterson
WEDS: A Writer's Wit | Stephen Crane
THURS: A Writer's Wit | Lois McMaster Bujold
FRI: My Book World | Ottessa Moshfegh, McGlue

Johnson, George M. All Boys Aren’t Blue: A Memoir-Manifesto. New York: Farrar, 2020.

All I can say is I wish this young adult book had been around when I was in high school—back in the middle of the last century. Yet it is odd that this man, thirty-eight years my junior, goes through many of the traumas I do in my youth: trying to maintain two psyches, one private and one public; two lives, one inner and one outer. I most love the details of Johnson’s college life, in which he joins a fraternity (of long-distinguished African-American lineage), half of whom are also gay, and the other half are OK with his orientation. He limns a very sensitive picture of his first time with another guy, one experience as a top and one as a bottom. The descriptions are real, even erotic, but not in themselves titillating. We also are privileged to read of his loving middle-class family life in New Jersey. This book should be available by way of multiple copies in every high school in America. Sadly, we live in a time when public libraries are being besieged by book burners, I mean, book banners, who serve to remove such tomes from our students’ shelves. I plan to buy copies and make sure they’re available in my city’s public libraries—or perhaps the little free libraries that pop up in towns. Maybe we all can do our part.

Coming Next:
TUES: A Writer's Wit | Moss Hart
WEDS: A Writer's Wit | Anne Tyler
THURS: A Writer's Wit | Hillary Clinton
FRI: My Book World | Alexander Chee, The Queen of the Night

Ken and I met on Valentine's Day in 1976, and it has always served as our anniversary date. This year, on our 47th, we booked a suite at the Pioneer Pocket Hotel in downtown Lubbock.

Beginning with the hotel restaurant, the  West Table, we shared a fine, if noisy, dinner—both partaking of a fine Scarpetta Pinot Grigio and a Pan Roasted Chicken with Warm Potato Salad and Lemon Caper Vinaigrette.

Thumbnail history: the Hotel Lubbock with six floors opened in 1925-26. Five floors were added in 1929-30. In 1961, it came under new ownership and was christened the Pioneer Hotel. It was replete with Italian marble floors in the lobby; the structure featured three restaurants; and its ballroom served as a center for civic events, including TTU fraternity dances. The May 11, 1970 tornado superficially damaged the hotel, but its steel-and-concrete structure remained a fortress (much better than the former Great Plains Life Building next door). Nineteen-seventy-five saw the hotel become a retirement center for people with low or fixed incomes and remained that way till the mid-1990s. It closed because the owners could not afford to make mandated changes in plumbing, heating, and air conditioning. It sat empty, boarded up for nearly a decade until the McDougal Companies bought it and converted the hotel into as many as twenty-five condos, some as large as 2,800 square feet. It opened in 2012, and in 2018, the third-floor spaces were converted into ten pocket hotel rooms or suites. It is difficult to pin down the term, but pocket hotels may have begun in Japan. The Pioneer Pocket Hotel features a "staffless" status. Clients book and pay online. On the day of arrival, they receive a text with door codes, and voila, there you are—ready to enjoy your stay fully stocked with fresh sheets, towel service, bottled water, and more. Our suite featured a TV in each room, but we didn't watch much.

​Ken and I enjoyed our one-night stay—an evening free from cooking—and will certainly consider staying again. It would make a great place for an overflow of guests in your own home! Note the gallery of photos directly below.

On February 20, as an extension of our anniversary celebration, Ken and I booked two tickets for the Czech Filharmonie Brno, established in the 1870s; the orchestra performed in Helen DeVitt Theater of the Buddy Holly Hall which opened in 2020, just as the pandemic was beginning. The program, as is typical of the Brno orchestra, features an all-Czech program, including Leoš Janáček's Sinfonietta and Antonín Dvořák's Symphony No. 8 in G Major. Buddy Holly Hall's Helen DeVitt Jones Theater seats around 2,300 persons by way of orchestra and dress circle seats on the main floor, and three balconies: the mezzanine, grand tier, and balcony levels. A smaller theater can accommodate lesser audiences. I can't wait to see an opera in the venue because that's certainly what it feels like to be there! Note photos below.

See Buddy Holly Hall | Helen Devitt Jones Theater for Upcoming Performances, Pop and Classical

Rodgers, Mary and Jesse Green. Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers. New York: Farrar, 2022.

