In late October, The Last Thursday Literary Illuminati and Associated West Coast Socialists gathered around the warm glow of their erstwhile bright forest green monitors to discuss Solicitor Simon's theory of Worm Creek water feeding into Elephant Butte and the lower Rio Grande Valley, and the benefits of educating the distaff outcasts of the family. Prof. Genoni was outside scrapping during this time and thus was excused.
All of the Zoom participants, demonstrating an abundance of caution, wore heavy jackets, work boots and plastic face masks, woolen scarfs, safety helmets, thick glasses, and displayed as little flesh as possible as appropriate for a righteous individual in this day and age. New members were requested to step up and introduce themselves, and explain why they would want to participate with such a group, and why their entry fee should therefore be waived accordingly. Solicitor Simon took notes as to arguments and summaries on all sides and they and the resulting grades are provided herewith.
Charlie – There is a question in my mind as to who was telling the truth about home schooling between Tara and Mom
Dick – I was from a small Utah town and 30% of my siblings gained Ph.D.'s. I taught at UNLV with another Mormon, Neilsen, who was always selling stuff. Mormons are usually very industrious and aggressive business people. I am not bothered about religion.
The book was all about the Mormon Church and the end of times. I am now a Catholic, but my Mormon family is very much into sharing. My niece in St. George, Utah sells ointments and offers Foot Zone (massage of feet) to liberate one’s mind. Mormons do tend to favor Mormons by selling and doing business with each other and are into storing large quantities of food. Often all their contacts are with Mormons, so a very insular group.
Charlie - Religious fundamentalists all share rigid beliefs and usually live separately in group of religion.
Peter – I see 2 types of Mormons in this book. The father was a frontiersman, pioneer type of fundamentalist, while Tara was an urban educated person whose Mormonism was all about striving and achieving.
Jeff – Tara’s story is ingrained in Mormonism. Her family is of fundamental importance to her. Many Mormons are consumed with success and wealth. Finances has always been part of Mormonism.
Peter – Mormons have infiltrated many groups like the Secret Service.
Mike – I think we can generalize here. Harari says tribalism is a basic human characteristic. Christopher Hitchens in God is not Great has the theme of how religion ruins everything.
Dick – Virtue is its Own Punishment by Richard Menzies describes three friends’ life stories growing up in Price, Utah, a coal mining town, as a Mormons. Both Richard and I grew up in Price, Utah and attended Carbon Jr. College. I became a Catholic at the age of 30 and am now opposed to Mormonism, but recognize that Mormonism is still a part of me. I escaped and got an education, which lost me some of the connection I had with my family.
Robert – I suspect that most of our members are persons who strived to get an educaon and that is what unites us.
Peter – “Books change you.” After I obtained my PhD, I tried to farm with my father-in-law but gave up on farming after a while. It simply did not interest me and often frustrated me, like trying to fix machinery. As I look back on it now I see that my whole language and thinking changed by my education.
Charlie – I grew up in a small town in Northern Louisiana as a Baptist. I went to school and lost touch with the community I had grown up in, also. It was like I joined a different tribe.
Dick – Any tribe must have a literature by those who left to get an education.
Bob’s Note – Charlie and Dick’s comments seems to me be the theme of Educated. Tara’s literary effort is her attempt to describe how she left one tribe and joined another tribe.
Jack: Tara Westover's Educated was difficult for me to read. I read it the first time over a year ago and couldn't finish it. I found it impossible to believe such an intelligent young woman would allow herself to be physically and emotionally abused again and again while at home for 17 years and even for years after she left home. In the second reading I paid closer attention to her struggle to maintain a relationship a daughter would hope to have with her parents and her siblings while faced with an unbelievably abusive environment at home. It appeared as if the conflict between her desire to learn about the world beyond Buck's Peak and her ties to a dysfunctional family that had cut itself off from the outside world could never be resolved and I'm not sure it was. She must continue to suffer psychologically. Westover is a good writer, which played a major role in keeping me interested in a very difficult story to read. I would grade it a C+ because I had to read it twice to get to what I thought was the heart of the story.
Mike: I could not warm up to Tara. Is this a chic book? Consider this passage of great personal tribulation: "My hair band broke. I didn't have a spare. The wind swept down the mountain, blowing strands in my eyes."
Also: "My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs." I submit this is every child's story.
Chick lit or chick literature is genre fiction, which "consists of heroine-centered narratives that focus on the trials and tribulations of their individual protagonists"
Karl: Catharsis. The writing I found to be a little uneven – fluctuating between excellent and merely good. Overall, a very nice effort for a first book.
I made two mistakes reading this book. The first was, between Part I and Part II, I consulted the Oracle about the author and read some of the Oracle’s offerings. That created some doubt in my mind about her accuracy in recalling the memories she was describing. The second mistake was that I looked up her mother’s business between reading Part II and Part III. That led to more readings and pictures, which again created some doubt. Having had those two experiences before reading Part III, I became very aware each time the author called attention to having some doubt as to the accuracy of her memory in relating certain experiences. I wonder how I would have reacted had I not consulted the Oracle until after I’d finished the book.
It didn’t help that there was an inconsistency in the description of the family’s financial wealth/ poorness. Early on the author explicitly says that her family wasn’t poor. And it doesn’t sound as if they were. However, twice later in the book she describes her family as being poor. Not any more. Her mother’s company employs either 24 or 30 people (depending on the source) and looks to have done about $12 MM last year and $5 MM this one. (Not sure of the company’s fiscal year definition.) A Google Maps view of the property shows the junk yard, house, many outbuildings, and a very large production facility for Butterfly Expressions, the Westover’s company, not to mention many pieces of heavy equipment.
The most interesting person in the memoirs, to my mind, was the author’s father. While clearly a religious zealot and survivalist who could not keep from trying to convert everyone around him to his way of thinking, he was apparently – at least, until he got hurt – very industrious and must have had a good local reputation in order to have gotten so many jobs. I am fascinated that his religious beliefs were so strong and unshakable that he believed that they were an adequate substitute for common sense, particularly when it came to endangering his children. And, while he preached endlessly, he didn’t stop his kids from doing what they wanted to do – though he may have imposed consequences if what they wanted to do was in conflict with his beliefs. I’m thinking of Tyler going off to college, Tara singing in the musicals, working at the grocery store, and going off to BYU, none of which he approved of, but all of which he accepted.
From a newspaper interview with the family’s attorney, who said that the book should be taken “with a grain of salt” the biggest issue the Westover’s have with the author’s description of her upbringing is her lack of acknowledgement of being decently home-schooled. They say, not so. Three PhD’s out of seven children gives their claim some credibility. Also, it came as a surprise to me that Tara’s mother not only graduated from a public high school, but that she also attended BYU (though there doesn’t seem to be any claim that she graduated).
One of the things I don’t have doubts about is the abuse the author suffered at the hands of her brother, “Shawn.” None of the outside readings I did in the middle of reading Educated created any question about that. After finishing the book, I read some of the reviews of it on Amazon.com – one of which was a very compelling testimony as to the accuracy with which the author described the situations in Part III of the book by her then boyfriend, Drew Mecham.
To sum up, clearly Ms Westover has psychological demons and I hope that by wring and publishing this book, she has been able to exorcise some of them. And regardless, of the truth or fiction of individual remembrances, she is certainly a remarkable woman.
Rob: Footnote. I thought the book's title was arrogant: I am educated. You aren't. A self-appointed Illuminati.
Great discussion
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