A Dialectic With the Everyday: Communication and Cultural Politics on Oprah Winfrey's Book Club
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Critical Studies in Media Communication
Vol. 20, No. 3, September 2003, pp. 295–316
A Dialectic With the Everyday:
Communication and Cultural Politics on
Oprah Winfrey’s Book Club
Ted Striphas
䊐 – This essay explores the cultural politics of television talk-show host Oprah Winfrey’s
Book Club. Because women constitute both the primary Oprah television audience and the
largest United States book buying public, it focuses specifically on women’s involvement in the
club and their modes of engagement with its selections. The Book Club’s astonishing success
was attributable in part to the carefully considered communication strategies through which
participants, Winfrey, and Oprah producers collectively articulated the value of books and
reading specifically for women. Their de-emphasizing of purely literary considerations, I
contend, enabled women to strategize how to use Book Club selections simultaneously to
distance themselves from and to engage more intensively with the demands of living in a
patriarchal and otherwise socioeconomically stratified society – a relationship I call a “dialectic
with the everyday.” This essay thus traces the communicative processes/practices through which
those involved in Oprah’s Book Club articulated a highly sophisticated economy of cultural
value around books and reading and the implications of that economy to a possible feminist
cultural politics.
T he Oprah Book Club did something
extraordinary. I don’t think there’s
been anything ever like it. When a beloved
television personality persuades, con-
people to read books, it’s not just a revol-
ution, it’s an upheaval.
– Toni Morrison, Nobel Prize winning
author, also selected for Oprah’s Book
vinces, cajoles, hundreds of thousands of Club (Oprah’s book club anniversary
party, 1997, p. 17)
Ted Striphas is Assistant Professor in the School Come on, people; Oprah isn’t a literary
of Communication Studies, Ohio University. This critic, or a family therapist, or a priest.
essay is derived from his doctoral dissertation, “A She’s a talk-show host. Some perspective
Constellation of Books: Communication, Technol- here, please.
ogy, and Popular Culture in the Late Age of – Abby Fowler (2001, p. 21), letter to the
Print” (University of North Carolina, Chapel editor, Newsweek
Hill, 2002). The author would like to thank When Oprah Winfrey announced on
Lawrence Grossberg (director), Marcus Breen,
Michael Hardt, Victoria Johnson, Della Pollock, the September 17, 1996 installment of
and Janice A. Radway for their input on the The Oprah Winfrey Show that she wanted
dissertation and Celeste Condit, Phaedra C. Pez- “to get the whole country reading
zullo, Greg Shepherd, and two anonymous again” (Oprah’s book club anniversary
CSMC reviewers for their advice on previous party, 1997, p. 1), few would have pre-
drafts of this piece. dicted the daytime television talk-show
Copyright 2003, National Communication Association
DOI: 10.1080/0739318032000112136296
OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003
personality’s extraordinary influence then, lies a concern for the specific
on bibliographic taste and patterns of communicative processes through
book buying in the United States. Yet which books are produced, distributed,
her first selection for the newly-formed exchanged, and consumed (Darnton,
Oprah’s Book Club, Jacquelyn 1995). It both insists on and explores
Mitchard’s (1996) hitherto modestly the role of communication with re-
successful novel The Deep End of the spect to the apparent success and
Ocean, proceeded to sell more than popular appeal of Oprah’s Book Club
700,000 copies and shot to number in the late 1990s and early 21st cen-
one on the New York Times bestseller tury. More specifically, it considers
list. The sudden, intense interest in the how communication about the selec-
book, and by extension the Book Club, tions for Oprah’s Book Club affected
prompted the Washington Post less than how individuals and groups engaged
two weeks later to profile the Club in a with the texts by asking: How have
cover story (Streitfeld, 1996). The those who orchestrated and partici-
significance of the Post’s coverage was pated in Oprah’s Book Club together
not lost on Winfrey, who noted that negotiated the purpose and value of
the Book Club enjoyed “an even big- books and reading?
ger start than Watergate” in its pages The success and popularity of
(Newborn quintuplets, 1996, p. 15). Oprah’s Book Club did not, of course,
Over the next six years, all 48 of insulate it from controversy; in fact,
Oprah’s Book Club selections followed the club’s extremely high profile prob-
a similar pattern of success. Each typi- ably attracted and intensified it. Dur-
cally sold a further half a million to ing its six year tenure Oprah’s Book
one million copies or more after being Club elicited an array of responses
chosen by Winfrey (Gray, 1996; from authors, readers, publishers, pro-
Ticker, 2000; Touched by an Oprah, fessional and lay literary critics, book-
1999). She even was awarded a gold sellers, and others. As the quotations
medal at the 1999 National Book above attest, critical appraisal ran the
Awards, the Oscars of the book indus- gamut from outright exuberance to
try, in recognition of the Book Club’s unmitigated contempt. Opponents of
ability to stimulate interest in and de- the Book Club were at a particular loss
mand for books and reading. Despite to explain how a stark, ambiguous
Winfrey’s decision in May 2002 to German novel like Bernhard
discontinue Oprah’s Book Club as a Schlinck’s The Reader (1997) could sit
mainstay of The Oprah Winfrey Show, side-by-side in the Oprah’s Book Club
her selections continue to figure catalog with Breena Clarke’s River,
prominently in most retail bookstores Cross My Heart (1999), which one
and non-book outlets (such as super- journalist dismissed as “a poorly writ-
markets, department stores, pharma- ten, sentimental novel from a diversity
cies, and so on).1 bureaucrat at Time, Inc.” (McNett,
Oprah’s Book Club was and contin- 1999, para. 5), let alone four selections
ues to be a complexly mediated cul- by Nobel Prize winning author Toni
tural phenomenon, combining printed Morrison – Song of Solomon (1977), Par-
books, television programs, letters, adise (1997), The Bluest Eye (1970), and
emails, and face-to-face conversations, Sula (1973).
