What do you think?
Rate this book
Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A memoir of coming of age in a conservative Southern family in postwar America.
To grow up in the 1950s was to enter a world of polarized national alliances, nuclear threat, and destabilized social hierarchies. Two world wars and the depression that connected them had unleashed a torrent of expectations and dissatisfactions—not only in global affairs but in American society and Americans’ lives.
A privileged white girl in conservative, segregated Virginia was expected to adopt a willful blindness to the inequities of race and the constraints of gender. For Drew Gilpin, the acceptance of both female subordination and racial hierarchy proved intolerable and galvanizing. Urged to become “well adjusted” and to fill the role of a poised young lady that her upbringing imposed, she found resistance was necessary for her survival. During the 1960s, through her love of learning and her active engagement in the civil rights, student, and antiwar movements, Drew forged a path of her own—one that would eventually lead her to become a historian of the very conflicts that were instrumental in shaping the world she grew up in.
Culminating in the upheavals of 1968, Necessary Trouble captures a time of rapid change and fierce reaction in one young woman’s life, tracing the transformations and aftershocks that we continue to grapple with today.
Includes black-and-white images
A memoir of coming of age in a conservative Southern family in postwar America.
To grow up in the 1950s was to enter a world of polarized national alliances, nuclear threat, and destabilized social hierarchies. Two world wars and the depression that connected them had unleashed a torrent of expectations and dissatisfactions—not only in global affairs but in American society and Americans’ lives.
A privileged white girl in conservative, segregated Virginia was expected to adopt a willful blindness to the inequities of race and the constraints of gender. For Drew Gilpin, the acceptance of both female subordination and racial hierarchy proved intolerable and galvanizing. Urged to become “well adjusted” and to fill the role of a poised young lady that her upbringing imposed, she found resistance was necessary for her survival. During the 1960s, through her love of learning and her active engagement in the civil rights, student, and antiwar movements, Drew forged a path of her own—one that would eventually lead her to become a historian of the very conflicts that were instrumental in shaping the world she grew up in.
Culminating in the upheavals of 1968, Necessary Trouble captures a time of rapid change and fierce reaction in one young woman’s life, tracing the transformations and aftershocks that we continue to grapple with today.
Includes black-and-white images
381 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 22, 2023
About the author
Drew Gilpin Faust
23 books168 followersCatharine Drew Gilpin Faust is an American historian who served as the 28th president of Harvard University, the first woman in that role. She was Harvard's first president since 1672 without an undergraduate or graduate degree from Harvard and the first to have been raised in the South. Faust is also the founding dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She has been ranked among the world's most powerful women by Forbes, including as the 33rd most powerful in 2014.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 325 reviews
September 30, 2023
I’ve enjoyed listening to Drew Gilpin Faust’s memoir Necessary Trouble over the past few days. Reading about this historian’s life experiences was fascinating, as she touched on some of the most significant events of the late 19th and early to mid-20th centuries.
Faust was born in 1947 in New York City but was raised in a ‘well-to-do’ family in segregated Virginia. She tells her story by introducing us to her family. I was absorbed by the stories of her family’s (grandfather, father, and brothers) involvement WWI and WWII. This provides an excellent context to understand how Faust ended up the way she did, a woman with a formidable sense of social justice, a strong moral compass. A ‘good lefty’ methinks.
As a young girl Faust saw the freedoms her brothers enjoyed and wanted that for herself. This put her at odds with her mother, something that lasted until her mother’s death when Faust was a young woman. I remember her saying, she “didn’t want to return home when her mother was alive, but also didn’t want to return home when her mother had passed”. That was so sad to read.
As a college student in the 1960’s, Faust was an active student advocate as well as being heavily involved in the civil rights and anti-Vietnam movements. I found her experiences in segregated Virginia illuminating, it really wasn’t so long ago.
This story also got me thinking about the never-ending conga-line of important social causes humanity needs to confront and deal with moving forward. To be sure, the 20 century was packed full of significant events and important social issues to be addressed. But this continues – today we have inequality, climate change, LGBTQI+, populism, conflict, AI and so, so much more. This made me feel a little pessimistic (and I’m a glass half-full of cream kind of bloke) about humanity’s ability to deal with these matters.
There is much more in this memoir, it is worth a read. I love the way this woman has a strong moral compass and was and is willing to be active in making this world a better place to live. I like her.
4 Stars
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an audio version of this book, in exchange for a review.
Faust was born in 1947 in New York City but was raised in a ‘well-to-do’ family in segregated Virginia. She tells her story by introducing us to her family. I was absorbed by the stories of her family’s (grandfather, father, and brothers) involvement WWI and WWII. This provides an excellent context to understand how Faust ended up the way she did, a woman with a formidable sense of social justice, a strong moral compass. A ‘good lefty’ methinks.
As a young girl Faust saw the freedoms her brothers enjoyed and wanted that for herself. This put her at odds with her mother, something that lasted until her mother’s death when Faust was a young woman. I remember her saying, she “didn’t want to return home when her mother was alive, but also didn’t want to return home when her mother had passed”. That was so sad to read.
As a college student in the 1960’s, Faust was an active student advocate as well as being heavily involved in the civil rights and anti-Vietnam movements. I found her experiences in segregated Virginia illuminating, it really wasn’t so long ago.
This story also got me thinking about the never-ending conga-line of important social causes humanity needs to confront and deal with moving forward. To be sure, the 20 century was packed full of significant events and important social issues to be addressed. But this continues – today we have inequality, climate change, LGBTQI+, populism, conflict, AI and so, so much more. This made me feel a little pessimistic (and I’m a glass half-full of cream kind of bloke) about humanity’s ability to deal with these matters.
