Book Review: Home by Julie Andrews
Home: A Memoir of My Early Years
THE ENTERTAINMENT CRITIC BOOK REVIEW, BY JAMES MYERS
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HOME: A MEMOIR OF MY EARLY YEARS
By Julie Andrews
Published by: Hyperion
Publication Date: April 1, 2008
Price: $26.95
352 Pages
ISBN-13: 9780786865659
Four Star Rating ****
JULIE ELIZABETH ANDREWS, DBE (BORN JULIA ELIZABETH WELLS ON OCTOBER 1, 1935 IS AN AWARD-WINNING ENGLISH ACTRESS, SINGER, AUTHOR AND ICON. SHE IS THE RECIPIENT OF GOLDEN GLOBE, EMMY, GRAMMY, BAFTA, PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD, THEATRE WORLD AWARD, SCREEN ACTORS GUILD AND ACADEMY AWARD HONOURS. ANDREWS ROSE TO PROMINENCE AFTER STARRING IN BROADWAY MUSICALS SUCH AS MY FAIR LADY AND CAMELOT, AS WELL AS MUSICAL FILMS LIKE MARY POPPINS (1964) AND THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1965).
ANDREWS HAD A MAJOR REVIVAL OF HER FILM CAREER IN THE 2000S, IN CHILDREN'S FILMS SUCH AS THE PRINCESS DIARIES (2001), ITS SEQUEL THE PRINCESS DIARIES 2: ROYAL ENGAGEMENT (2004), AND THE SHREK ANIMATED FILMS (2004-2007). IN 2005, ANDREWS MADE HER DEBUT AS A STAGE DIRECTOR WITH A REVIVAL OF THE BOY FRIEND, IN WHICH SHE ALSO MADE HER BROADWAY ACTING DEBUT IN 1954.
ANDREWS IS ALSO AN ACCOMPLISHED WRITER OF CHILDREN'S BOOKS, AND IN 2008 SHE PUBLISHED AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY, HOME: A MEMOIR OF MY EARLY YEARS.
“I am told that the first comprehensible word that I uttered as a child was ‘home.’
My father was driving his secondhand Austin 7; my mother was in the passenger seat beside him holding me on her lap. As we approached our modest house, Dad backed the car to turn onto the pocket-handkerchief square of concrete by the gate and apparently I quietly, tentatively, said the word.
‘Home.’
My mother told me there was a slight upward inflection to my voice, and not a question so much as a trying of the word on the tongue, with perhaps the delicious discovery of connection…the word to the place. My parents wanted to be sure they heard me correctly, so Dad drove around the lanes once again, and as we returned, it seems I repeated the word.
My mother must have said it more than once upon our arrival at our house-perhaps with satisfaction? Or relief? Or maybe to instill in her young daughter a sense of comfort and safety. The word has carried enormous resonance for me ever sense.
Home.”
The voice, once lost, that brought us some of the landmark musicals of the 20th Century, The Sound of Music, Camelot, My Fair Lady, and Mary Poppins, has returned in this wonderful memoir. Julie Andrews’s new book, Home: A Memoir of My Early Years, is a richly detailed, wonderful book that takes us inside all of the ins and outs of her early life, both personal and professional. Born into a marriage of two horribly mismatched parents, her father the teacher, her mother a performer, the mother eventually left the father to marry a successful vaudeville singer, and Julie went with her mother. Julie gives us a vivid description of the war years in England, in a household full of strife and full of music.
Julie’s professional life began when she was only 12. The family became dependent on her income for their survival. In 1948 she became the youngest solo performer to ever participate in a Royal Command Performance before the Queen. Julie sang all over the country, and she performed weekly on the BBC, living in rented rooms with older female chaperones, and an abiding longing for family and home. AtRead full review
