Audition By Barbara Walters Book Review
Walters Notes Her Extraordinary Life, Personally And Professionally
Barbara Walters’s name shouldn’t be synonymous with catfights on The View, but sadly, it is. It is unfortunate because her memoir, Audition (ISBN-13:978-030726640) reminds new generations, that she wasn’t always the maternal figure on the aforementioned ladies’ gabfest talk show.
Published by Knopf on May 6, Audition follows Walters’s life from birth; she discusses and sets up her childhood home life early on. Her father, a show business man was always venturing new ideas for his nightclubs and performances, some successes, others not. These ups and downs of his career left Walters and her mother in a constant state of uncertainty about the future—which translated to Walters’ adult life.
Sister Jackie
Walters states from the beginning the affect her sister Jackie had in her life. Jackie was her older sister, and mentally impaired. Walters expresses her childhood feelings of embarrassment of her sister’s condition painfully, remarking how she never had friends over to her home because she feared having to explain why her sister was different. Walters mentions Jackie regularly throughout the book until her sad death.
Audition After Audition
Walters titled her book Audition for a reason, and upon completion of the tome, it is evident as to why. The theme of auditioning in her life has followed from her childhood where she “auditioned” to fit in with her classmates at the numerous new schools she attended, she “auditioned” to land her pivotal co-anchor place in NBC’s Today show in the 1960’s, she “auditioned” for the men in her personal life. Some of these auditioned, Walters acknowledges, went well (she wrapped up thirteen years on the Today show before moving to ABC) while others did not (after three failed marriages, Walters realized that marriage was not for her).
Guilt Tripping
Another prominent theme that colors the memoir is that of guilt. As a child, Walters is plagued with guilt for not being more understanding of her sister’s mentally impaired condition. Another source of ample guilt stemmed from her father’s lack of financial stability. Walters discusses how she always worried if her family would have enough money to make ends meet during her father’s tough financial troubles.
More guilt entered Walters’s life while raising her daughter Jackie (named after her sister) and young Jackie fell into a dark world of depression, drugs and street gangs. Walters reasoned that due to her high profile television broadcasting career and lack of a stable father figure for Jackie, it was Walters’s fault that her daughter’s life spiraled out of control. Though the situation was more than resolved—with Jackie turning her life around—Walters’s clearly still harbors hurt feelings of confusing and guilt dubbing the chapter “The Hardest Chapter To Write.”
Walters crafts her book with detail and precision, her simple use of proper English and grammar is refreshing. Her life is elaborately portrayed in this book and well organized. The first half of the book is told chronologically, however, once Walters tells the reader that she will no longer be discussing her personal life in the book, the book is chaptered off by categories of the famous people, politicians and other newsmakers Walters had interviewed in her decades-spanning career.
The Final Word
What makes Walters’s memoir so intriguing is that the public has always known little about journalists in terms of their personal lives. This usual lack of personal information is a typical unspoken law of maintaining a level of professionalism while reporting the news. Though millions have watched Walters’s groundbreaking Specials on ABC, they never got to know Walters. In this book, she leaves out no detail. The anecdotes and her impressions of her countless interviewees are strictly nothing short of fascinating.
