Educated (book)

Last updated

Educated: A Memoir
Educated (Tara Westover).png
First edition cover
Author Tara Westover
Audio read by Julia Whelan
Cover artistPatrik Svensson [1]
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
SubjectMemoir
Publisher Random House
Publication date
February 18, 2018
Media typePrint (hard & paperback), e-book, audiobook
Pages352 pages
Awards2019 Alex Award
ISBN 978-0-399-59050-4 (First edition hardcover)
270.092 B
LC Class CT3262.I2 W47 2018
Website tarawestover.com/book

Educated is a 2018 memoir by the American author Tara Westover. Westover recounts overcoming her survivalist Mormon family in order to go to college, and emphasizes the importance of education in enlarging her world. She details her journey from her isolated life in the mountains of Idaho to completing a PhD program in history at Cambridge University. She started college at the age of 17 having had no formal education. She explores her struggle to reconcile her desire to learn with the world she inhabited with her father.

Contents

As of the September 13, 2020, issue of The New York Times, the book had spent 132 consecutive weeks on the Hardcover Non-Fiction Best Seller list. [2] It won a 2019 Alex Award and was shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, PEN America's Jean Stein Book Award, and two awards from the National Book Critics Circle Award. [3]

Summary

Westover is raised in isolation in Buck's Peak, Idaho by her parents, pseudonymously referred to as Gene and Faye Westover respectively. Gene was paranoid about hospitals, public education, and the government, partially due to the siege at Ruby Ridge. Faye consequently homeschools the Westover children.

Gene denies Westover's attempts to seek normality in her life. Her brother Shawn initially helps her and the two grow closer but he starts physically abusing her as she befriends Charles, a boy she meets while performing in theater. Another of Westover's brothers, Tyler, learns of the abuse and encourages her to leave home and take the ACT to be able to apply to Brigham Young University (BYU). Westover is later admitted to BYU under a scholarship. Shawn reconciles with her after standing up to Gene on her behalf.

Sometime later, Westover studies at the University of Cambridge and receives scholarships that allow her to continue attending. The pressure of maintaining her grades in order to keep her scholarship results in Westover feeling stressed. Additionally, her alienation from the outside world and lack of formal schooling become issues.

Later, Westover reconnects with Charles, but is unable to act romantically towards him because of her conservative upbringing. Remembering Gene's and Shawn's abuse towards her, results in Westover terminating her relationship with Charles.

Westover now feels alienated in Idaho and worries that Gene may have bipolar disorder. She cuts ties with him, but reconnects after he expresses interest in her life at school. After Shawn marries Emily, a young woman he was dating, Westover worries about Emily who previously expressed fear of Shawn.

Westover confides to one of her professors about her family. Her professor encourages her to apply for the studying abroad program at Cambridge. After arriving at King's College, Westover is assigned to work with Professor Jonathan Steinberg. Both of her professors encourage her to attend graduate school. Westover applies for and wins the Gates Scholarship and forms a temporary truce with Gene. The two previously fell out over how she chronicled her past to local news outlets and her decision to attend school in England.

After returning to Cambridge, Westover takes steps to be part of the world, including getting immunized for vaccinations her family rejected. She occasionally returns to Idaho where she learns that Shawn is still abusing Emily. Her sister, Audrey, learned about Shawn's behavior, but Faye does not believe her. Westover and Faye take up email correspondence through which the latter suggests that Gene is mentally ill and writes about how they plan to get Shawn the help he needs. On another trip home, Shawn briefly shows signs of change, but later accuses Audrey of lying about his abusive behavior and threatens to kill her. Gene and Faye do not take Westover seriously when she tells them about Shawn's threat.

Westover encounters Shawn with a bloody knife on another visit home. Terrified, she lies that Gene lied about Shawn's treatment to Audrey. Later, she realizes that Faye had never been on her or Audrey's side. After returning to England, Shawn threatens her life. Audrey also cuts ties with Westover, claiming she is under Satan's control. Westover then begins graduate school at Harvard and her parents briefly visit and try to convince her to come home.

After returning home again, Westover discovers that Erin, Shawn's ex-girlfriend, wrote to Faye that she was delusional and demonizing her brother. Westover returns to Harvard and eventually England. After suffering panic attacks, she ends contact with her parents for a year, attempting to recover. She struggles in her studies, but Tyler encourages her and she successfully completes her PhD.

Years later Westover returns to Idaho for her maternal grandmother's funeral. She reunites with Tyler, his wife, two maternal aunts and her other siblings, most of whom still take Gene's and Shawn's side. At the end of the memoir, Westover is in touch with only a few family members and accepts that she needs to be away from the mountain.

Westover family

Other major people

Background

Of her upbringing, Westover has said, "My father created our reality in a really meaningful way because we were so isolated. He would say these things about public education and doctors and the government and we didn't know any better. We didn't go to school so as far as we knew the world was exactly the way our father described it." [4] Westover got her undergraduate degree at Brigham Young University and her PhD at Cambridge.

