Wash Post slams Essie Mae book
CVK
“Dear Senator” shows no concern about Thurmond’s inappropriate, abusive appropriation of a vulnerable young household servant; instead, it offers only the hearts-and-flowers version of the story. (The corner of each page is adorned with a curlicued ribbon, lest readers have any doubt that this memoir should be read as a romance novel.) …
Washington-Williams fantasizes that Thurmond didn’t marry until his mid-forties because her mother had been the great love of his life, whom he was kept from marrying only by society’s racial prejudices. These are a naive daughter’s pipe dreams…
Ouch.
The reviewer also calls Essie Mae out for including countless flattering photos of a young and rugged Strom Thurmond, while neglecting to publish a single picture of either her “ill-used, ill-fated birth mother or her devoted adoptive mother.”
The shameful story of abusive, manipulative relationships between white men and black women — throughout the centuries of slavery and after — should be told often, told well and made available to a wide readership. It’s her life, but Washington-Williams and her ghostwriter refuse to tell it honestly.
Damie wrote:
She’s a christian lady, she has the right to be forgiving.
Posted 26 Jan 2005 at 4:23 am ¶
Lorna wrote:
Wonderful book. Told in honest truth I believe. Maybe if times had been different for Strom he may have married her mother. Who knows?
Posted 16 Jun 2005 at 6:56 pm ¶
joe wrote:
I think that one’s attitude toward family and loved ones should be viewed in a positive light. This is why the book should stand as it is.
Unless one’s relationship with their own parents are poor, I can think no other reason for a book by a daughter would come out anything but forgiving.
As for the critics–perhaps they should look at their own relationships, and see whether or not this is the basis for their vile. Easier for them to criticize from the outside looking in, but not when the shoe is on the other foot. They have no heart, or it’s only for themselves.
Posted 09 Aug 2005 at 11:27 am ¶
molly wrote:
I agree with Joe, its much easier to criticize when the shoe is on the other foot. Mrs. Williams is a forgiving christian woman, that is what I’ve gathered from her book. There is no need to bash or trash, not only the man who brought her into this world but took care of his parental resposibilities. Now I’m not letting Mr. Thurmond off the hook because he most certainly was WRONG for engaging in sex with a minor. But the man is gone, what good would it have done for Mrs. Williams to trash a man she loved, I think the media did a somewhat fairly good job of that by themselves. I think the book was an excellent read, and it shed some much needed light, on the highly overlooked black female/white male concubine sexual relationships. There are so many stories like Mrs. Williams, but for some reason they always get overlooked. Sad!!
Posted 22 Dec 2005 at 3:25 am ¶