Personal History: Katharine Graham Free

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Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Details if other :. Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Preview — Personal History by Katharine Graham. Personal History by Katharine Graham. In lieu of an unrevealing Famous-People-I-Have-Known autobiography, the owner of the Washington Post has chosen to be remarkably candid about the insecurities prompted by remote parents and a difficult marriage to the charismatic, manic- depressive Phil Graham, who ran the newspaper her father acquired. Katharine's account of her years as subservient daughter and wife is so In lieu of an unrevealing Famous-People-I-Have-Known autobiography, the owner Personal History: Katharine Graham the Washington Post has chosen to be remarkably candid about the insecurities prompted by remote parents and a difficult marriage to the charismatic, manic-depressive Phil Graham, who ran the newspaper her father acquired. Katharine's account of her years as subservient daughter and wife is so painful that by the time she finally asserts herself at the Post following Phil's suicide in more than halfway through the bookreaders will want to cheer. After that, Watergate is practically an anticlimax. Get A Copy. Paperbackpages. Published February 24th by Vintage first published More Details Original Title. Katharine Graham. Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography Other Editions Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Personal Historyplease sign up. See 1 question about Personal History…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 4. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Start your review of Personal History. Feb 05, Jonathan Eng rated it it was ok. This book is fascinatingly uninteresting. Katharine Graham lived bigger than Personal History: Katharine Graham of us ever will, meeting Albert Einstein, kicking it with President Kennedy, living in homes decorated with Renoirs and Manets, spending summers at Personal History: Katharine Graham second home with horses and daily refreshed flower bouquets, traveling the world, attending both Vassar and The University of Chicago, battling unions, investing with Warren Buffet, and broadcasting the Watergate scandal. Her life should have made for an interesting r This book is fascinatingly uninteresting. Her life should have made for an interesting read, yet it simply wasn't. Too many characters, too much pride, too much passivism. I was disappointed to find that the leader of the Washington Post simply deferred to her publisher and her editor in most situations. She seemed to know nothing about running the paper, and at the same time, this page monster-of-a-book is ONLY about the paper. She spends inadequate time discussing her own feelings. Was it really as easy as she made it seem to accept her husband back after his public affair and attempted divorce? Did the Personal History: Katharine Graham or 5 miscarriages really not affect her enough to dedicate a full paragraph to them? The Personal History: Katharine Graham of this book shows an aged Katharine Graham, which seems Personal History: Katharine Graham since it reads as Personal History: Katharine Graham as an old lady reciting the encyclopedia. If you want a more interesting story, ask me about my day. View all 18 comments. I don't always like biographies - they can be very self serving and trite. But I was blown away by this woman. Frankly, I didn't know much about her or her story of taking over the Washington Post upon the death of her husband - a job she really Personal History: Katharine Graham been preparing for her whole life, if she knew it or not. Katherine Graham is a amazing, strong and wise woman, and she tells her tale in a very honest way, Personal History: Katharine Graham her flaws, her mistakes and her Personal History: Katharine Graham as lessons for the rest of us. She had a seat I don't always like biographies - they can be very self serving and trite. She had a seat at the table for some of the biggest stories of our time, yet she makes each of these stories deeply personal in the telling. She's an inspiration for women in business, and who struggle to manage family, social, political and Personal History: Katharine Graham obligations. A remarkable woman, a remarkable life, and a remarkable book. View all 4 comments. Apr 04, Coco rated it it was amazing Shelves: memoirwomen. This book was over six hundred pages and I enjoyed them all. While Katharine Graham's autobiography is ostensibly her own history, it's Personal History: Katharine Graham the history of our country. Beginning Personal History: Katharine Graham her father, Eugene Meyer, and his close dealings with the Hoover Administration and going all the way through her own birds-eye view of various presidents, including Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, and, most fascinating of all, Nixon. Graham's life was supposed to be much different. Married to Phil Graham who r This book was over six hundred pages and I enjoyed them all. Married to Phil Graham who ran her family's paper, the Washington Post, with four children, she thought she would be mother, wife and hostess. Sadly, Phil's little understood bipolar disease created havoc for the family before causing him to take