There is much more in this memoir, it is worth a read. I love the way this woman has a strong moral compass and was and is willing to be active in making this world a better place to live. I like her.
4 Stars
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an audio version of this book, in exchange for a review.
August 23, 2023
Drew Gilpin Faust’s memoir is that of an historian, one born into a privileged American southern family but who chafed at the various traditions and boundaries this privilege brought her. She was born in 1947, part of the baby boom generation, and very early wanted the freedoms her brothers seemed to have. She also wanted to learn, more than her mother had ever aspired to. This set up an adversarial relationship that never was resolved. She apparently asked uncomfortable questions early in life after hearing a news article about black schools being closed. Her sense of right and wrong formed young and does not appear to have altered in the years since.
In this memoir, Faust takes us through her life as a child in Virginia, to her days at Concord Academy in Massachusetts and on to college at Bryn Mawr in Pennsylvania. Along the way, the ideas of justice, right and wrong, freedom, all develop more and more as this child of the 1950s becomes a teenager of the 1960s. She is involved in some of the major movements of the time and her involvement grew organically from the beginnings we have read about from the start. From a tour of Communist Eastern Europe, to the civil rights movement and Freedom Summer, and to the early days of the anti-war movement during the war in Vietnam, Faust had a role of some kind in events many of us saw at a distance.
Here the historian is defining herself through her lived history. From her father and grandfather who fought in WWII and WWI respectively, lost great uncles and others, there is a legacy of service coupled with the patriarchal background in her family. Sons were called, not daughters. Drew Gilpin Faust certainly found her own way to meet that call from her country.
Recommended for readers of memoirs and history.
Thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for a copy of this book. This review is my own.
In this memoir, Faust takes us through her life as a child in Virginia, to her days at Concord Academy in Massachusetts and on to college at Bryn Mawr in Pennsylvania. Along the way, the ideas of justice, right and wrong, freedom, all develop more and more as this child of the 1950s becomes a teenager of the 1960s. She is involved in some of the major movements of the time and her involvement grew organically from the beginnings we have read about from the start. From a tour of Communist Eastern Europe, to the civil rights movement and Freedom Summer, and to the early days of the anti-war movement during the war in Vietnam, Faust had a role of some kind in events many of us saw at a distance.
Here the historian is defining herself through her lived history. From her father and grandfather who fought in WWII and WWI respectively, lost great uncles and others, there is a legacy of service coupled with the patriarchal background in her family. Sons were called, not daughters. Drew Gilpin Faust certainly found her own way to meet that call from her country.
Recommended for readers of memoirs and history.
Thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for a copy of this book. This review is my own.
February 4, 2023
I was very excited to read this memoir from a historian I have long admired. More than that, the description of this book seemed to combine many of my historical interests. It also didn’t hurt that the cover photo is the spitting image of my mom who was born a few years after the author (though my mother certainly lived a very different life in rural Alabama).
It started off interesting as I felt that the author’s vulnerability coupled with extensive family history underscored the tension at the heart of her own memories of coming of age in 1950s Virginia and the cracks that reverberated across her family’s generations. For millennials like me, I think the historical record woven into the author’s own life events would be perceived by many readers of my generation as insightful — particularly the examination of femininity. I even found myself jotting down perspectives I wanted to ask my mother & grandmother their takes on which I likely would have not considered had I not read this book.
Yet as the book went on, I felt less of the author’s honest self-inspection and more a sense of mere self-positioning within historical recollections. It was at that moment (specifically the chapter with many pointed Martin Luther King Jr. quotes) that I began to wonder why the author wrote this memoir or who her intended audience might be. It suddenly went from an endearingly conflicted childhood to myopic young adulthood with a tone-deaf sense of white saviorism. Had the book done more to avoid speaking for large swarths of people (the second half of the book generously employs “we” when describing a countercultural moment that deserves more nuance than granted) and involved more emphasis on an examination of her own bias & privilege (as the book description implies & the epilogue actually does the best job of — though far too late), then I think I would have no question as to the why of this memoir & a higher star rating.
Still I am grateful to NetGalley & Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the opportunity to read this ARC. Not every memoir is for every person, and, although I was disappointed overall, I encourage those who would like to gain a certain perspective & historical account of American youth in the 1950s/1960s to pick this one up as you will get that told in no uncertain terms.
It started off interesting as I felt that the author’s vulnerability coupled with extensive family history underscored the tension at the heart of her own memories of coming of age in 1950s Virginia and the cracks that reverberated across her family’s generations. For millennials like me, I think the historical record woven into the author’s own life events would be perceived by many readers of my generation as insightful — particularly the examination of femininity. I even found myself jotting down perspectives I wanted to ask my mother & grandmother their takes on which I likely would have not considered had I not read this book.
Yet as the book went on, I felt less of the author’s honest self-inspection and more a sense of mere self-positioning within historical recollections. It was at that moment (specifically the chapter with many pointed Martin Luther King Jr. quotes) that I began to wonder why the author wrote this memoir or who her intended audience might be. It suddenly went from an endearingly conflicted childhood to myopic young adulthood with a tone-deaf sense of white saviorism. Had the book done more to avoid speaking for large swarths of people (the second half of the book generously employs “we” when describing a countercultural moment that deserves more nuance than granted) and involved more emphasis on an examination of her own bias & privilege (as the book description implies & the epilogue actually does the best job of — though far too late), then I think I would have no question as to the why of this memoir & a higher star rating.