among other media and forms of com- Feelings of contempt for the club
munication. At the heart of this study, came to a head in September 2001297 CSMC STRIPHAS when author Jonathan Franzen pub- gled demeaning attitudes towards licly divulged his misgivings about women and the cultural forms they Winfrey’s selecting his highly ac- tend to engage. claimed novel, The Corrections (2001), Thus, this essay critically reads for the Book Club. Winfrey has women’s conversations about and “picked some good books,” Franzen modes of engaging with the selections remarked upon hearing the news, “but for Oprah’s Book Club, bearing in she’s picked enough schmaltzy, one-di- mind these negative appraisals and the mensional ones that I cringe myself, ways in which patriarchal assumptions even if I think she’s really smart and inflect them. Both the success of and she’s really fighting the good fight” controversies surrounding the Book (quoted in Kirkpatrick, 2001, p. C4). Club, I maintain, flowed in part from Franzen worried, in other words, that the ways in which Winfrey, Oprah Win- so-called serious readers might cease frey Show producers, and participants in taking his book, well, seriously, given the club together articulated the value its association with a host of books of of books and book reading specifically putatively lesser caliber. His public for women. The first part of this essay, comments earned him the dubious dis- therefore, both reflects on and situates tinction of being the only author ever Oprah’s Book Club within the context to have an invitation to The Oprah Win- of feminist responses to mass culture. frey Show rescinded. Despite – or per- Here, I argue that the club offered a haps because of – the controversy, his set of symbolic and material resources novel went on to win the coveted Na- with which feminist cultural producers tional Book Award in December 2001. might begin piecing together a femin- These and other critics have repeat- ist aesthetics. In addition to teasing out edly thrown their hands in the air the logic by which selections were trying to explain how high art so easily made for the Book Club, in the next could commingle with mass culture, let section I show how women’s patterns alone how millions of Oprah viewer/ of engaging with Oprah books as ma- readers were unfazed by this seeming terial artifacts paralleled the ways in contradiction. Thus, not only is it which groups of women have been worth considering how specific com- shown to employ specific categories of munication practices relate to the popular literature (such as romance Book Club’s popularity, but also how novels) to escape temporarily from members of the Book Club challenged conservative gender role expectations. normative economies of cultural value In the third section, I reverse course to through their participation in it. This consider how conversations about the struggle becomes all the more salient narrative content of Oprah books when one considers that women be- prompted women to move closer to tween the ages of 18 and 54 make up and interrogate the determinate condi- both the primary audience for The tions of their everyday lives and expe- Oprah Winfrey Show and the largest ag- riences. As such, I argue, Oprah’s gregate book reading public in the Book Club advanced a particular pro- United States (Dortch, 1998; Gabriel, tocol for engaging with popular litera- 1997; Kinsella, 1997; Radway, 1984). ture, a dialectic with the everyday, Reproachful responses to Oprah’s whereby women were encouraged to Book Club, in other words, provide a use books and book reading as vehicles kind of cover under which are smug- both to step outside of and to interro-
298
OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003
gate critically values and routines. Fi- women in society, and second, an
nally, this essay concludes by assessing abiding commitment to taking seri-
the club’s actual and potential rela- ously these and other mass cultural
tionship to a feminist cultural politics, forms, with the intention of assessing
recognizing how, as a club, it may their effects and political possibilities.
have opened possibilities for dialogue Modleski (1982, 1998) recognizes
and collective political action. that the narratives and fantasy struc-
tures of romance novels, gothics, and
daytime soap operas produced in the
1970s and early 1980s surely rein-
Feminist Responses to Mass forced highly circumscribed under-
Culture: A Critical standings of women’s place in society.
Framework Despite their conservatizing impulses,
however, she maintains that feminist
Condemnations of Oprah’s Book scholars should resist flatly condemn-
Club follow a long line of condescend- ing them. “It is useless to deplore
ing responses to media genres and [mass cultural] texts for their omis-
mass cultural forms targeted toward sions, distortions, and conservative
and consumed primarily by women. affirmations,” she argues. “It is crucial
At least since Tania Modleski’s (1982) to understand them: to let their omis-
path-breaking book Loving With a Ven- sions and distortions speak, informing
geance: Mass-Produced Fantasies for Women, us of the contradictions they are meant
feminist scholars have challenged both to conceal and, equally importantly, of
popular and scholarly accounts that at the fears that lie behind them” (1982,
best are dismissive of, and at worst p. 113). Thus Modleski, Janice A.
openly hostile to, women and their Radway (1984), and numerous femin-
relationships to mass culture. This line ist scholars who have followed them
of research thus has focused on a host have enjoined researchers to engage
of media genres, including romance the thorny question of why women are
and gothic novels (Light, 1999; Mod- drawn to such texts, the nature of the
leski, 1982; Radway, 1984, 1999b), pleasures they derive from them, and
young women and girls’ magazines the relationship of these texts to
(McRobbie, 1991), popular music and women’s everyday lives.
dance (McRobbie, 1994), soap operas Together, Modleski (1982, 1998)
(Modleski 1982, 1998), prime time and Radway (1984) maintain that the
television sitcoms featuring women pleasure and popularity of romance
(Dow, 1996), and literature, television novels, gothics, daytime soap operas,
programming, and films geared to- and other texts derive at least partly
ward women of color (Bobo, 1995; from the ways in which they achieve
Bobo & Seiter, 1997). Without dimin- both a symbolic and practical fit with
ishing the significant differences across the everyday lives and experiences of
these studies, they (and this essay) women living in patriarchal societies.
