BoomerGirl Diary

When the Irish memoirist Nuala O'Faolain died recently, The New York Times published a rich eulogy, saying O'Faolain became a sensation because her story resonated with readers. Wonder what they'll say about Barbara Walters? If O'Faolain struck a chord because her Irish readers could relate to growing up poor and unloved, where does that leave Walters, coming from the opposite vantage point? The wealthy celebrity growing old. The journalist leaking her own secret about illicit love - only to know she'd be feeding the media to feed herself. The title - "Audition: A Memoir" - suggests she's trying out. Any chance the words "Audition" and "Audacity" got placed on the wrong covers? O'Faolain's work resonated for its unvarnished description of Irish life in the 1940s and 1950s. In her case, readers had walked in her shoes. "A lot of us suffered in the Ireland of my day,'' O'Faolain once said. "We came out of a culture where women were utterly powerless and children had no value.'' In our culture, Walters represents a woman's potential for power. In fearlessly pursuing an agenda where some might fear scandal, her memoir itself is an exercise in leveraging the media by breaking news in a book. O'Faolain, too, wrote of romance, failed relationships, low self-esteem and bouts of heavy drinking. Her sense of personal failure, despite her celebrity, became a theme of her writing. "I have won a few skirmishes against self-defeat lately,'' O'Faolain wrote in one passage. "But I haven't got much confidence." Walters, on the other hand, exudes the full range of feminine confidence, her book reflecting a career built on the ability to move deftly from bold to feminine. In an interview she described her story as one of "struggle and survival that I think a lot of people, especially woman, can relate to." In the end, what they say about Walters will probably have a lot to do with her survivor instincts. They'll probably say, too, that she had a one-of-a-kind career, breaking through glass ceilings to sit on sofas next to some of the world's greatest leaders. And that, in one person, her style covered all the connotations of the word "guts." I'm not sure what motivates anyone to write a tell-all memoir. Money. Attention. Legacy. Walters had all of that long ago. In Nuala O'Faolain's case, her memoirs defined her life. For Walters, her life defined her memoir: Pushy, but with too much gentility to be offensive. In her book, Walters notes the importance of style and delivery. For example, if you're interviewing a heinous killer, you wouldn't ask, "How could be such a monster?" The better question: "There are people who think you are a monster. How do you respond to that?" The lesson: Even in the face of a monster, you can choose your course. Once again, Walters emerges as master at work.