I’ve been a huge fan of comic Carol Burnett my entire life. I remember her belting out a song called “Shy,” when she appeared in a TV version of the play, Once Upon a Mattress. By today’s standards, it was a simple production and recorded on kinescope for us now to cherish by way of YouTube. The one highlight is Burnett as the princess singing “Shy” with some irony, her mouth open wide, her lungs full of air, no microphone needed. The thing I don’t know or realize at the time is that the music is written by the author of this book, Mary Rodgers—the younger daughter of composer Richard Rodgers.
 
Mary Rodgers’s book is co-written with Jesse Green, a lifelong friend. Rodgers at one point attempts to pen the book herself, yet always gets bogged down. But you’re a storyteller, Jesse tells her, a talker! So Mary tells her stories to Jesse, and Jesse does more than write them down. He creates a great book, handing over each draft to Mary for approval, until they arrive at what is this tome.
 
The title may not be quite so ironic when applied to Mary. Although she in many ways is bold, she is always reigned in, first of all, by her parents. Her mother, probably jealous of her daughter’s talent (this learned from Mary’s many hours on analysts’ sofas), belittles her and her work. Richard Rodgers, her famous father, is also begrudging with regard to how much time he spends with his daughter. Mary Rodgers (b. 1931) is an early feminist without the crusading. She must fight her way into every project she obtains until she reaches a certain point (probably when Mattress becomes a huge hit). Even after that, she doesn’t always get the big projects. Her fame comes more or less from writing projects for children.
 
In fact, she must love children a great deal, giving birth to six of her own (three each by two different husbands), one dying quite young. Her legacy, as she tells it, may to be a better parent than composer. She tries, in vain sometimes, to be a better mother than her own mother was. Ultimately she realizes she may not be able to have it all, as more recent feminists realize. At least not without a lot of help, women can’t have it all. (We’re talking the hiring of tutors, governesses, child caregivers, not to mention lots of domestic help—something available only to the wealthy.) At any rate, this memoir is enjoyable to read on many levels. Not always the greatest prose (transcription of an oral work seems to miss out on the finishing touches that grammar and phrasing can give it), with perhaps far too many footnotes that could have been incorporated into the main text, this memoir is still a pleasant and entertaining read.

Coming Next:
TUES: A Writer's Wit | Laura Lippman
WEDS: A Writer's Wit | Muriel Spark
THURS: A Writer's Wit | Havelock Ellis
FRI: My Book World | George Saunders: A Swim in a Pond in the Rain

​Eisen, Cliff and The Letters of Cole Porter. New Haven: Yale, 2019. 

If you are a fan of Cole Porter and his music, you will probably enjoy this collection of letters. Though some of them refer to his bisexuality, most of them pertain to his many professional and personal connections. Such communications illustrate many characteristics about Mr. Porter. One, he is a consummate professional, in spite of his propensity to play and play hard during vacations and between gigs on Broadway or Hollywood. He answers every bit of mail himself, except when he occasionally calls on his secretary to take care of something. He is a team player, important for anyone working in a collaborative arena like the theatre. Second, he is also fierce but polite about not doing anything musically that would (in his opinion) ruin a show. At the same time, when overpowered by those above him, he sometimes gives in, particularly, it seems, when the issue does not matter that much to him.

​In a business that can be crass and cold at times, Porter is also very caring and thoughtful of everyone he comes in contact with. He sends thank you notes for the smallest favors, and, because he often runs short of money before he makes it big, he is generous with cash gifts and loans later in life. Third, his wit and sharp tongue are unmatched with regard to the social whirl of the 1930s through the 1950s. Though he wouldn’t dream of hurting anyone publicly, he does not mind getting off a zinger or two during a personal letter to a dear friend. Perhaps most interesting is how Porter shares some of his methods for songwriting:

A friend who travels with Porter in 1955 relates this story: “We were not stopped very long at the border. On the Spanish side, one of the soldiers came out with Cole’s passport in his hand, looked in the car, and said, ‘Cole Porter . . . Begin the Beguine!’ and kissed his fingers to the air, and began to sing the song. Cole’s music is known everywhere we go—even in the remote spots” (507).

​I think that just about says it all about Cole Porter, his music, and how many fans he still has in the world!