Sarah *Hearts* Learning
What’s the motivating factor behind Sarah Palin’s new autobiography Going Rogue: An American Life? Did she write it to make a couple bucks? To get a chance to sit down with Oprah and possibly Hillary Clinton? To energize a possible 2012 presidential campaign? To dispel rumors started by Levi Johnston, the father of her grandchild? To stick it to the McCain team?
We probably won’t know for a number of months, if ever, but after finishing the first chapter, one of the book’s aims is quite apparent: to refute the idea that Sarah Palin is not an intellectual.
But in the process of establishing her intellectual and educational credentials, Palin is guilty of violating the rule of “show, don’t tell.” Instead of letting the reader deduce her scholastic horsepower through her ideas and thought processes, Palin takes a number of detours to relate histories and actions commonly associated with braniacs or aspiring policy wonks. The result is that it seems a bit forced.
Palin on Books
What is the most iconic symbol of the learned person? Books, of course. Palin does her best to make sure she is understood to be a reader.
Reading was a special bond between my mother and me … My siblings were better athletes, cuter and more sociable than I, and the only thing they had to envy about me was the special passion for reading that I shared with our mother.(p.15)
My appetite for books connected my schoolteacher father and me, too. (p.16)
My folks were smart: less TV meant more books. From The Pearl, to Jonathan Livingston Seagull to Animal Farm and anything by C.S. Lewis, I would put down one book just long enough to pick up another. The library on Main Street was one of my summer hideaways. (p. 27)
Palin on Her Academic Pedigree
Apples usually don’t fall far from the tree; if Palin can make the case that her parents and grandparents are intellectuals, then it is easier to cast her in the same light.
Everybody in the family played Scrabble and took great pride in hoarding Ks and Qs and slapping them down in long, fancy words on triple-letter scores. (p. 12)
Note: Why Ks? They’re worth 5 points—behind J, X, Q, and Z.
He [Palin’s dad] got the adventure he yearned for and earned his master’s degree. (p. 14)
He [Palin’s grandfather] played football for Columbia University (later renamed University of Portland…) My grandmother Helen studied at the University of Idaho. (p. 11)
Palin on College
Given her professed love for learning, there is surprisingly little about Palin’s experiences in college. It is described almost entirely in the context of missing Todd while away at school, and a brief explanation is given as to why she transferred schools and why she took more than four years.
It turned out that [college in] Hawaii was a little too perfect. Perpetual sunshine isn’t necessarily conducive to serious academics for eighteen-year-old Alaska girls. (p.42)
I looked forward to every poli sci lecture [that she took in college]. (p.45)
It was a huge relief when I graduated, grabbed my diploma, and beat feet back to Alaska, happy to be in the same state as Todd. (p. 48)
Some of Palin’s academic feats and credentials are truly impressive, but the manner in which she pointedly directs readers to these stories does little for her reputation. If anything, her seeming insecurity only serves to make me doubt whether she can compete with the country’s top political minds.