his own life. She was thrust into the position of taking over the Washington Post. Vast in scope and yet filled with personal insights President Kennedy sent a plane to bring Phil back to Washington when he had a public mental breakdownit's a fascinating look at the way government really works, in the salons and dining rooms of Georgetown. Even though the press often had a tumultuous relationship with many of the administrations, it was interesting that they could all meet for dinner the next evening and behave in a civilized fashion. Until Nixon, that is. Even though most of us know that Watergate was bad, Mrs. Graham's book really made me realize how personal and how vicious Nixon and his White House Guard were. The Post was truly out there, hanging in the wind alone, for quite awhile before other papers joined them and the book takes the reader Personal History: Katharine Graham a series of gutsy decisions that likely changed the course of our nation. My greatest disappointment was learning that Kay Graham died in I wish I could have written her and let her know how much this book taught me and how much her life meant. From a self- doubting woman, who was always the only female in the boardroom, to a confident person, she is a wonderful teacher and role model for all of us. I read that her daughter, author Lally Weymouth, didn't want her to write this book. Perhaps it's because Graham discusses Phil's mental illness, infidelity and suicide. I felt she did it with grace and love, however, but I'm sure it was hard for her daughter. I, for one, however, am grateful she had to courage to do so. Jul 26, Connie G rated it it was amazing Shelves: non-fictionhistoryautobiography-memoir. Katharine Meyer Graham's autobiography takes us from her childhood as the daughter of a successful businessman to being the powerful woman at the head of the Washington Post. Katharine Meyer and her siblings were mainly raised by their nursemaid and governess as young children. Their mother was an eccentric Personal History: Katharine Graham and artist, and their father owned the Washington Post. After Katharine's college years, she did some writing for the Post. She married Phil Personal History: Katharine Graham, a brilliant, charismatic young lawy Katharine Meyer Graham's autobiography takes us from her childhood as the daughter of a successful businessman to being the powerful woman at the head of the Washington Post. She married Phil Graham, a brilliant, charismatic young lawyer who clerked at the Supreme Court. Her father passed the Washington Post on to Phil who expanded the business by buying Newsweek and some television stations. Phil was very involved in politics, especially with Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. Phil's behavior began to become very erratic, he was Personal History: Katharine Graham as manic-depressive, and he eventually took his own Personal History: Katharine Graham. People expected Katharine to sell the newspaper, but she wanted to keep it in the family and pass it on to her children. She was thrust into the role of publisher, and did a lot of learning on the job. Some of the most interesting parts of the book include the Post's coverage of the Pentagon Papers, Watergate, working with the editor Ben Bradlee, and the pressmen's strike. Her friends and business associates would fill a volume of "Who's Who in America". In an age when there were few women executives, Katharine Graham was the only woman in the Fortune She was involved with the successful Washington Post until her mids. In addition to being a fascinating autobiography, "Personal History" is also an interesting look back at over sixty years of social and political history. Personal History by Katharine Graham | Book Club Discussion Questions |

Sign up for our newsletters! Graham spent her childhood and adolescence in a household that revolved around the needs of the parents rather than those of the children. It wasn't until she was two and a half that she was first mentioned, in passing, in her mother's diary--"The babes Bill and K take some of my time this week" [p. What long-term effects, if any, did this parental neglect have upon Graham's life? Of her father's passing the Post to his son-in-law rather than to his daughter, Graham notes, "Far Personal History: Katharine Graham troubling me personally that my father thought Personal History: Katharine Graham my husband and not me, it pleased me" [p. Why did Graham and many other women of Personal History: Katharine Graham generation have this point of view? At the time, her father explained that "no man should be in the position of working Personal History: Katharine Graham his wife" [p. Eugene Meyer believed that social responsibility accompanied the privileges of wealth. Does the sense of public duty that Eugene Meyer passed on to his daughter strike you as unusual? He also believed that a newspaper's first duty was to serve the public interest, not the political ends of its owner. How closely did Philip Graham, and later his wife, adhere to these precepts while at the helm of the Post? Hardly a conventional woman in her own day, Agnes Meyer was ambitious, politically involved, intellectually driven, and not at all "nurturing" of her children. In what ways did her mother shape the person Katharine Graham was to become? What does Graham's description of