Still I am grateful to NetGalley & Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the opportunity to read this ARC. Not every memoir is for every person, and, although I was disappointed overall, I encourage those who would like to gain a certain perspective & historical account of American youth in the 1950s/1960s to pick this one up as you will get that told in no uncertain terms.
August 22, 2023
Oof - I have a lot to say about this one, and have been stewing on my review for a few days now.
The book itself: I felt this one was slow, but had little nuggets of interesting information. It seemed to gloss over a lot of time, while not really taking the time to look inward and really see why things fell into place that way. It felt more like blips of a story that a relative would tell you over drinks one night. Just high level things that make you realize that person had a life you may not have acknowledged or been aware of before.
The title: I know that in the notes after, Faust takes time to explain why the book is titled in the way that it is, and shares that the blessing was given. However, it made me really look at this book and the story it tells and wonder - what trouble does she think she actually found? What times did she risk literally anything to be where she was? She risked a bad grade on one paper. She risked being woken up by a security guard on a campus. But beyond that, was she aware of the risks she took, or did she do it blindly because she felt drawn, and never really understood the true potential costs? After all, courage without wisdom is foolishness.
Overall, when I finished the book, I felt a bit icky. Although this is obviously her story to tell, I can’t help but feel like it’s a grab to secure her place in the history of the movement, and I’m not sure who this book was aimed at.
I do believe it is a perspective of someone who lived through it, but I’m just not sure this perspective should be the frontrunner here.
2.5 stars rounded up.
Thank you NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for sending this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
The book itself: I felt this one was slow, but had little nuggets of interesting information. It seemed to gloss over a lot of time, while not really taking the time to look inward and really see why things fell into place that way. It felt more like blips of a story that a relative would tell you over drinks one night. Just high level things that make you realize that person had a life you may not have acknowledged or been aware of before.
The title: I know that in the notes after, Faust takes time to explain why the book is titled in the way that it is, and shares that the blessing was given. However, it made me really look at this book and the story it tells and wonder - what trouble does she think she actually found? What times did she risk literally anything to be where she was? She risked a bad grade on one paper. She risked being woken up by a security guard on a campus. But beyond that, was she aware of the risks she took, or did she do it blindly because she felt drawn, and never really understood the true potential costs? After all, courage without wisdom is foolishness.
Overall, when I finished the book, I felt a bit icky. Although this is obviously her story to tell, I can’t help but feel like it’s a grab to secure her place in the history of the movement, and I’m not sure who this book was aimed at.
I do believe it is a perspective of someone who lived through it, but I’m just not sure this perspective should be the frontrunner here.
2.5 stars rounded up.
Thank you NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for sending this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
November 18, 2023
3.5 🐘🐘🐘
A walk down memory lane for this baby boomer.
A walk down memory lane for this baby boomer.
January 4, 2024
The 28th president of Harvard University, Drew Gilpin Faust was the first woman and the first Southerner in the job. She had a relatively long tenure, 2007-2018, given the way things are going now. This memoir outlines her family's family and "how she got to be that way," but what it really does is show how she sprung singular from the head of Athena, the war goddess.
It seems Faust was always destined to fight against the strictures and unfairnesses she observed from her place in restricted White southern society. But her way of telling the story chafed. Perhaps it is because I am nearly her age and I ache to think no one was able to break down the barriers behind which her mother hid before her early death. Faust is smart, well-educated and articulate but she chafes, knowing so much.
She ends her memoir at the time of her graduation from college. One presumes she went on to honors and studying history. I remember when she was chosen to lead Harvard--I was impressed and proud, being a woman myself. I admire what she was able to do but I don't have to like her, do I?
It seems Faust was always destined to fight against the strictures and unfairnesses she observed from her place in restricted White southern society. But her way of telling the story chafed. Perhaps it is because I am nearly her age and I ache to think no one was able to break down the barriers behind which her mother hid before her early death. Faust is smart, well-educated and articulate but she chafes, knowing so much.
She ends her memoir at the time of her graduation from college. One presumes she went on to honors and studying history. I remember when she was chosen to lead Harvard--I was impressed and proud, being a woman myself. I admire what she was able to do but I don't have to like her, do I?
April 6, 2023
I was excited to read this book, as in college I took two semesters of Drew Faust's classes: History of the South I and II. She was an excellent professor and teacher and I knew this book would be well-written and interesting.
While this is categorized as a memoir, it feels more like a cross between memoir and history book (as evidenced by the pages of bibliographic notes). The first several chapters feel more like a history book, as Faust sets the context for what is to come, describing the Virginia of her own childhood and that Virginia of those who came before her. Once Faust enters boarding school and college, the stories get more personal and "memoir-ish" as she shares her experience living through the 50s and 60s. While of course this is Faust's own life that she recalls, and she can't help being who she is -- a rich, privileged, white girl/women -- you can't help but wonder at times if this -- this recollection of the fight for black civil rights -- is really her story to tell? Is this who I should be learning about this from? Maybe not exclusively, but it is still interesting to learn how and why one white women became so involved in the movement ... to get that particular perspective. And for me it was of course great to get insight into the childhood and college years of one of my favorite college teachers, and understand why she went into her chosen field.
NOTE: Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
While this is categorized as a memoir, it feels more like a cross between memoir and history book (as evidenced by the pages of bibliographic notes). The first several chapters feel more like a history book, as Faust sets the context for what is to come, describing the Virginia of her own childhood and that Virginia of those who came before her. Once Faust enters boarding school and college, the stories get more personal and "memoir-ish" as she shares her experience living through the 50s and 60s. While of course this is Faust's own life that she recalls, and she can't help being who she is -- a rich, privileged, white girl/women -- you can't help but wonder at times if this -- this recollection of the fight for black civil rights -- is really her story to tell? Is this who I should be learning about this from? Maybe not exclusively, but it is still interesting to learn how and why one white women became so involved in the movement ... to get that particular perspective. And for me it was of course great to get insight into the childhood and college years of one of my favorite college teachers, and understand why she went into her chosen field.
