Summary:
From
a former marine and Yale Law School graduate, a powerful account of
growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at
the struggles of America’s white working class
Hillbilly
Elegy is
a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white
working-class Americans. The decline of this group, a demographic of our
country that has been slowly disintegrating over forty years, has been reported
on with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as
searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social,
regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around
your neck.
The Vance
family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.’s grandparents were
“dirt poor and in love,” and moved north from Kentucky’s Appalachia region to
Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a
middle-class family, and eventually their grandchild (the author) would
graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of their success in
achieving generational upward mobility.
But as the
family saga of Hillbilly
Elegy plays out, we learn that this is only the short,
superficial version. Vance’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of
all, his mother, struggled profoundly with the demands of their new
middle-class life, and were never able to fully escape the legacy of abuse,
alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America.
Vance piercingly shows how he himself still carries around the demons of their
chaotic family history.
A deeply moving
memoir with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the
story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling
meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this
country.
Review:
I read The Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance because it is on my daughter’s
reading list this summer and reading what she reads allows me to connect with
her through our life long love of books. The
Hillbilly Elegy is the best book I’ve read in a long time. The last book I
read on my daughter’s list was Ayn Rand’s Anthem,
and the classical rhetorical laced with her “I” agenda made me graze pages like
a fat cow eager for slaughter. Kill me, please! No offense to Rand, she has her
merits, but I wanted a story. I am a big tootsie pop (sucker) for good stories.
Now several key ingredients make up a well-constructed story beginning with a
Shakespearean understanding of the human condition.
1. Vance understands the human condition. The
human condition are the characteristics, essential events, and particular
events which evolve around birth, growth, and inner and outer conflict.
“Mamaw
could spew venom like a Marine Corps drill instructor, but what she saw in our
community didn’t just piss her off. It broke her heart.”
Vance understands what
motivates the anger behind his Mamaw’s words, and it cuts at the core of the
human condition. Vance’s book is loaded with this understanding, not just
Mamaw, but his father and the reason he gave him up in the first place, his
mother and her continuous struggle with drugs and men, his Aunt Wee, and his
sister Lindsay, and finally his own human condition revealed in the monster
dream at the end.
2. Themes of forgiveness bathed in hope and the
strength to overcome adversity. Vance came from dirt poor and turned Ivy League
Yale graduate now living the American dream. He didn’t make that journey with
the human feelings of anger and resentment that often blames others for their
circumstances; He made it with love, forgiveness and understanding.
“For me
understanding my past and knowing I wasn’t doomed gave me the hope and
fortitude to deal with the demons of my youth.”
3. Humility: Vance credits his success hugely to
his mamaw and papaw. “Few of even my closest friends understood how utterly hopeless
my life would have been without Mamaw and Papaw. So maybe I just wanted to give
credit where credit is due.”
He doesn’t
only credit Mamaw and Papaw, but a whole slew of blue-collar workers who helped
him to achieve his Ivy League dream. These people include his sister, his
cousin Gail, his Aunt Wee and even his mother, despite her many problems,
instilled in him a lifelong love of education.
Vance says,
“Remove any of these people from the equation and I’m probably screwed.”
4. Accessibility: The Hemingway/Shrunk in White style of writing has a
conversational syntax that can be grasped by anyone. Vance may be Ivy League
now, but he still has the heart of his hillbilly ancestors and he knows how to
speak to them and for them.
5. Humor: This book will make you laugh out loud
despite some of the horrific circumstances in Vance’s childhood, the laughter
was the hope as conveyed in many of Mamaw’s speeches, especially this
particular one on bullying.
“And she
said something I will never forget: ‘Sometimes, honey, you have to fight, even
when you’re not defending yourself. Sometimes it’s just the right thing to do.’
Then she taught me a move, a swift hard (make sure to turn your hips) punch
right to the gut.”
6. Solutions: Glass
Castle by Jeanette Walls is similar to Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy because it
shows a tough upbringing turned successful; however, as good as that story was,
Walls did not offer any solutions for the homeless. Now, I’m not saying Vance
offers great solutions for the problems with poverty in our country, but he
does offer simple solutions, ones involving self-examination and our role in
society. Recently, someone told me to read Black
Rednecks and White Liberals by Thomas Sowell (the title made me hesitate
reminding me of a book Tom Buchanan liked in The Great Gatsby), now while this book probably offers great
solutions; It was not what I looked for with Vance’s book. In Vance’s book I
looked for a story about a poor boy who went Ivy. Vance’s book is a memoir and
the parallel to Sowell’s non-fiction book just doesn’t work here. I recommend
Vance’s book to all of those people who still believe in the American Dream and
the hope and love where good family support fuels the dream. Vance’s tone is so
optimistic for those wanting to follow a similar path, and even more so to
everyone who wants stability, a home, a family and love.
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