share at least two attributes in com- As Modleski (1982, p. 14) puts it, the
mon: first, a recognition that demean- “enormous and continuing popularity”
ing attitudes toward these mass of these types of texts “suggests that
cultural forms and women’s engage- they speak to the very real problems
ments with them reflect larger patriar- and tensions in women’s lives.” Simi-
chal assumptions about the value of larly, Radway (1984, p. 45) asserts,299 CSMC STRIPHAS “the meaning of the romance-reading masculine power and masculine plea- experience may be closely tied to the sure implied in the narratives of soap way the act of reading fits within the operas” and other mass cultural forms middle-class mother’s day and the way involving a predominantly female the story itself addresses anxieties, audience (Modleski, 1979/1997, p. 46), fears, and psychological needs result- with the larger goal of amplifying these ing from her social and familial pos- criticisms and articulating them back ition.” While both Modleski and into the sphere of cultural production. Radway are cautious not to overesti- Critical responses to daytime tele- mate the progressive political possibili- vision talk shows further confirm the ties that may follow from women’s rule that mass cultural texts intended engagements with mass culture, both for and consumed primarily by women underscore how “contemporary mass- tend to attract condemnation. Popu- produced narratives for women con- lar, scholarly, and lay critics alike rou- tain elements of protest and resistance tinely impugn these shows for underneath highly orthodox plots” spectacularizing the profane and/or (Modleski, 1982, p. 25; see also Rad- for offering a surfeit of popular psy- way, 1984, pp. 17, 220). In other chological quick-fixes to recalcitrant words, mass entertainment and femin- social problems. Among scholarly crit- ist politics are not, perforce, antitheti- ics, Janice Peck (1994) and Dana L. cal. Cloud (1996) have argued respectively The challenge facing feminist schol- that talk on The Oprah Winfrey Show and ars of mass culture, then, is what to do popular biographies about Winfrey with these pleasures, these small ker- both turn on and reinforce a classically nels of protest which, at some level, liberal notion of the autonomous indi- may challenge patriarchal values, as- vidual subject. By advancing an ethic sumptions, and power structures, al- of individual responsibility and per- beit within the constraints of capitalist sonal psychological healing, they production? Modleski (1982, p. 25) ob- maintain, the Oprah Winfrey text de- serves that, in most circumstances, nies the necessity of contesting struc- these challenges are neither obviously tural forms of oppression through nor explicitly feminist. Yet she also collective political action. maintains that they can provide the On a more optimistic note, Peck rudiments of a more sustained and (1994, p. 115) concedes that The Oprah broad-ranging critique of patriarchy. Winfrey Show is “haunted by traces of “Clearly,” she states, “women find social egalitarian values, democratic soap operas eminently entertaining, strivings, and desires” to transform and an analysis of the pleasure that “social worlds.” Some feminist schol- soaps afford can provide clues not only ars have engaged various Oprah Win- about how feminists can challenge this frey texts hoping to recover these pleasure, but also how they can incor- traces and let them speak, thereby porate it” (1979/1997, p. 43). She goes cobbling together a feminist aesthetics on to propose the project of recovering from the raw materials of mass cul- a “feminist aesthetics” from the ture. Corinne Squire (1997), for exam- specific media genres and mass cul- ple, argues that although the show’s tural forms targeted to women. This persistent focus on women’s victimiza- feminist aesthetics would “rechannel tion may prove disarming for some and make explicit the criticisms of viewers, it still manages to weave to-
300 OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003 gether a complex, shifting narrative of nized, edited, and arranged, given the women’s experiences of gender, race, conventions of commercial television and class. As such, the show consist- and the producers’ understandings of ently illuminates “the contradictions what might appeal to The Oprah Win- that traverse our [women’s] subjectivi- frey Show’s television audience. ties” (p. 109). Against those who would All viewers invited to discuss Book claim that Oprah merely reduces Club selections on the air dis- structural social inequities to personal tinguished themselves by taking the psychological problems, moreover, time to write in to The Oprah Winfrey sustained viewing of the show suggests Show. In other words, they demon- a recurrence of specific psychological strated a level of interest and practical motifs. As more and more Oprah guests involvement setting them apart from attest to their reality, Squire claims, the majority of readers who pre- they aggregate or “begin to shed sumably decided not to write in. Thus, [their] individual psychological their comments are not necessarily character and start to look like … typical of the club as a whole. These social, political, or religious fact[s]” voices are significant, nevertheless, (p. 110). She concludes, therefore, because those invited to participate that The Oprah Winfrey Show possesses on air were considered by the show’s “some modest feminist value” owing producers to be ideal readers whose to its narrative structure (p. 109; relationships to the book(s) under see also Masciarotte, 1991; Shattuc, discussion, they hoped, would 1999). resonate with the broadest possible This essay continues the project of audience. recovering a feminist aesthetics vis-à- The question, which is best left open vis Oprah Winfrey’s Book Club, by for the time being, is whether the re- investigating why women were drawn sponses of these ideal readers reflect a en masse to a specific category of reasonably diverse cross-section or an popular literature. Methodologically, it essentializing amalgam of women’s ex- consists of a close reading of tran- periences engaging with Book Club scripts of all 45 episodes of The Oprah selections. Indeed, as Charlotte Bruns- Winfrey Show featuring Oprah’s Book don (1999, p. 361, emphasis in orig- Club.2 These materials, at minimum, inal) notes, “the personae and provide a reasonably accurate and ac- positions” offered by mass cultural cessible public record of how Winfrey, texts, and which often serve as the Oprah Winfrey Show producers, authors, taken-for-granted analytical categories and viewers invited to join them on for feminist critics (such as “the ‘fe- the air conceived of and regularly male spectator,’ ‘reading as a woman,’ talked about the value of specific books ‘women of color,’ ‘we,’ ‘the ordinary and books in general, in addition to woman”’), are “historical identities, the particular norms and protocols for en- contradictory sites and traces of politi- gaging with them.3 Indeed, the tran- cal arguments and exclusions.” The scripts provide some evidence of how mode of address of The Oprah Winfrey approximately 200 club members pub- Show and the Book Club selections is licly discussed the selections in rela- thus worth scrutinizing, insofar as it tionship to their daily lives4 – with the may reflect normative assumptions important caveat that these conversa- about, and perhaps challenges to, tions were strategically planned, orga- proper female subjectivity.
