Audition: A Memoir | 
| Author: Barbara Walters
Publisher: Knopf
Category: Book
List Price: $29.95
Buy New: $10.00
You Save: $19.95 (67%)
New (65) Used (35) Collectible (14) from $9.98
Avg. Customer Rating:  225 reviews
Sales Rank: 784
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 624
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.2
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.2 x 2.2
ISBN: 030726646X
Dewey Decimal Number: 070.92
EAN: 9780307266460
Publication Date: May 6, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Young people starting out in television sometimes say to me: “I want to be you.” My stock reply is always: “Then you have to take the whole package.”
And now, at last, the most important woman in the history of television journalism gives us that “whole package,” in her inspiring and riveting memoir. After more than forty years of interviewing heads of state, world leaders, movie stars, criminals, murderers, inspirational figures, and celebrities of all kinds, Barbara Walters has turned her gift for examination onto herself to reveal the forces that shaped her extraordinary life.
Barbara Walters’s perception of the world was formed at a very early age. Her father, Lou Walters, was the owner and creative mind behind the legendary Latin Quarter nightclub, and it was his risk-taking lifestyle that gave Barbara her first taste of glamour. It also made her aware of the ups and downs, the insecurities, and even the tragedies that can occur when someone is willing to take great risks, for Lou Walters didn’t just make several fortunes—he also lost them. Barbara learned early about the damage that such an existence can do to relationships—between husband and wife as well as between parent and child. Through her roller-coaster ride of a childhood, Barbara had a close companion, her mentally challenged sister, Jackie. True, Jackie taught her younger sister much about patience and compassion, but Barbara also writes honestly about the resentment she often felt having a sister who was so “different” and the guilt that still haunts her.
All of this—the financial responsibility for her family, the fear, the love—played a large part in the choices she made as she grew up: the friendships she developed, the relationships she had, the marriages she tried to make work. Ultimately, thanks to her drive, combined with a decent amount of luck, she began a career in television. And what a career it has been! Against great odds, Barbara has made it to the top of a male-dominated industry. She was the first woman cohost of the Today show, the first female network news coanchor, the host and producer of countless top-rated Specials, the star of 20/20, and the creator and cohost of The View. She has not just interviewed the world’s most fascinating figures, she has become a part of their world. These are just a few of the names that play a key role in Barbara’s life, career, and book: Yasir Arafat, Warren Beatty, Menachem Begin, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Roy Cohn, the Dalai Lama, Princess Diana, Katharine Hepburn, King Hussein, Angelina Jolie, Henry Kissinger, Monica Lewinsky, Richard Nixon, Rosie O’Donnell, Christopher Reeve, Anwar Sadat, John Wayne . . . the list goes on and on.
Barbara Walters has spent a lifetime auditioning: for her bosses at the TV networks, for millions of viewers, for the most famous people in the world, and even for her own daughter, with whom she has had a difficult but ultimately quite wonderful and moving relationship. This book, in some ways, is her final audition, as she fully opens up both her private and public lives. In doing so, she has given us a story that is heartbreaking and honest, surprising and fun, sometimes startling, and always fascinating.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 220 more reviews...
 Product September 5, 2008
Bought as a present along with another book (hardbound) from Amazon "The Last Lecture". On both copies pages were so unevenly cut it looked as though a mouse or two had a good dinner. The library had a proper copy! Otherwise, Amazon has been good to me over the years, except for the ultimate embarrasement of presenting this gift (time ran out.)
 BARBARA WALTERS AUDITION September 4, 2008
Here I am in Australia possibly one of a few to own the book as it is not due to hit our shelves until at least December. I received the book last night and sat up and read nearly half the book before I had to concede to sleep. She is a very interesting woman and the people she has met and interviewed is mind blowing and at the same time this intimate travel through Babara Walters life displays the humble and human side of her. I am betting that by late this evening I will have finished the book, because it was so hard to put down.
I would recommend it to anyone - even if you don't know the first thing about this lady. A book well worth buying.
worth the money September 2, 2008
Entertaining.....very, very detailed story of Barbara's personal and public life. Long book, worth the money if you are a fan.
Didn't Read the Book August 31, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I will not support a woman that has had affairs by buying her book. Why not just put a PIG on the cover?
Good, Honest Insights for Working Women August 30, 2008
My mother-in-law gave me this book and I wasn't expecting to particularly like it, as I am not that familiar with Barbara Walter's work (other than a few specials I have watched.) I certainly didn't realize all the barriers she had broken through for women in journalism. But what really drew me into this book was her honesty about being a working mom - the conflicts she often felt between her own career drive and the needs of her daughter, parents, and disabled sister. She owns up to that most difficult of emotions that many of us working moms often feel but frequently deny - GUILT. But at this point in her life, she is philosophical about it, and doesn't come off as self-punishing, or as regretting her decisions. She is grateful for her extraordinary life, and comes off as having done the best she could. I especially appreciated her honesty about the difficulties she had with her daughter as a teenager. I think that chapter alone is worth reading the book.
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