the heated political argument that delayed her wedding ceremony indicate about the role of politics in her married life? What impression do you gain from the narrative of Philip Graham's political agenda and his influence upon Presidents Johnson and Kennedy? What impresses you about how Katharine Graham handled herself in friendships and business dealings with men in power? Do you think that Katharine Graham would have made a good political figure herself? Graham writes of her relationship with her husband, "I literally believed that he had created me, that I was totally dependent on him, and I didn't see the downside at all" [p. Was this a happy marriage up until the time when Philip Graham's illness became obvious? Or do you agree with her friend's assessment that it was "good" for her that he left [p. Was her continued loyalty to him, even after he left her for another woman, misplaced? How would you characterize Graham's account of their separation and her portrayal of her husband's mistress? Three major crises punctuate Graham's account of her years at The Washington Post : the decision to publish the Pentagon Papers, the handling of the revelations of the Watergate affair, and her dealings with the pressmen's strike. How do these three events show the quality of her leadership? Her ability to react under extreme pressure? Is there anything in her handling of these situations that you disagree with? In the pressmens' strike, she was blamed for the suicide Personal History: Katharine Graham one of the workers. Is there any justification for this? The reader will not learn much from Katharine Graham about what it's like to live with millions of dollars at one's personal disposal. What role does Graham's inherited--and Personal History: Katharine Graham earned--wealth play in this narrative? Does the couple's attempt to Personal History: Katharine Graham Philip Graham's breakdown strike you as indicative of a social stigma attending mental illness that our society has since outgrown? Was Personal History: Katharine Graham self-imposed isolation that Katharine Graham endured at the time, as his sole confidante and support during the course of his illness, worthwhile? When she writes of herself and her children as "enablers" [p. In any memoir, the writer is faced with looking back at the past and at actions that seem, from the present venue, regrettable. What is the role of self-criticism in this memoir? Do you agree with Graham's belief that to have gone on a cruise after her husband's suicide was the wrong thing to do, since it meant that her two Personal History: Katharine Graham sons had to deal with the aftermath of their father's death on their own? What other aspects Personal History: Katharine Graham her life would she change, do you suppose, if she had the chance? Are you surprised at how much social contact there was between the Grahams and such figures as Presidents Johnson and Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, and George Shultz, etc.? Is your view of these Personal History: Katharine Graham figures changed Personal History: Katharine Graham all by seeing them through Graham's eyes? How well do you think that she dealt with the wrath of Richard Nixon? How do the revelations in this book change your preconceptions about the relationship between media and politics in this country? Philip Graham's suicide is clearly a turning point in his wife's story. Is she, in a sense, a different person once she goes to work at the Post? The episode of his mental illness and its aftermath encapsulates many of the recurrent themes in the work, especially the competing obligations Graham felt as a private woman versus a public one. How well does she deal with the Personal History: Katharine Graham that comes with being in such an elevated position? How well does she balance the needs of home and of work? Is this a story of a Personal History: Katharine Graham who was to find her real fulfillment as a working woman, but who never would Personal History: Katharine Graham discovered that if she had remained at home? Although Katharine Graham did not at first Personal History: Katharine Graham with the aims of the feminist movement, throughout her career she found herself Personal History: Katharine Graham a good deal of gender-based discrimination and prejudice. For instance, she was characterized as being a "'house mother and cheerleader'" for the company [p. What were the particular challenges facing her that a man in her position would not have had to confront? Would you consider Graham a feminist? Graham identifies her husband as the energetic partner Personal History: Katharine Graham the marriage, the one who was fun to be around, while she herself was "the foundation, the stability" [p. Has the women's movement significantly affected gender roles in most marriages? Many celebrity books in this country are ghostwritten, and clearly Katharine Graham did not have to take on Personal History: Katharine Graham enormous labor of writing such a lengthy book herself. Why do you suppose she chose to do so? What does she achieve by having done so? What stylistic and tonal qualities of her writing contribute to your sense of Katharine Graham's presence, personality, and character? How do you interpret this description of what it meant to Graham to take on her husband's job after his Personal