301
CSMC STRIPHAS
“No Dictionary Required” is wonderful for the summer, because I
didn’t want you to, like, just breeze
According to some critics, Oprah through it and then have to complain
Winfrey’s emergence as a key arbiter to me because you didn’t have enough
of cultural value and authority bor- to read.” Winfrey then went on to
dered on absurdity. The Wall Street admonish her audience to “take your
Journal, for instance, claimed (through time with it. Read one of
a thinly disguised veil of indignation) the … chapters, come back, let that
that “no dictionary is required for settle in with yourself, come back and
most” of Oprah’s Book Club selec- read another chapter” (Oprah’s book
tions, “nor is an appreciation for ambi- club, 2000, June 23, p. 17). She con-
guity or abstract ideas. The biggest cluded the broadcast by reiterating
literary challenge of some Oprah that it was a “great, great, great book
books is their length” (Crossen, 2001, for the summer, 546 pages” (p. 18).
p. W15). As the primary spokesperson Winfrey framed other selections al-
for the club, the Journal took Winfrey most identically. At the beginning of a
to task for failing to challenge readers June 1997 broadcast, Winfrey stated:
with the apparent literariness of Book “Today we’re announcing a big – I
Club selections, or, alternatively, for mean B-I-G book” (Book club finale,
failing to challenge readers with titles 1997, p. 1). Later, when she revealed
that were sufficiently literary at all. the selection, she explained (p. 17):
The Journal, however, made no effort
to understand the Book Club’s de- I knew back last year when we first started
cision-making on its own terms. this Book Club that this was the book that
The televised Book Club discussions you should be reading for the summer,
admittedly tended to shy away from because it is 740 pages long. Now for a lot
even the most basic vocabulary em- of you, that’s – that’ll be your first time
ployed in literary criticism (tone, ima- with a book that big – a big accomplish-
gery, metaphor, symbolism, allusion, ment, OK? So our big book for the sum-
and so on). Thus, the Journal was right mer is Songs in Ordinary Time by Mary
to point out that length was a more McGarry Morris.
important criterion for selecting titles
for the club than were traditional liter- Winfrey used virtually the same lan-
ary considerations. Almost every on guage to frame the June 1998 selec-
air announcement of new Oprah’s tion, Wally Lamb’s (1998) I Know This
Book Club selections, in fact, included Much Is True – “a great, big book for
at least some mention of each book’s the summer,” she called it, at 897
total number of pages. Why then did pages (Oprah’s book club, 1998, June
page length play such a crucial role in 18, p. 17). Jane Hamilton’s (1988) The
the selection process? Book of Ruth, in contrast, appears to
The selection of Barbara King- have been selected in December 1996
solver’s (1998) The Poisonwood Bible is in part because of its brevity. “You
telling. When Winfrey announced the have two months to finish … and it’s
book in June 2000, just prior to The not even a whole lot of pages … . [I]t’s
Oprah Winfrey Show’s summer recess, only 328 pages in paperback,” Win-
she described it as “a walapalooza of a frey explained. She then commented
book … . It’s 500 and some pages … . on the possible significance of the
[A]ctually, it’s – yeah, 546, 546, which book’s length: “The next Book Club302 OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003 airs Wednesday, January 22nd of next their children and, more broadly, the year, 1997. We gave you extra time everyday demands they faced as over the holidays so you don’t have to women living in a patriarchal society. read at the Christmas table, OK?” Similarly, women used Oprah’s Book (Behind the scenes, 1996, pp. 20–21). Club selections to create spaces and The language Winfrey used to thus remove themselves both symboli- frame every one of these books sug- cally and practically from their dom- gests that her selections for the club estic, female role-assigned duties. were not made on the basis of her Indeed, women featured on tastes alone. That she repeatedly re- Oprah’s Book Club highlighted how ferred to specific selections as summer these kinds of responsibilities posed books, holiday books, and so forth in- formidable challenges to their finding dicates that both time and page length personal time. The August 2000 Book were carefully considered criteria by Club program, for example, included which specific books were selected. an audio excerpt of a letter explaining Longer books often were timed to co- how one woman was moved by The incide with the summer months, when Poisonwood Bible (Kingsolver, 1998), a Oprah viewers presumably had more novel chronicling a pious American time to spend reading. Shorter books, family’s mission in the Belgian Congo on the other hand, often coincided and the Congolese struggle for inde- with months when women were as- pendence. “As a stay-at-home mom, I sumed to have more responsibilities often feel caught up in the world of and thus less time to read (such as children, conversations with children, around the winter holidays). Oprah’s conversations about children. I loved Book Club producers were sensitive, in this book. It brought me out of the other words, to how books and read- world I live in” (Oprah’s book club, ing could be made to fit into the rou- 2000, August 23, p. 23). Karen, an- tines of women’s lives, rather than other Book Club participant, likewise placing the burden on women to ad- explained: “My children now are just their schedules to accommodate trained that when they see Mom with books and reading. a book, they just don’t bother me … . In one respect, then, women’s pat- And on Saturday and Sunday morn- terns of engaging with the selections ings, my husband knows I’m going to for Oprah’s Book Club can be said to get up early at five to read, fall back to mirror those of women who consume sleep, and wake up again and read other categories of popular literature. some more … . I get up about 1⬊00 in Among the women whom Radway the afternoon to start my day, because (1984, p. 213) interviewed, for exam- I love to just lay there and read” (Let- ple, reading romance novels func- ters to Oprah’s book club, 2001, para. tioned in part as “a ‘declaration of 271). Like Radway’s (1984) romance independence’ and a way to say to novel readers, these women affirmed others, ‘This is my time, my space. how the reading of popular literature Now leave me alone.”’ Romance could help them both to justify and to novel reading, in other words, allowed enact a desire to step outside and away these readers to construct imagined – from the sometimes tedious and un- albeit effective – spatial and temporal fulfilling role expectations placed upon barriers with which to modulate their them as women, if only temporarily. heterosexual partnerships, the needs of Although women may have turned
303
CSMC STRIPHAS
to Oprah’s Book Club for this reason, books” (Newborn quintuplets, 1996,
its extraordinary success cannot be re- p. 15).
duced to that alone. Many women Candy Siebert’s provocative state-
featured on Oprah’s Book Club at- ment that something about Oprah’s
tributed their inability to read books to Book Club compelled her to take up
their responsibilities at home, yet books and book reading raises an im-
equally as many women indicated portant question: What about the club
never having developed an interest in moved women to engage with and
books or book reading at all prior to read books for the first time in many
their involvement with the club. years, perhaps even for the first time in
For example, the September 1997 their lives?