NOTE: Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
August 26, 2023
Format Read: Audiobook from NetGalley (available now)
Review: I enjoyed this audio, the author’s narration was engaging. I learned a lot about what it was like for a women to grow up in the Northeast, US in the 60’s.
Recommended For: Those who wants memoir set mostly in the 60’s by a women who was college educated and fought for civil rights.
Book-opoly #23
September 19, 2023
Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury I found to be one of the most revealing and insightful memoirs that it has been my pleasure to read for quite a while. Faust, a former President of Harvard University, shares with the reader her family history from both the paternal and maternal sides, as well as her growing consciousness from being a child in a conservative, white, privileged family in Virginia during the 1950s that, as a female, her life was expected to conform to one not altogether different from her mother's. That is, it's a white man's world and a woman's role was meant to be that of wife and mother, while her 3 brothers were raised to live independent lives in a world largely made to accommodate men like them. This is what Faust's mother had tried to explain to her. Faust could and would not subscribe to this societal expectation. As a young girl, she "could see how the lives of so many around me had been deformed and diminished by the constraints of custom and conformity, as well as by the unjust social hierarchies that structured our world. I wanted to understand that world, to see it fully without distortion or illusion."
In Necessary Trouble, Faust provides a unique portrait of the segregated South, and her experiences as a student and activist in both the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1960s. It is also a book that gives the reader a palpable - and at times, vicarious - feel of how the events and changes wrought in the U.S. during the 1950s and 1960s shaped our society and impacted on Faust's own life, culminating with her graduation from Bryn Mawr College in May 1968.
In Necessary Trouble, Faust provides a unique portrait of the segregated South, and her experiences as a student and activist in both the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1960s. It is also a book that gives the reader a palpable - and at times, vicarious - feel of how the events and changes wrought in the U.S. during the 1950s and 1960s shaped our society and impacted on Faust's own life, culminating with her graduation from Bryn Mawr College in May 1968.
September 14, 2023
The first section of the memoir, the authors youth, upbringing and disconnection from her parents were both interesting and relatable. My sister was born the same year and the similarities are striking.
From there on the book seemed like a student class Overview on boomer events. Impressively, the author played a part in many of the events. Forest Gump like. Her discovery American wrongs are pervasive with the boomer self discoveries. Somehow as human kind evolves over the millennia, the prior generation wasn’t smart enough to change smartly and the to make the world a better place. Boomers had the awareness to make societal changes
Got news for you, boomer. Prejudice and women’s issues were NOT restricted to the South. And definitely not just in America. In 1960, what place in the world would living be better?
Nothing new here, except the authors Gump like ride during the period.
At least she didn’t go to Woodstock 🎶
From there on the book seemed like a student class Overview on boomer events. Impressively, the author played a part in many of the events. Forest Gump like. Her discovery American wrongs are pervasive with the boomer self discoveries. Somehow as human kind evolves over the millennia, the prior generation wasn’t smart enough to change smartly and the to make the world a better place. Boomers had the awareness to make societal changes
Got news for you, boomer. Prejudice and women’s issues were NOT restricted to the South. And definitely not just in America. In 1960, what place in the world would living be better?
Nothing new here, except the authors Gump like ride during the period.
At least she didn’t go to Woodstock 🎶
December 19, 2023
A memoir by historian and first woman President of Harvard, who grew up in post WWII era and into the civil rights movement - sounded fascinating to me. But this book fell flat on several levels.
The beginning was interesting, as we learn about her family history and the death of her mother. From there we move through her life as she participated in the civil rights movement. We get a front row seat and follow her in her participation.
But we don’t get to know *her*. Much of this book read like a history book. There is very little self reflection and what feels like a whole lot of self grandiosity. After awhile it was off putting. We don’t learn how this shaped her. We don’t see a look-back to her conflicted relationship with her mother, who died very young, and learn how now, in her 70s, she has learned a broader perspective of their differences.
She seemed detached for much of the book. And her very choppy reading of the audiobook was distracting and cold. I mostly couldn’t wait for this to be over.
The beginning was interesting, as we learn about her family history and the death of her mother. From there we move through her life as she participated in the civil rights movement. We get a front row seat and follow her in her participation.
But we don’t get to know *her*. Much of this book read like a history book. There is very little self reflection and what feels like a whole lot of self grandiosity. After awhile it was off putting. We don’t learn how this shaped her. We don’t see a look-back to her conflicted relationship with her mother, who died very young, and learn how now, in her 70s, she has learned a broader perspective of their differences.
She seemed detached for much of the book. And her very choppy reading of the audiobook was distracting and cold. I mostly couldn’t wait for this to be over.
November 1, 2023
Faust is a bit younger than I am, but it still was a trip down memory lane, reading of familiar events. But there were differences. I wasn't of a privileged class nor from the south. And I was much older when I became aware of contradictions that she was aware of in grade school.
I found the beginning a more interesting read than the later half of the book. Maybe more personal. Maybe more apparent contradictions.
I found the beginning a more interesting read than the later half of the book. Maybe more personal. Maybe more apparent contradictions.
February 24, 2024
This is a beautifully written, thoughtful memoir of growing up in remarkable times. The author's account of her involvement in and commitment to the Civil Rights movement is compelling and written in a way that both acknowledges her own privilege and avoids lapsing into a tale of white saviorism--a difficult position to negotiate, but one that I think she does very well.
