Ahead of Father's Day, Michael Chabon and Jamie Bernstein dive into the gaps between dads and their kids
By Bob Hoover - The Dallas Morning News
June 8, 2018
Mothers get roses and brunch on their day; fathers get a six-pack, maybe a few days late. The late Philip Roth called this relationship between father and child "the poignant abyss" cracked open by "our words, our brains, with mentality."
These new books, one by the daughter of a famous dad, the other by the well-regarded son of a little-known man, explore this abyss with a mix of regret and hope but always with love for their complicated male parent.
Jamie Bernstein, who turns 66 this year, is the oldest of three children of Leonard Bernstein, the larger-than-life figure of America's classical and Broadway musical world. It's the centennial of his birth, hence this memoir.
Her father is probably the only American composer-conductor whose celebrity equaled his success as a musician, from such Broadway hits as On the Town and West Side Story to classical works such as The Age of Anxiety and Kaddish.