History: Katharine Graham Elsewhere, she writes of being married to her job. Do you think that she would have accomplished what she did had she married again? Katharine Graham found a truly productive partnership with Ben Bradlee; in many ways he seems to have been an integral part of her success at the paper. Why do you suppose they worked so well together? To what degree is success dependent upon working with the right people, or learning how to deal with less sympathetic people? To what degree is successful management determined by finding the right balance of personalities in a working environment? In any autobiography some episodes are emphasized while others are muted. What parts of Graham's life are underplayed in this memoir? Do you sometimes find yourself wanting to know more about certain aspects of her life? What might explain or justify these omissions? While the tradition of autobiograpy by men in public life Personal History: Katharine Graham well established, that of women is far less so. If you have read recent examples--those of Colin Powell and Robert McNamara, for instance--how does Graham's narrative follow the pattern established by male writers? What does it owe to the emerging tradition of writing about female experience? What are the differences, if any, between the two? Though they are nonfiction, autobiographies can be compared to novels that follow a character's education, development, life story--novels like Jane Austen's EmmaGeorge Eliot's The Mill on the Flossor Charles Dickens's Great Expectations. How does Graham's narrative compare to these or similar novels you've read? How would you characterize the movements of its "plot"? What is the effect upon you as a reader of the story as a whole? Graham often mentions the fact that she lacked confidence, even after having reached a level of achievement that few people--men or women--ever do. Does she come across in her writing as a woman lacking in confidence? Is this, at bottom, a problem shared by most individuals, no matter how successful and no matter their sex? If not, how is Katharine Graham's lack of confidence specific to her sex and her generation? Personal History by Katharine Personal History: Katharine Graham. The Book Report Network. Skip to main content. Reading Group Guide. Katharine Graham Biography Bibliography. All Rights Reserved. Katharine Graham - Wikipedia

Reading Guide. Look Inside Reading Guide. Oct 17, Minutes Buy. Dec 08, Minutes Buy. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Biography In this bestselling Personal History: Katharine Graham widely acclaimed memoir, Katharine Graham, the woman who piloted the Washington Post through the scandals of the Pentagon Papers and Watergate, tells her story—one that is extraordinary both for the events it encompasses and for the courage, candor, and dignity of its telling. Here is the awkward child who grew up amid material wealth and emotional isolation; the young bride who watched her brilliant, charismatic husband—a confidant to John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson—plunge into the mental illness that would culminate in his suicide. As timely now as ever, Personal History is an exemplary record of our history and of the woman who played such a shaping role within them, discovering her own strength and Personal History: Katharine Graham of self as she confronted—and mastered—the personal and professional crises of her fascinating life. Katharine Graham is fondly remembered as the powerful, longtime publisher of the Washington Post. Personal History: Katharine Graham died in When you buy a book, we donate Personal History: Katharine Graham book. Sign in. The Best Books of So Far. Read An Excerpt. Feb 24, ISBN Add to Cart. Also available from:. Nov 07, ISBN Feb 09, ISBN Available from:. Audiobook Download. Paperback 2 —. Add to Cart Add to Cart. Also by Katharine Graham. See all books by Katharine Graham. About Katharine Graham Katharine Graham is fondly remembered as the powerful, longtime publisher of the Washington Post. Product Details. Inspired by Your Browsing History. The Complete Persepolis. Marjane Satrapi. The Line Becomes a River. The Girl Who Smiled Beads. Clemantine Wamariya and Elizabeth Personal History: Katharine Graham. A Mighty Long Way. Steven M. Esther Safran Foer. Dreams from My Father. Barack Obama. Dan-el Padilla Peralta. God Save Texas. Lawrence Wright. Edwidge Danticat. A Guest of the Reich. The Gatekeepers. Chris Whipple. Reading Lolita in Tehran. The Woman Warrior. Maxine Hong Kingston. Secret Daughter. Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Jane Sherron de Hart. Our Man. George Packer. Out of Africa. Isak Dinesen. The Power Broker. Robert A. An Odyssey. Daniel Mendelsohn. Life Undercover. Amaryllis Fox. Life Is So Good. Richard Glaubman and George Dawson. Call Me American. Abdi Nor Iftin. The World Is My Home. James A. Sonia Nazario. At the Dark End of the Street. Danielle L. Michelle Obama. Peter Personal History: Katharine Graham. Andrew Roberts. Modern Comfort Food. Related Articles. Looking for More Great Reads? Download Hi Res. LitFlash The eBooks you want at the lowest prices. Read it Forward Read it first. Pass it on! Stay in Touch Sign up. We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please try again later. Become a Member Start earning points for buying books!