This book had a powerful emotional impact on me. So much of what Dr. Faust writes about resonates so strongly with recollections of my own childhood and youth: what it was like to be a girl in the 1950s, a difficult relationship with a disapproving mother, the Civil Rights Era, the Vietnam War. Although our backgrounds and experiences of those times were vastly different, I felt such a strong kinship to the author, the feeling of having gone through these things together.
This book had a powerful emotional impact on me. So much of what Dr. Faust writes about resonates so strongly with recollections of my own childhood and youth: what it was like to be a girl in the 1950s, a difficult relationship with a disapproving mother, the Civil Rights Era, the Vietnam War. Although our backgrounds and experiences of those times were vastly different, I felt such a strong kinship to the author, the feeling of having gone through these things together.
September 8, 2023
Excellent; highly, highly recommend.
August 16, 2023
I love a good memoir and there are some amazing examples out there. The best connect the reader into the heart and mind of the writer, and do so in a way that seems to be deeply investigated. The reader is a confidant and a close friend, or at least that is the feeling, and what I was hoping for with Necessary Trouble. Unfortunately, this is less a memoir and more of a historical account of events surrounding the author and how she engaged in those events.
The research is excellent and the writing is solid for a historian. This issue is that the reader is held at arm's length. The life is discussed, but not investigated with a majority of the text dedicated to the story of injustice and uprise in the 1960s without a deep personal connection. There are moments, pieces of writing from that time included, etc. However, what this piece is missing is heart. It relies heavily on the impact of the times examined and the divides perceived, making this an average read.
There is also an itch at the back of my brain, when so much of a book about a white wealthy Virginian teen tells the story of the civil rights movement with lots of “we” and “us.” While she did spend two summers actively participating in outreach engagement, there is a lack of her personal story that makes this teeter on the line of problematic… that line that moves from telling her story to telling a Black story that should be told by Black voices.
The research is excellent and the writing is solid for a historian. This issue is that the reader is held at arm's length. The life is discussed, but not investigated with a majority of the text dedicated to the story of injustice and uprise in the 1960s without a deep personal connection. There are moments, pieces of writing from that time included, etc. However, what this piece is missing is heart. It relies heavily on the impact of the times examined and the divides perceived, making this an average read.
There is also an itch at the back of my brain, when so much of a book about a white wealthy Virginian teen tells the story of the civil rights movement with lots of “we” and “us.” While she did spend two summers actively participating in outreach engagement, there is a lack of her personal story that makes this teeter on the line of problematic… that line that moves from telling her story to telling a Black story that should be told by Black voices.
February 20, 2023
Drew Faust’s coming of age reflections are situated within the story of the country’s own development, specifically seeking to break free from constraints on the roles of women and deeply rooted racial prejudice. A distinguished historian of the South, she contextualizes her own experience growing up in Virginia and being educated in the northeast within larger political and social currents. It is most certainly the tale of a very privileged young woman, which she readily and repeatedly acknowledges. The book will resonate with others of similar experience as a near-perfect crystallization of the epiphany of recognizing, and then feeling impelled to try to dismantle, the falsehoods on which one has been raised. To others, it may, unfortunately at times, come off as lacking self-awareness, and yet her accomplishment in relation to her originally prescribed role is remarkable. Faust is an artful, engaging, funny, and sharply intelligent writer. The book is as-advertised in terms of covering her early life, but I found myself wanting very much to read her analysis of what came next, particularly with respect to her experience as a woman in the academy and in becoming and serving as Harvard’s first woman president.
December 19, 2023
A good memoir with clear voice of the author that delivers on its promise of delivering readers into an era that feels very distant from today’s, but also so many parallels. I didn’t know how active Faust was as a student in the issues of the time — traveling through communist countries, marching in the south, protesting the Vietnam War. I appreciated the look inside her thought process on weighing abstract school work versus more direct action. It will always blow my mind how much the world can change in the span of one life time — this memoir is a great reminder of that, and it perhaps not so subtly urges readers to not take change for granted but to be an active participant in change.
Couldn’t help but to get a signed copy of this at Harvard Book Store when I was back in September.
Couldn’t help but to get a signed copy of this at Harvard Book Store when I was back in September.
October 5, 2023
Guest review by my mother:
http://perfectretort.blogspot.com/?_s...
4 1/2 stars from me! Recommended.
http://perfectretort.blogspot.com/?_s...
4 1/2 stars from me! Recommended.
January 23, 2024
This is not so much a typical memoir - it is the author’s life as seen through the times in which she grew up. Her world view began when she was 9 and wrote a letter to President Eisenhower! She became
more political as she became aware of the inequalities around her. DGF was definitely in the right places at the right times. Although - she made it happen - it wasn’t an accident. Lots of hands on history told throughout this book and reminded me of those heady times during the mid to late 60’s.
more political as she became aware of the inequalities around her. DGF was definitely in the right places at the right times. Although - she made it happen - it wasn’t an accident. Lots of hands on history told throughout this book and reminded me of those heady times during the mid to late 60’s.
October 4, 2023
Amazon suggested this book and I read it because I was interested in the experience of someone who had grown up in Virginia who came of age during the Civil Rights struggle.
I found the parts about her life growing up in Front Royal in the 40s and 50s the most interesting and also her attempts to understand her family’s history and attitudes towards race. She also participated in the Civil Rights movement, and no matter how many times I read about the South during this era, it is still hard to realize just how violent the efforts were to maintain a segregated society.
But a lot of this book fell flat for me. The book begins to feel less personal as she gets into high school and college. I don’t regret reading it but I am also not sure that I would recommend it.