Westover decided to write the book after she confronted her parents about her brother's abuse, and the resulting conflict led to her becoming estranged from some members of her family. She began searching for stories to help her understand what had happened. In 2018, she told The New York Times, "I wrote the book I wished I could have given to myself when I was losing my family. When I was going through that experience, I became aware of how important stories are in telling us how to live — how we should feel, when we should feel proud, when we should feel ashamed. I was losing my family, and it seemed to me that there were no stories for that — no stories about what to do when loyalty to your family was somehow in conflict with loyalty to yourself. And forgiveness. I wanted a story about forgiveness that did not conflate forgiveness with reconciliation, or did not treat reconciliation as the highest form of forgiveness. In my life, I knew the two might always be separate. I didn't know if I would ever reconcile with my family, and I needed to believe that I could forgive, regardless." [5]

Westover has said that she set out to explore the complexity of difficult family relationships. In an interview with The Irish Times , she said, "You can love someone and still choose to say goodbye to them, and you can miss someone every day and still be glad they're not in your life." [4]

Her parents' attorney has said that "Her parents raised their family in what Tara described as an extremist mindset, but what they felt was self-sufficiency." [6] They maintain that there is only a "little germ of truth" in her book. [6] Their attorney said Westover's parents were hurt that Westover would write a book that slanders her upbringing and that she would accuse her brother [Shawn] of the abuse described. [6]

Reception

Educated was an instant #1 New York Times bestseller, and was positively reviewed by The New York Times, [7] [5] The Atlantic , [8] USA Today , [9] Vogue , [10] [11] The Economist , [12] and Literary Review , which praised Westover's writing as "crisp, persuasive and heartbreaking in its honesty." [13] The book was also nominated for a number of national awards, including the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, PEN America's Jean Stein Book Award, and two awards from the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Educated spent more than two years in hardcover on the New York Times bestseller list [14] and is being translated into 45 languages. [15] The New York Times ranked Educated as one of the 10 Best Books of 2018, [16]  and The American Booksellers Association named Educated the Nonfiction Book of the Year. [17] As of December 2020, the book had sold more than 8 million copies. [18]

Awards and recognition

Westover's book earned her several awards and accolades:

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References

  1. ↑ Tara Westover (February 20, 2018). Educated: A Memoir. Random House Publishing Group. p. 1. ISBN   978-0-399-59051-1.
  2. ↑ "Hardcover Nonfiction Books - Best Sellers". The New York Times . Retrieved September 10, 2020.
  3. ↑ "Book". Tara Westover. Retrieved November 5, 2019.
  4. 1 2 Conroy, Catherine. "'You could miss someone every day and still be glad they're not in your life'". The Irish Times . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  5. 1 2 Jordan, Tina (March 2, 2018). "Spinning a Brutal Off-the-Grid Childhood into a Gripping Memoir". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  6. 1 2 3 Seamons, Necia P. (February 23, 2018). "'Educated' should be read with grain of salt, says family's attorney". The Herald Journal . Retrieved November 5, 2019.
  7. ↑ MacGillis, Alec (March 1, 2018). "Review: 'Educated,' by Tara Westover". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  8. ↑ Hulbert, Ann (February 13, 2018). "'Educated' Is a Brutal, One-of-a-Kind Memoir". The Atlantic. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  9. ↑ Peters, Sharon. "In 'Educated,' the inspiring story of an isolated young woman determined to learn". USA Today . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  10. ↑ Freeman, Hadley (February 15, 2018). "Tara Westover on Turning Her Off-the-Grid Life Into a Remarkable Memoir". Vogue. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  11. ↑ MacSweeney, Eve (February 16, 2018). "Tara Westover's Educated Is Already Being Hailed as the 'Next Hillbilly Elegy'". Vogue. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  12. ↑ "A riveting memoir of a brutal upbringing". The Economist. ISSN   0013-0613 . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  13. ↑ Coghen, Ada (February 1, 2018). "Literary Fixes". Literary Review .
  14. ↑ "Best Sellers". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  15. ↑ "Curtis Brown". www.curtisbrown.co.uk. Retrieved September 22, 2020.
  16. ↑ "The 10 Best Books of 2018". The New York Times. November 29, 2018. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  17. ↑ "Authors Honored at 2019 Indies Choice and E.B. White Read-Aloud Awards". the American Booksellers Association. May 31, 2019. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  18. ↑ Barclay agency profile . Retrieved December 31, 2020.{{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help)
  19. ↑ "The Indie Biography & Memoir Bestseller List". American Booksellers Association. March 17, 2021. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  20. ↑ Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) (January 10, 2019). "2019 Top Ten Amazing Audiobooks for Young Adults". American Library Association. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  21. ↑ Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) (February 14, 2020). "2019 OBCB Arts and Humanities". American Library Association. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  22. ↑ "Educated: A Memoir | Awards & Grants". American Library Association. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  23. ↑ "2018 The National Book Critics Circle Award". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved April 4, 2021.
  24. ↑ "The Best Books of 2018". Amazon.com. Archived from the original on September 2, 2019. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  25. ↑ Cummings, William. "'Factfulness' and 'Educated' among the titles on Obama's summer reading list". USA Today. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  26. ↑ Elkins, Kathleen (December 3, 2018). "Bill Gates says these are the 5 best books he read in 2018". CNBC. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  27. ↑ Gates, Bill. "Educated is even better than you've heard". gatesnotes.com. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  28. ↑ "Seattle Arts & Lectures \ Tara Westover". Seattle Arts & Lectures. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
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