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| Obama: 'New York girlfriend' was composite |
| 2012-05-03 |
| He lied in his autobiography? Only about where to inflate her. His autobiography's a novel? That's different... I think he was mis-quoted... One of the more mysterious characters from President Obama's 1995 autobiography Dreams From My Father is the so-called 'New York girlfriend.' Obama never referred to her by name, or even by psuedonym, but he describes her appearance, her voice, and her mannerisms in specific detail. But Obama has now told biographer David Maraniss that the 'New York girlfriend' was actually a composite character, based off of multiple girlfriends he had both in New York City and in Chicago. He's a complicated man...and no one understands him but his composite women... "During an interview in the Oval Office, Obama acknowledged that, while Genevieve was his New York girlfriend, the description in his memoir was a "compression" of girlfriends, including one who followed Genevieve [Cook] when he lived in Chicago," Maraniss writes in his new biography, an excerpt of which was published online today by Vanity Fair. "In Dreams from My Father, Obama chose to emphasize a racial chasm that unavoidably separated him from the woman he described as his New York girlfriend," Maraniss writes, offering a passage from the book in which they go to see a play by a black playwright: One night I took her to see a new play by a black playwright. It was a very angry play, but very funny. Typical black American humor. The audience was mostly black, and everybody was laughing and clapping and hollering like they were in church. After the play was over, my friend started talking about why black people were so angry all the time. I said it was a matter of remembering--nobody asks why Jews remember the Holocaust, I think I said--and she said that's different, and I said it wasn't, and she said that anger was just a dead end. We had a big fight, right in front of the theater. When we got back to the car she started crying. She couldn't be black, she said. She would if she could, but she couldn't. She could only be herself, and wasn't that enough. Is he sure he didn't take her to his Chicago church? "None of this happened with Genevieve," Maraniss writes. "She remembered going to the theater only once with Barack, and it was not to see a work by a black playwright. When asked about this decades later, during a White House interview, Obama acknowledged that the scene did not happen with Genevieve. "It is an incident that happened," he said. But not with her. He would not be more specific, but the likelihood is that it happened later, when he lived in Chicago. "That was not her," he said. "That was an example of compression I was very sensitive in my book not to write about my girlfriends, partly out of respect for them. So that was a consideration. I thought that [the anecdote involving the reaction of a white girlfriend to the angry black play] was a useful theme to make about sort of the interactions that I had in the relationships with white girlfriends. And so, that occupies, what, two paragraphs in the book? My attitude was it would be dishonest for me not to touch on that at all ... so that was an example of sort of editorially how do I figure that out?"" Broadway Books, a division of Random House's Crown Publishing Group, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. UPDATE: In the reissue of "Dreams from My Father," Obama writes in the introduction that "some of the characters that appear are composites of people I've known." CORRECTION: An earlier version of this blog post stated that Obama had acknolwedged using composite characters in the reissue. In fact, Obama acknolwedged the use of composite characters in the first edition of the book. The story you are about to read is true. Maybe. |
| Posted by:Beavis |
| #27 He's a complicated man...and no one understands him but his composite women... Very well done! Sent me back to the way back machine :-) And check out whose "bringin him in!!!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2cHkMwzOiM |
| Posted by: Capsu78 2012-05-03 20:40 |
| #26 "She had dark hair, and specks of green in her eyes. Her voice sounded like a wind chime." Reading T.S. Eliot paid off. More like Automotive Today. And actually, according to warrengeneologydotcom, I am African. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2012-05-03 19:33 |
| #25 the so-called 'New York girlfriend.' Didn't (s)he go down to New Orleans to work in the transvi show on Bourbon Street? Actually, I kind of give the guy some credit for modifying the particulars of (alleged) ex-girlfriends - it would be cruel to publically shame them for having associated with him. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2012-05-03 18:55 |
| #24 Is bammer going to come out with a sequel in his approaching retirement? It could be "Dreams from My Composite Girlfriend." |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2012-05-03 17:18 |
| #23 Aussie girls are complex ...er.. composite. |
| Posted by: tipper 2012-05-03 17:08 |
| #22 Obama's girl friend was a composite, had a low radar cross-section, and a top speed of Mach 1.5. |
| Posted by: Cincinnatus Chili 2012-05-03 16:54 |
| #21 It is true I am a Typical Kansan. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2012-05-03 16:45 |
| #20 as a Typical White Person™ (Like his Grandma) you wouldn't get it |
| Posted by: Frank G 2012-05-03 16:09 |
| #19 Sorry, I have lost my 2012 Racial Justice and Equalization Circular. What exactly is Typical Black American Humor? |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2012-05-03 15:53 |
| #18 Now you know why George Soros has to write Obama's speeches which Obama reads from the teleprompter. He read Obama's book and decided he had better write his speeches. |
| Posted by: Elmeatch Pelosi1774 2012-05-03 14:41 |
| #17 "Compressing a woman". Huh? |
| Posted by: George Unique7923 2012-05-03 14:17 |
| #16 What is hiding? That's easy. He doesn't like girls. |
| Posted by: Sheba and Tenille2758 2012-05-03 13:34 |
| #15 her name was Reggie Love Shouldn't that be, "his name is Reggie Love"...Oh! never mind. |
| Posted by: tipper 2012-05-03 13:20 |
| #14 Can't believe some one actually read something in this day and age. Like they might learn whats in it. Was the book also 2000+ pages long? |
| Posted by: Glereger Ebbolutch8005 2012-05-03 13:05 |
| #13 I never thought the kid who ate dogs and had an imaginary girlfriend would one day grow up to be president. |
| Posted by: Beavis 2012-05-03 12:28 |
| #12 I don't get it. Are we talking about a novel here? A work of fiction? Or is it supposed to be an autobiography? Or a biography? For one thing, composite characters are commonly used in works of fiction and the practice is perfectly acceptable because the author doesn't claim that any of the characters are real or that the events that are described ever really happened. But if the work is supposed to be non-fiction this is totally unacceptable. If you fudge a little here and there, how do we know that the whole thing is not a pack of lies? How do we know what is the truth and what isn't? Furthermore, if it's supposed to be an autobiography, why does Obama need a biographer? Who actually wrote this book, Maraniss or Obama? If it was a biography then it's OK for Maraniss to write it. But autobiographies are supposed to be written by the subject of the book. You cannot have it both ways. |
| Posted by: Ebbang Uluque6305 2012-05-03 12:03 |
| #11 Composite? Like Fiberglas? |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2012-05-03 11:56 |
| #10 Foreward. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2012-05-03 11:33 |
| #9 Nearly everythng it would appear Jim. Nearly everything. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2012-05-03 11:12 |
| #8 "Liar" Comes to mind, Just WHAT IS HE HIDING? |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2012-05-03 11:08 |
| #7 The word he is looking for is "fabrication." |
| Posted by: Iblis 2012-05-03 10:57 |
| #6 her name was Reggie Love |
| Posted by: Frank G 2012-05-03 10:32 |
| #5 Expect angry words with his ghost writer |
| Posted by: tipper 2012-05-03 03:44 |
| #4 He's composting ? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2012-05-03 03:38 |
| #3 I think he was mis-quoted... Or misunderstood. Where have we heard that before? But Obama has now told biographer David Maraniss that the 'New York girlfriend' was actually a composite character, based off of multiple girlfriends he had both in New York City and in Chicago. Slut. |
| Posted by: gorb 2012-05-03 02:30 |
| #2 Basically he's claiming that heys not lying he's |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2012-05-03 00:31 |
| #1 *** cough **** cough *** cough **** ... D *** NGED TASTY AM FRITTER. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2012-05-03 00:16 |