I found the parts about her life growing up in Front Royal in the 40s and 50s the most interesting and also her attempts to understand her family’s history and attitudes towards race. She also participated in the Civil Rights movement, and no matter how many times I read about the South during this era, it is still hard to realize just how violent the efforts were to maintain a segregated society.
But a lot of this book fell flat for me. The book begins to feel less personal as she gets into high school and college. I don’t regret reading it but I am also not sure that I would recommend it.
December 20, 2023
I was delighted to read about my alma mater Bryn Mawr as it was (ahem) when I was born. Faust brings her historian training to her memoir (getting copies of letters she sent from the presidential archives!). She had a remarkable and fascinating early life. I also enjoyed the context provided by discussing her grandparents' and parents' lives.
November 4, 2023
Fascinating memoir by the author of growing up in a privileged conservative southern family and her political awakening during the tumultuous 1960s and 1970s. I wish the book had traced her later development into an excellent historian and president of Harvard.
November 29, 2023
3.5 stars!
A very fascinating memoir, filled with simple but effective writing! It is amazing to me just how much Drew Gilpin Faust accomplished before she turned twenty years; how, as a teenager, she was ready to fight every social battle in the world in the name of decreasing injustice. This book was lent to me by a coworker who said that the author reminded him of me. I wish, but I spent my teenage years finding peace in books rather than in the world.
Some topics discussed in this memoir really stood out to me: the generational cycle of fighting between mothers and daughters, the clash of racism and Christianity, and the power of the young generation to fix the world before us. The first one especially caught my eye immediately because I feel as though I could talk about it for hours. Mother and daughters fight on the basis of their freedom, independence, and place in a man's world constantly because their definition of "feminism" is so different within the world they grow up in. It hurts because in reality, the mother and the daughter are simple reflections of each other, both screaming because they are desperate for their voices to be heard. Additionally, I loved her analysis of the books that impacted her life the most because it got me thinking about the countless books that changed my life immensely!!
At the end of the day, I love reading such detailed memoirs because it makes me feel as connected to the person's family as they were; it fills the ache of not having such details about my own family. I love reading about fighting the prejudice I see in our world, and it is both comforting and sad to know that these battles continue to be fought generation after generation. Nonetheless, I do think that the author attempted to include too many serious, discussion-worthy topics; the book would have been more effective to just focus on a couple. When you read about sexism, racism, Vietnam War, etc. the timelines get a bit jumbled and you lose a little bit of interest.
Good book, but could have been better!
Favorite Quotes:
"I was not meant to become a woman, for that category carried dangerously sexual and sensual implications. It was a term that seemed almost impolite in its emphasis on the physical aspects of female identity rather than the acquired graces by which a lady was defined. Black people were women; I must be a lady."
"And it was not only dangerous for girls to have good minds, it was unnecessary -- even wasteful."
"Men make war, and war makes men."
"Suffering is not measured in millions or thousands but in many individual cases. It is only when we see the meaning of an individual's suffering that we can begin to multiply it into statistics."
A very fascinating memoir, filled with simple but effective writing! It is amazing to me just how much Drew Gilpin Faust accomplished before she turned twenty years; how, as a teenager, she was ready to fight every social battle in the world in the name of decreasing injustice. This book was lent to me by a coworker who said that the author reminded him of me. I wish, but I spent my teenage years finding peace in books rather than in the world.
Some topics discussed in this memoir really stood out to me: the generational cycle of fighting between mothers and daughters, the clash of racism and Christianity, and the power of the young generation to fix the world before us. The first one especially caught my eye immediately because I feel as though I could talk about it for hours. Mother and daughters fight on the basis of their freedom, independence, and place in a man's world constantly because their definition of "feminism" is so different within the world they grow up in. It hurts because in reality, the mother and the daughter are simple reflections of each other, both screaming because they are desperate for their voices to be heard. Additionally, I loved her analysis of the books that impacted her life the most because it got me thinking about the countless books that changed my life immensely!!
At the end of the day, I love reading such detailed memoirs because it makes me feel as connected to the person's family as they were; it fills the ache of not having such details about my own family. I love reading about fighting the prejudice I see in our world, and it is both comforting and sad to know that these battles continue to be fought generation after generation. Nonetheless, I do think that the author attempted to include too many serious, discussion-worthy topics; the book would have been more effective to just focus on a couple. When you read about sexism, racism, Vietnam War, etc. the timelines get a bit jumbled and you lose a little bit of interest.
Good book, but could have been better!
Favorite Quotes:
"I was not meant to become a woman, for that category carried dangerously sexual and sensual implications. It was a term that seemed almost impolite in its emphasis on the physical aspects of female identity rather than the acquired graces by which a lady was defined. Black people were women; I must be a lady."
"And it was not only dangerous for girls to have good minds, it was unnecessary -- even wasteful."
"Men make war, and war makes men."
"Suffering is not measured in millions or thousands but in many individual cases. It is only when we see the meaning of an individual's suffering that we can begin to multiply it into statistics."
November 2, 2023
This book is fairly long and covers a lot of data, but, if you have the time to spend on it, this is a detailed story about the civil rights movement from the perspective of a wealthy white girl who took part in and came of age during the movement.
As I said, this book covers a lot, here are just two of the sections that stood out to me.