Oprah’s Book Club program featured Some critics have expressed dismay
an interview with Candy Siebert, who over the range of titles chosen for
had written in to Oprah explaining her Oprah’s Book Club. “Taken individu-
newfound interest in the Book Club: ally,” the Wall Street Journal reported,
“Oprah’s books run the gamut from
absorbing to vacuous” (Crossen, 2001,
Winfrey: Candy Siebert wrote us to p. W15). The Journal was troubled, in
say … she’s never read a book in her en- other words, by the seemingly incon-
tire life. Not one? sistent demands Oprah’s Book Club
Siebert: Not one. […] placed on participants in terms of the
Winfrey: Until?
Siebert: Until – I kept watching the Book degree of difficulty of club selections,
Club … . And finally I bought my first which fluctuated between arguably
book, and I bought it so I would have to straightforward books like A. Manette
read it. And I did it. I – [Wally Lamb’s Ansay’s (1994) Vinegar Hill and Alice
1992] She’s Come Undone – and I – I cried Hoffman’s (1997) Here on Earth, to
at the end and it was because I finished it more intricate, lyrical titles such as
and it was a great book. those of Toni Morrison and Bernhard
Winfrey: It was the first book you read at Schlink. Perhaps those who had not
40 years old? read books in many years were drawn
Siebert: Yes. to Oprah’s Book Club precisely be-
Winfrey: I could weep for you.
(Oprah’s book club anniversary party, cause of this apparent inconsistency.
1997, p. 4) Indeed, Oprah Winfrey Show produc-
ers demonstrated remarkable sensi-
tivity to the range of reading abilities
The same program also featured of both actual and potential club
videotaped excerpts from previous members, and this sensitivity was
episodes of Oprah, in which one reflected in the timing and relative
unidentified woman testified to not degree of difficulty of titles chosen for
having read a novel in two decades; the Book Club. Anticipating that read-
another shared that she had not read ers might encounter difficulty with Par-
any books at all in about a dozen adise (Morrison, 1997), club members
years. Similarly, the October 1996 were granted seven, rather than the
Book Club discussion included an customary four weeks between the an-
audio excerpt of a letter from an nouncement of the book and its dis-
unidentified woman who stated: “I cussion (Book club: Toni Morrison,
am 46 years old. And until this past 1998).5 Beyond merely acknowledging
year, I have not read more than five and making allowances for the fact304
OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003
that certain titles might prove more time” (Oprah’s book club, 1999, Sep-
challenging for readers than others, tember 9, p. 8).
the choice of books often was Still, Winfrey’s warnings did not
influenced directly by the relative manage to defuse readers’ strong reac-
difficulty of the preceding one. The tions to the book. Rather than trying
Reader (Schlink, 1997) was followed by to conceal the fact that many club
Anita Shreve’s (1998) ,
The Pilot’s Wife members disliked pro-
Mother of Pearl,
which Winfrey described repeatedly as ducers of The Oprah Winfrey Show opted
a “quick read” in contrast to the pre- instead to air readers’ frustrations in
vious selection (Oprah’s book club, an audio montage:
1999, March 31, p. 21).
Winfrey: Some people didn’t make it be-
The Poisonwood
Bible (Kingsolver, 1998) similarly was yond the first word before getting frus-
followed by Elizabeth Berg’s Open
trated.
House (2000) “[A]s I’ve been saying,”
.
Unidentified woman #1: Why is Even’s
Winfrey revealed, “is really
Open House
name Even? I am so confused.
going to be a breeze. I thought after Winfrey: Others got stuck a little later in
reading over 500 pages, we needed the book. […]
something lighter” (Oprah’s book Unidentified woman #7: Half the time
club, 2000, August 23, p. 20). I’m not sure what the characters are talk-
The intense frustration many mem- ing about. Will it get better or should I just
bers of Oprah’s Book Club felt to- wait for the next book? […]
wards the September 1999 selection, Winfrey: One reader even used it as a
Melinda Haynes’ (1999) sleep aid.
Mother of Pearl,
provides by far the richest example Unidentified woman #12: It was a great
illustrating how the relative difficulty book to read before going to bed because
of club selections affected the choice of I always fell asleep quickly.
(Oprah’s book club, 1999, September 9,
subsequent books. When announcing p. 9)
Mother of Pearl in June 1999, Winfrey
anticipated some of the difficulties Airing readers’ negative reactions
readers might encounter with the book was an extremely clever strategy by
but encouraged them to persevere. which to reframe the confusion and
Mother of “is layered,” she ob-
Pearl frustration many women felt toward
served, “which means that in the be- Mother of Pearl from a personal failure
ginning you’re thinking, ‘Where is this to an error on the part of the Book
going?”’ (Oprah’s book club: White Club. What this incident reveals is that
Oleander , 1999, pp. 14–15). At the con- on Oprah’s Book Club reading did not
clusion of the program she re-empha- connote the act of humbling oneself
sized: “It’s not a fast read, again. The before the genius of an intractable
first few chapters may challenge you, book, as it may in a more traditional
so stay with it until the flood. Hang in economy of literary instruction.
there until the flood, OK? You’ve got Rather, it connoted, on the one hand,
all summer to read it” (p. 17). When doing one’s best to engage with chal-
the Book Club reconvened in Septem- lenging books, and on the other,
ber, Winfrey reiterated her caveats. “I recognizing that one’s dissatisfaction
warned you-all,” she stated, “it wasn’t with specific selections stemmed not
an easy book, but my feeling was that from a personal intellectual defect but
you have the whole summer. There rather from Winfrey and her produc-
are no deadlines. You can take your ers’ failure to choose a book that met305
CSMC STRIPHAS
the needs, tastes, and desires of the to share some of the group’s favorite
club. selections. “Truthfully,” she said,
Like other longer and more com- “Mother of Pearl, we all agreed
plex books, was followed
Mother of Pearl was … four-star. We loved it. We
by what Winfrey characterized as a far would read passages just to anyone
easier and quicker selection. “Now if walking by that’s how much we loved
Mother of Pearl was too challenging for it” (p. 20).
