A Truly Exceptional Man
“Who She Was” is a book written by a son, Samuel G. Freedman, about the mother, Eleanor Freedman, he never really knew. Samuel G. Freedman has written six non-fiction books, which many have won awards. He is a professor of journalism at Columbia and a New York Times columnist. In addition, Freedman runs a seminar about how to write a book. However, his experience and expertise could not have prepared him enough for the journey he was going to embark on.
Freedman is not writing an ordinary memoir. He could not get the information about his mother’s life through questions and answers from his mother because she had died from cancer. Instead, he had to use his exceptional researching and reporting skills to gather up bits and pieces to paint a fairly accurate picture of her life. Such a difficult task could only have been completed with great determination. Freedman had more than an ordinary author’s will when writing this book. He was set on a mission, to figure out who his mother was.
When speaking about “Who She Was,” there is one thing that must be mentioned, the purpose and driving force of writing this book. Freedman quoted his friend saying “Every book starts with a question and the purpose of the book is to answer it.” In this case, Freedman’s question was “What made his mother feel and die feeling so unfulfilled.” He did not have a close relationship with his mother and knew very little about her before marriage but did realize she was missing something in her life. He always wanted to be independent of her and he overcame her death quickly and painlessly. At the age of forty-five, when he finally visited his mother’s grave, he realized how serious and wrong it was to feel detached from his mother. His guilty feeling compelled him to learn more about his mother.
The problem was how was he going to learn about her past if she was dead? Freedman had to begin an unimaginable research project to uncover his mother’s life. He would research the music, movies, news, and culture of her time period. He would obtain her high school and college transcripts, medals, social security files, and other documents that would help him better understand her abilities and economic status. To add to all the research, Freedman used his reporting skills as well. He interviewed her brother, Seymour, sister, Fannie, friends, Marion and Vicky, and her boyfriends, including Hy Keltz. His approach to interviewing was that, “The interviewer had to bring questions that would elicit more specific answers.” He would visit them multiple times acquiring new and exciting information and objects every time. These objects included military records and discharge papers, photographs, journals, and his mother’s jewel box filled with interesting treasures. Freedman was discovering his mother’s life.
When Freedman was doing his research, he had to resolve a conflict: Should his book be driven by his emotions or should he approach it objectively like a historian. In his speech, he explained that he decided to take a middle ground. Freedman said, “The head is stimulated by the heart, and the heart is amended by the head.” He meant that when he would acquire information, Freedman would approach it impartially. However, the more he learned, the more emotionally attached he felt. He began to feel utter humiliation and remorse for having treating his mother so heartlessly. He realized how intelligent she was and how much she sacrificed in her life. He understood how difficult her life was and how she died feeling so unfulfilled. He could not prevent the sentiment he was feeling toward his deceased mother. However, knowing that he had a book to complete, Freedman would not be carried away by his emotions, which explains what he meant in the second part of his quote.
Freedman is a truly a super smart, master teacher with remarkable reporting skills. He took on a complex task that was both difficult to achieve and almost too emotional to handle. However, he did not let his sentiment get in the away of a mission. By writing this book, it was a way for him to reconcile his mother’s love. He did feel that he was the revenge for the way his mother would treat her mother. After completing this book, he felt he was “able to be her son again.”