In chapter 4 she shared a story of how her grandmother put up a plaque in the Black section of their family cemetery, referencing to those buried there as "beloved servants" rather than as the slaves that they were. Though Faust when 10 years olds when this occured, she did not realize it had occured until later. Wondering why her grandmother would pay for such a item with a sentiment considered so racist today, she looked into it. What she learned was that, at the time her grandmother erected it, there had been a local concern about running out of burial ground for the regions white residents. Their proposed solution had been to take over the Black section of the cemetery, erasing the record of their existence. Therefore, Faust's grandmother's actions, while racist in the concepts it expressed, were intended as an acknowledgement of the lives that had lived and been buried there. I appreciated Faust's thoughtfulness in looking at the context, and in acknowledging how activism can sometimes be quiet. Some people we would condemn by today's standards were actually doing something brave and pushing the status quo for their own context.
A second part that stood out to me came in chapter 12 when Faust discussed the draft. She spent time exploring the many responses that were explored and employed by those wishing to avoid war time and the many discussions she had with her peers about it. Amidst the list of possible options Faust inserted questions about the ethics of it all, including the acknowledgement that, by taking efforts to avoid the draft, that would just mean that less affluent men would fill those spaces instead. If it is immoral to go and fight, and it is immoral to avoid and thereby send others to die, what should one do?
I appreciated the thoughtfulness expressed in this book. It is not just a collection of events that Faust experienced, it is a reflection on how her experience shaped her, how her privileges impacted her, and how she fought to push against the injustices she saw. I think this was the first time I read about such experiences from someone who grew up during these years, and I appreciate that I was able to learn about it from such a skilled orator.
I would recommend this to people who wonder about those who came of age during the civil rights movement and the Vietnam war.
As I said, this book covers a lot, here are just two of the sections that stood out to me.
In chapter 4 she shared a story of how her grandmother put up a plaque in the Black section of their family cemetery, referencing to those buried there as "beloved servants" rather than as the slaves that they were. Though Faust when 10 years olds when this occured, she did not realize it had occured until later. Wondering why her grandmother would pay for such a item with a sentiment considered so racist today, she looked into it. What she learned was that, at the time her grandmother erected it, there had been a local concern about running out of burial ground for the regions white residents. Their proposed solution had been to take over the Black section of the cemetery, erasing the record of their existence. Therefore, Faust's grandmother's actions, while racist in the concepts it expressed, were intended as an acknowledgement of the lives that had lived and been buried there. I appreciated Faust's thoughtfulness in looking at the context, and in acknowledging how activism can sometimes be quiet. Some people we would condemn by today's standards were actually doing something brave and pushing the status quo for their own context.
A second part that stood out to me came in chapter 12 when Faust discussed the draft. She spent time exploring the many responses that were explored and employed by those wishing to avoid war time and the many discussions she had with her peers about it. Amidst the list of possible options Faust inserted questions about the ethics of it all, including the acknowledgement that, by taking efforts to avoid the draft, that would just mean that less affluent men would fill those spaces instead. If it is immoral to go and fight, and it is immoral to avoid and thereby send others to die, what should one do?
I appreciated the thoughtfulness expressed in this book. It is not just a collection of events that Faust experienced, it is a reflection on how her experience shaped her, how her privileges impacted her, and how she fought to push against the injustices she saw. I think this was the first time I read about such experiences from someone who grew up during these years, and I appreciate that I was able to learn about it from such a skilled orator.
I would recommend this to people who wonder about those who came of age during the civil rights movement and the Vietnam war.
August 25, 2023
This is a brave and poignant memoir about the author's privileged childhood in the segregated South and the birth of her questioning spirit. The author discusses struggling with the ups and downs that come from a privileged family. The theme of freedom is threaded throughout the book, including the Civil Rights Movement, communism, and the lack of freedoms of the Soviet Bloc. It also speaks to the author's own struggles for freedom from the conventions and beliefs she found so constraining when she was young. Her mother didn't value her intelligence and found it almost offensive to what a lady should be.
The author delves into generational, gender, and racial divides as she describes instances of the "necessary trouble" she created growing up as a privileged young woman who refused to accept the status quo. Even as a child, she was aware of the larger inequities in her Southern world. At nine, the author wrote a strongly worded letter to Eisenhower in support of school integration and continued to advocate for what she believed in. This book embodies the idea of how we can find our way in the world, even if it is not encouraged.
To listen to my interview with the author, go to my podcast at:
https://www.momsdonthavetimetoreadboo...
The author delves into generational, gender, and racial divides as she describes instances of the "necessary trouble" she created growing up as a privileged young woman who refused to accept the status quo. Even as a child, she was aware of the larger inequities in her Southern world. At nine, the author wrote a strongly worded letter to Eisenhower in support of school integration and continued to advocate for what she believed in. This book embodies the idea of how we can find our way in the world, even if it is not encouraged.
To listen to my interview with the author, go to my podcast at:
https://www.momsdonthavetimetoreadboo...
August 11, 2023
Parts of this book seemed like a mirror to my own past, even though I am at least ten years younger than the author. However, I did grow up in Virginia and the attitudes and experiences she describes are so familiar that I could hear them in my head as I read the words. Her writing could have been just as applicable to my older cousins, who also participated in some of the civil rights volunteer work as Dr. Faust. I looked up to them as if they held all the wisdom of how to navigate the rapidly changing world.
But, alas, of course they did not.
To her credit, the author was very often in the right place at the right time to be a part of some history-making events, such as the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, and Dr. King's commencement address to the Bryn Mawr Class of 1966. She convincingly portrays her own engagement with civil rights and anti-war efforts in language that is authentic and compassionate. I do try to hear the voices of baby boomers who may be the exceptions rather than the rule because as a whole, this generation largely abandoned those early dreams for capitalist-inspired ones.