you,” she stated, “I’ve got the ideal There was no single level, then, at
one to bring you back, really” which members of Oprah’s Book Club
(Oprah’s book club, 1999, September read, and indeed their range of read-
9, p. 6). Her remark acknowledged ing interests and abilities was reflected
that Mother of alienated many
Pearl in the seemingly inconsistent profile of
members of the Book Club, and that the titles chosen for the club. Winfrey
the subsequent selection was chosen and her producers, deliberately made
precisely to help them to re-engage. and timed selections to appeal strat-
When Winfrey finally revealed the egically to a broad range of women/
selection at the end of the program, readers and to welcome newcomers
Maeve Binchy’s (1998) she
Tara Road, to the club, some of whom may have
reiterated: “OK. Now some of you felt intimidated by books and book
might have felt a little challenged with reading.
our summer book but I’ve got a new
book to bring you back. It is a fast
read – far, far away from the Deep “It’s More About Life”
South” (the setting of ).
Mother of Pearl
She continued: “It’s a thick book. It’s a In the previous section, I explored
thick book but a really fast read. I how women involved in Oprah’s Book
promise you” (p. 19). Club used specific selections to create
This is not to suggest, however, that spatio-temporal barriers, which al-
members of the Book Club were unan- lowed them to regulate the incursions
imously turned off by Mother of Pearl of children and heterosexual partners.
and that faster reads like Tara Road This pattern of use is consistent with
were the only fare that appealed to the findings presented in Radway’s
them. Indeed, several women ex- (1984) study of romance novel readers.
pressed how much they enjoyed Pearl Yet the foregoing analysis explored
during the September 1999 Book Club only how the very fact of the Oprah
broadcast. “A friend asked me if I was books as material artifacts occasioned
leaving this planet, what three books the construction of these barriers.
would I take with me,” one woman How, then, did Oprah’s Book Club
shared. “My second choice was Mother articulate the content of specific selec-
of ” (Oprah’s book club, 1999,
Pearl tions? It is worth pointing out that
September 9, p. 9). Similarly, a second Radway’s romance readers employed
woman revealed: “ is the
Mother of Pearl both the actual, physical books and the
only book that when I finished reading narrative content to distance them-
it, I immediately began rereading it selves and/or to escape from the ev-
because I was captivated” (p. 20). At eryday/patriarchal demands they
the end of the broadcast, Winfrey faced as women. The narratives of
asked a guest in the studio audience “failed” romances, in fact, “tread[ed]
who belonged to a women’s book club too close to the terrible real in ordi-306
OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003
nary existence” (Radway, 1984, p. 72). hometown” of Rutland, Vermont,
In contrast, women routinely turned to Winfrey explained. The program then
the narrative content of the selections cut to a videotaped segment of Morris
for Oprah’s Book Club to reflect on touring Rutland:
the conditions of their lives and experi- There is so much of Atkinson, Vermont in
ence – to engage more intensively with Rutland, Vermont … . On the corner is
and to interrogate everyday life. the funeral home I imagined when I was
The March 2001 Book Club dis- writing the funeral of Sonny Stoner’s wife,
cussion included an intriguing message Carol. And I naturally thought of this little
from Winfrey directed to those who restaurant when I was writing the book.
had and had not read that month’s This is the Rutland Restaurant. It’s been
selection, Joyce Carol Oates’s (1997) here since 1917 … . The character of Sam
We Were the Mulvaneys. “Don’t worry if is very much like my father. He – he was
you haven’t read … We Were the Mul- a very intelligent man, an educated man,
vaneys,” she stated, “because as with all who was cursed with the disease of alco-
our Book Club shows, it’s more about holism … . I’ve created my own Rutland,
life than about a novel” (Oprah’s book I guess. (Oprah’s book club anniversary
club: We Were the Mulvaneys, 2001, party, 1997, p. 17)
p. 1). What this statement suggests, Similarly, the January 2001 Book Club
and what emerged time and again on episode focused on the inspiration be-
episodes of Oprah’s Book Club, is that hind Andre Dubus III’s (1999) House of
the content of specific books was per- Sand and Fog. The author shared how
ceived to be valuable by Winfrey and he drew the book’s premise from an
viewer/readers to the extent that it article he had read in the Boston Globe,
shared a clear connection with life, or in which a young woman, like the lead
that it resonated with their everyday character Kathy Nicolo, was wrongly
interests, personal experiences, and evicted from her house for failing to
concerns. pay an erroneous tax bill (Oprah’s
One way in which the Book Club book club, 2001, January 24). Dubus
both established and maintained this also disclosed that the other main
connection to life was through its con- character, Massoud Amir Behrani,
stant emphasis on the actuality – not was based on the life of a friend’s
merely the realism – of the settings, father who had been a colonel in the
events, and people featured in each Iranian Air Force before the Shah was
book. Nearly every episode of Oprah’s deposed and who, like Behrani, lost
Book Club thus included interviews in nearly everything upon emigrating to
which the author related her or his the United States. Dubus went on to
creative process, which almost always note that the man who had purchased
highlighted how she or he drew the house in the Globe article was of
significant inspiration from existing Middle Eastern descent, prompting
people and places. This pattern began him to wonder, “What if my colonel
at least as far back as the beginning of bought this house?” – a question that
the club’s second season, when the summarizes the book’s basic storyline
Book Club featured Morris’s (1996) (Oprah’s book club, 2001, January 24,
Songs in Ordinary Time. “Even though p. 13).
