He loved to sing. He loved to have fun. And he wrote beautiful letters, just as her father did, which – alas and alack – Eleanor Roosevelt destroyed. But she refers to his beautiful letters. And she was charmed by him.
BLANCHE WIESEN COOKEleanor Roosevelt started off almost every early article she wrote, starting with, “My mother was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.” And I think her life was a constant and continual and lifelong contrast with her mother.
More Blanche Wiesen Cook Quotes
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You know, unloved, judged harshly, never up to par. And she was her father’s favorite, and her mother’s unfavorite. So her father was the man that she went to for comfort in her imaginings.
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A lot of people say that Eleanor Roosevelt wasn’t a good mother. And there are two pieces to that story. One is, when they were very young, she was not a good mother. She was an unhappy mother.
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I think her Grandmother Hall gave her a great sense of family love, and reassurance. Her grandmother did love her, like her father, unconditionally. And despite the order and the discipline – and home at certain hours and out at certain hours and reading at certain hours,
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There’s very little private time with the children in the early years. Actually, there’s much more private time with the children in the 20s.
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And during the campaign of 1936, she writes that she and her brother would always rather be out doing things when they’re sick, rather than take to their beds.
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By 1938, Eleanor Roosevelt was so angry at FDR’s policies, she writes a book called This Troubled World. And it is actually a point-by-point rebuttal of her husband’s foreign policy. We need collective security. We need a World Court.
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I think FDR was very dashing and charming and debonair, and probably reminded her of her father. A great bon-vivant. He loved to party.
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The Letters of Elliott Roosevelt. And it really was an act of redemption, really one of her first acts of redemption as she entered the White House.
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Her mother died at the age of 29, essentially turning her face to the wall and deciding to die. And so we can only imagine the agony she felt. And Eleanor Roosevelt really wanted to make her mother happier, and – and to make her live, you know, make her want to live.
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And the correspondence between them that we have, I mean, she says, “I cannot believe you’re not going to say one word.” And she writes to Walter White, “I’ve asked FDR to say one word. Perhaps he will.” But he doesn’t. And these become very bitter disagreements.
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And there’s something about, you know, when your mother dies, this sense of abandonment. I think Eleanor Roosevelt had a lifelong fear of abandonment and sense of abandonment after her parents’ death.
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The amazing thing, I think, historically, is that he says, “Go do it. If you can make this happen, I’ll follow you.”
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Politics is not an isolated, individualist adventure. Women really need to emerge as a power to be the countervailing power to the men.
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Eleanor Roosevelt loved to write. She was a wonderful child writer. I mean, she wrote beautiful essays and stories as a child. And Marie Souvestre really appreciated Eleanor Roosevelt’s talents and encouraged her talents.
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One, she’s really talented, an organizational woman. She knows how to do things. She begins to compare her life to her grandmother’s life. And it’s very clear to her that being a devoted wife and a devoted mother is not enough.
BLANCHE WIESEN COOK