And though the author clearly has her faults, I am grateful to be able to read her story in the context of the times it describes as events unfolded. The writing is crisp and self-aware, even self-critical at times. Through it all this is a story of a young woman coming of age in an era of unquestionable privilege, who slowly realizes that it is her call to do what she can to do better. She fearlessly travels with a student group behind the Iron Curtain to wage peace and converse with real individuals living in completely foreign situations. She takes what she learns and applies it, even realizing that college may not be her best option for ultimately fighting for social justice and peace, but she does it anyway because it is expected, and she does sprinkle those at-the-time radical ideas throughout her college papers and essays.
I like this young near-radical Drew Gilpin. Seen through the lens of years, Dr. Faust does a remarkable job of making her real and relatable. I'd just like to know what comes next, how she navigated the years after graduation, as she assumed her career as a historian and author. Perhaps she'll humor us with that story soon.
Thanks to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for offering the free review copy in exchange for an honest review.
But, alas, of course they did not.
To her credit, the author was very often in the right place at the right time to be a part of some history-making events, such as the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, and Dr. King's commencement address to the Bryn Mawr Class of 1966. She convincingly portrays her own engagement with civil rights and anti-war efforts in language that is authentic and compassionate. I do try to hear the voices of baby boomers who may be the exceptions rather than the rule because as a whole, this generation largely abandoned those early dreams for capitalist-inspired ones.
And though the author clearly has her faults, I am grateful to be able to read her story in the context of the times it describes as events unfolded. The writing is crisp and self-aware, even self-critical at times. Through it all this is a story of a young woman coming of age in an era of unquestionable privilege, who slowly realizes that it is her call to do what she can to do better. She fearlessly travels with a student group behind the Iron Curtain to wage peace and converse with real individuals living in completely foreign situations. She takes what she learns and applies it, even realizing that college may not be her best option for ultimately fighting for social justice and peace, but she does it anyway because it is expected, and she does sprinkle those at-the-time radical ideas throughout her college papers and essays.
I like this young near-radical Drew Gilpin. Seen through the lens of years, Dr. Faust does a remarkable job of making her real and relatable. I'd just like to know what comes next, how she navigated the years after graduation, as she assumed her career as a historian and author. Perhaps she'll humor us with that story soon.
Thanks to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for offering the free review copy in exchange for an honest review.
September 3, 2023
Just finished reading Necessary Trouble by Drew Gilpin Faust. It is her autobiography of her life growing up in the 50’s and 60’s. She would go on to become the first woman President of Harvard. As a child she grew up as a privileged white girl in an ultra-conservative home in the South. As she grew up she began to question things like segregation or the role she would play as a “lady” that were a part of her life. A large part of the book relates her attempts to change those norms.
Being the same age as Drew much of the book ignited memories for me (although I grew up in a liberal home in Massachusetts). I loved her stories, they were well told and, for me, immersive. I have read other reviews that did not care for her or the book. I think a lot of that depends on your personal politics.
Being the same age as Drew much of the book ignited memories for me (although I grew up in a liberal home in Massachusetts). I loved her stories, they were well told and, for me, immersive. I have read other reviews that did not care for her or the book. I think a lot of that depends on your personal politics.
September 22, 2023
Drew Gilpin Faust grew up in a conservative family in segregated Virginia. She was expected to become a "lady," and conform to the prevailing ideas about gender and race. Somehow, Faust saw the inequity surrounding her and began to question why her school was all white and why Blacks could only hold subservient roles in society. She began to set out on her own path as a ten-year-old when she wrote a letter to President Eisenhower pleading for equality opportunity for Black people. She was lucky to be sent off to boarding school at Concord Academy and this lead to many enlightening experiences and finally college at Bryn Mawr during the civil rights era. Faust writes in great detail about her engagement with civil rights and her developing interest in history as well as her emerging capacity for leadership. The book ends at her college graduation and her trip home to vote for the first time. Her mother dies never having understood her daughter and how she has become the person she is.
January 18, 2024
I guess I just don’t like memoirs. They seem so relentlessly focused on the writers experience, well (duh) the whole point of a memoir. So I guess it’s me not the writer I grew up in the same time…just different circumstances. Unlike her. I only lived for three months in the south Georgia however, the same events dominated she describes her fear during the Cuban missile crisis living so close to Washington DC.Hmmm my experience, marching to a shelter and spending hours huddled with my classmates in Okinawa, might be a tad more fear inducing than the generalized angst she experienced.
She seemed like all the rich white girls I knew following and protesting the latest that never committed to one thing Her description of “ helping” in a poor black neighborhood of Philadelphia is hilarious. After identifying rats as the problem they would solve they melted away and never went back.
I guess I was left with a sense of what did she actually accomplish other than removing parietal controls at Bryn Mawr? That sentence might sum up my whole problem with the book.
She seemed like all the rich white girls I knew following and protesting the latest that never committed to one thing Her description of “ helping” in a poor black neighborhood of Philadelphia is hilarious. After identifying rats as the problem they would solve they melted away and never went back.
I guess I was left with a sense of what did she actually accomplish other than removing parietal controls at Bryn Mawr? That sentence might sum up my whole problem with the book.
September 30, 2023
I really enjoyed Necessary Trouble by Drew Gilpin Faust. She was Harvard's first female president, the culmination of a career spent breaking down barriers and fighting for social justice. The first part of the book is a family memoir, a genealogist's dream of an album tracing some of the extraordinary people she descended from, and her parents, who made her life harder and who would have preferred to perpetuate their racist, classist ideals in their daughter, but she had other ideas. For anyone that has ever felt compelled to become someone that their parents didn't want them to be, it's a relatable and engaging story.
Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the opportunity to review a temporary digital ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.
Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the opportunity to review a temporary digital ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 325 reviews