the people were made up, some of the Because the characters, settings, and
places in Atkinson, Vermont [the set- so forth to which specific Oprah books
ting of Songs] are not far from Mary’s refer sometimes no longer were there,307
CSMC STRIPHAS
however, producers of The Oprah Win- Like the videotaped interview with
frey turned to authors, invited
Show Morris, the Tademy interview in-
guests, and particular textual elements cluded a segment in which she toured
to bear witness to their actuality. For locations that had inspired scenes in
example, the November 1999 pro- the book. “Cane River is a real place,”
gram on Clarke’s (1999) River, Cross My Tademy began. But in contrast to the
Heart dwelled extensively on the actu- Morris interview, very few of the
ality of the novel’s setting and main places Tademy described in the book
character. The story takes place in still existed. “I began to go and visit
1920s Georgetown, DC, when the Cane River, and I would just walk
neighborhood consisted largely of along unmarked sites just trying to get
working class African Americans (in the feel of the place. […] A lot of the
contrast to its far whiter, petite-bour- areas that were plantations that I talk
geois population of today). In order to about in the book no longer exist. For
demonstrate the actuality of “black one thing, so much of it was burned
Georgetown,” the episode included a during the Civil War” (Oprah’s book
videotaped interview with 100 year- club:Cane River , 2001, p. 3). Tademy’s
old Eva Calloway, whom Winfrey de- videotaped tour of Cane River thus
scribed as “one of the last living provided evidence of the absence of
witnesses” of the old community (Anne the places featured in Near
Cane River.
Murray, 1999, p. 11). Calloway’s wit- the end of the Book Club discussion,
nessing was clearly meant to actualize Winfrey also noted the photographs
a Georgetown that once existed. The included in the book. “[T]hat’s one of
episode also featured an on-camera the fascinating things, didn’t you all
interview with Edna Clarke, the au- think, about the book?” she asked the
thor’s mother, whom Winfrey revealed studio audience. “When you turn the
“was the inspiration behind 12 year- page, there are the pictures of the
old Johnnie Mae,” the novel’s main people you’ve been reading about”
character (Anne Murray, 1999, p. 10). (p. 15). Winfrey drew attention
The videotaped interview with Lal- specifically to the indexicality of these
ita Tademy, author of the September photographs: they could not have been
2001 Book Club selection Cane River produced without the women and
(2001) likewise bore witness to the
, places of Cane River actually having
disappearance of people and places been present. Together, the
while underscoring their actuality. videotaped author tour and the photo-
Spanning the years 1834–1936, Cane graphs invited participants in the Book
River chronicles the lives of four gener- Club to think about the characters and
ations of Louisiana Creole slave setting ofCane River as actual, despite
women, all of whom were Tademy’s their novelization.
ancestors whom she came to know The Oprah’s Book Club catalog
after conducting exhaustive genealogi- consists almost entirely of novels, save
cal research (Oprah’s book club: Cane for two works of nonfiction and three
River, 2001). Although Cane River is a short children’s books. Bracketing the
novel, the videotaped author interview children’s books, the preceding dis-
stressed again and again how the book cussion suggests that the reified
blurred the boundaries between fiction classificatory scheme of fiction versus
and nonfiction (without using those ex- nonfiction does not adequately ac-
act words). count for the logic underlying the se-308 OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003 lections for Oprah’s Book Club; it re- which patriarchy and capitalism inflect lies on a predetermined literary dis- one another, yet he adds that this very tinction that may have been burden opens possibilities for the inappropriate from the standpoint of “active critique” (p. 223) and trans- the club, even if those closely associ- formation of these structures given the ated with it occasionally employed that gendered contradictions, inconsisten- distinction themselves (Salute to moth- cies, and double standards they in- ers, 1997). Put another way, the two evitably produce. nonfiction books selected for Oprah’s Indeed, the televised Oprah’s Book Book Club, Maya Angelou’s (1981) Club broadcasts regularly went be- The Heart of a Woman and Malika yond framing the selections as stories Oufkir’s (2001) Stolen Lives, may seem that actually happened, by highlight- anomalous alongside the 40-plus nov- ing how the characters, events, and els chosen for the Book Club. Yet, the themes corresponded with and pro- repeated stress producers of The Oprah voked women to question their every- Winfrey Show placed on the actuality of day lives. During the first anniversary the novels suggests a rupturing of the episode of the Book Club, Winfrey distinction between fiction and remarked: “I love books because you nonfiction on Oprah’s Book Club. read about somebody else’s life but it Heart of a Woman and Stolen Lives indeed makes you think about your own” made perfect sense alongside the nov- (Oprah’s book club anniversary party, els chosen for the club; virtually all of 1997, p. 2). She reaffirmed this point them were portrayed as stories that 18 months later: “We love books be- actually happened, even if book pub- cause they make you question your- lishers, booksellers, and critics per- self” (Oprah’s book club, 1999, March sisted in classifying, marketing, and 31, p. 13). Reading books was valued talking about these selections simply as on Oprah’s Book Club, then, because works of fiction or nonfiction. it provoked critical introspection or, Thus Oprah’s Book Club producers more strongly, provided women with and participants were further able to symbolic and practical resources with connect books with life by troubling which to challenge reified conceptions this most basic bibliographic distinc- of their subjectivities. tion. Collectively, they articulated Herein lies the Book Club’s dialectic Book Club selections – novels es- with the everyday. Following Mikhail pecially – from the realm of the imag- Bakhtin (1981), dialectic denotes any ined to the actual, or perhaps it would two opposing yet dynamically interde- be more accurate now to say from the pendent elements whose tense rela- fantastic to the everyday. For the ev- tionship can provoke change. On eryday, as Michèle Mattelart (1997, Oprah’s Book Club, the very fact of p. 25) observes, “represent[s] a specific the books themselves provided at least idea of time within which [both] some women with time and space women’s social and economic role is away from their daily obligations as carried out” and “the fundamental dis- partners, mothers, and professionals, crimination of sex roles is expressed.” while the content of the books encour- Similarly, Henri Lefebvre (2002, p. 11) aged just the opposite. In other words, notes that women tend to bear a dis- club members valued the reading of proportionate burden of “the weight of Book Club selections not only because everyday life” owing to the ways in it helped them to create distance from
309
CSMC STRIPHAS
their everyday responsibilities and rou- to [her] 18 years ago,” when she was
tines as women. On the contrary, it forced to move in with her mother-in-
also enabled them to move closer to law while her husband completed a
and interrogate their everyday lives as degree (Oprah’s book club, 1999, De-
women via the characters and events cember 3, p. 14). Another guest,
in the books. Cherie Burton, also identified with El-
The way in which the December len Grier. “I wouldn’t say it feels like a
1999 selection, Ansay’s (1994) Vinegar prison here,” she stated, describing the
Hill, was discussed and framed on The experience of living with her in-laws
Oprah Winfrey Show is illustrative of this for the past eight months, “but there
dialectic with the everyday. The novel are some moments where I do feel
turns on the tensions between a mar- trapped” (p. 6).
ried couple and their in-laws, and Indeed, The Oprah Winfrey Show rou-
more specifically on the main charac- tinely featured letters and stories from
ter Ellen Grier’s struggle to assert her- women who connected the narratives/
self after she, her husband James, and characters of specific Book Club selec-
their two young children are forced to tions directly to their own everyday
move in with James’s overbearing par- lives. One viewer/reader named Con-
ents. Vinegar Hill, Ansay explained, was nie, for instance, wrote in to the show
born of actual events; she and her after reading Morris’ (1996) Songs in
parents moved in with her paternal Ordinary Time to express how she felt
grandparents briefly when she was while reading the book:
five, and she drew some of the scenes Winfrey: Now, didn’t you write me that
in the book directly from that experi- you thought at one point reading it that
ence (Oprah’s book club, 1999, De- Mary [McGarry Morris] had changed the
cember 3). Although Ansay claimed names of the characters to protect your
that Ellen was not her mother per se, privacy?
she did reveal that her “mother’s own Connie: Yes. Yes. Exactly. I – I – that was
story inspired Ellen’s transformation” my first impression. Marie was 35. I was
(p. 15). The program thus stressed how 34 when my experience happened. My
Vinegar Hill was grounded in the events children were the exact same age as Alice,
and experiences of a woman who had Norm, and Benjy. And as I read, I just
overcome unreasonable expectations thought, “This is my story.” … I should be
resulting from her heterosexual part- writing this book.
nership. (Oprah’s book club anniversary party,
1997, p. 16)
For the remainder of the broadcast,
Oprah producers broke with the tra- She’s Come Undone (Lamb, 1992) gener-
dition of inviting four or five guests to ated a similar response from C. C.,
discuss the book over dinner with who was invited to join the videotaped
Winfrey and the author, opting instead conversation about the book. “[T]his
to invite married women and their was my life,” she stated. “My father –
mothers-in-law to the studio to share after my mother died, even though I
how their relationships with one an- lived in the same house with him, he
other and their families had been af- was never there … . [H]e would be
fected by living together. One guest, gone for days at a time to his girl-
Valerie, explained that she was friend’s house, he would be away on
“amazed at how similar Ellen’s experi- business or whatever, and he loved me
ence was to something that happened with food the same way Dolores’ [the310 OPRAH WINFREY’S BOOK CLUB SEPTEMBER 2003 main character] father did” (Third Rock view with the Hanson family who, like From the Sun, 1997, p. 12). Likewise, the Mulvaneys, were ostracized from Here on Earth (Hoffman, 1997) res- their community after they filed suit onated strongly with Cynthia, a par- against a young man who had raped ticipant in the April 1998 Book Club their daughter Susan.6 As Jayne Han- discussion. Cynthia was drawn to son, Susan’s mother explained, “[I]t March Murray, the main character, dawned on me reading this book, we who early on in the book struggles have all been – we’ve all been raped” over whether to leave her husband (p. 7). Richard, whom she considers to be a Collectively, all of these women rec- bland but otherwise agreeable partner. ognized themselves and their everyday Richard “reminded me of my … ex- lives in the characters and situations husband, just a really great guy,” Cyn- presented in specific Book Club selec- thia observed. “He met my checklist: tions. Their engagements with the good looking, athletic, good family, books, therefore, facilitated not only smart, educated, and all of that. But he their breaking temporarily from their was the wrong good guy. And, as a everyday lives or the normative expec- woman, I grew up thinking that the tations placed on them as women liv- only way you would leave a man or ing in a patriarchal society, but also should leave a man is if he beats you their interrogating and perhaps even or if he’s abusive or if he’s an al- challenging the social pressures impli- coholic … . But how do you leave a cated in, for example, heterosexual good man?” (Oprah’s book club, 1998, partnerships, families, intimacy, April 9, p. 17). Identifying with char- beauty, body image, and gendered vi- acters and events in specific Oprah’s olence. Book Club selections thus allowed Interestingly, the one novel in which these participants to interrogate some Winfrey promised “a total escape from of their everyday assumptions and rou- your own life – escape, escape, escape” tines. (Oprah’s book club, 2000, November The March 2001 program on We 16, p. 21), House of Sand and Fog Were the Mulvaneys (Oates, 1997) pro- (Dubus, 1999), met with significant re- vided some of the most moving exam- sistance on the part of readers invited ples of this process of identification to participate in the videotaped dis- and self-reflection. Winfrey indicated cussion.7 All but one of the guests was that numerous readers had written in particularly disgusted by the character to the show explaining how they had Kathy Nicolo, whose lying, promiscu- seen themselves and their families in ity, theft, substance abuse, racism, and the book. “[W]hat’s so exciting about inattention to her daily responsibilities We Were the Mulvaneys,” Winfrey ob- disturbed them deeply. While the ex- served, was that “we’ve gotten so act source of their distress remains un- many letters from … people who were clear, it may have been at least partly members of families who say, ‘We a function of the book’s escapist tenor. were the Grants,’ or ‘We were the Its deeply tragic conclusion – the five Pullmans.’ ‘We were’ – a lot of people principal characters wind up either started their letters that way” (Oprah’s dead or imprisoned – may have fur- book club: We Were the Mulvaneys, ther reinforced this sense of discon- 2001, p. 6). The broadcast also in- nect. House of Sand and Fog may have cluded a poignant videotaped inter- upset these readers precisely because it
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