Book offers engaging look at Barbara Bush’s life

“BARBARA BUSH; Matriarch of a Dynasty,” by Pamela Kilian, Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s Griffin, New York, 2003, paperback, 237 pages, $14.95.

Daughter. Prankster. Wife. Mother. Grandmother. First lady. America’s grandmother.

Regardless of which role Barbara Bush is fulfilling at the moment, she is always herself. That’s the clear message from author Pamela Kilian, whose biographical account, “Barbara Bush: Matriarch of a Dynasty,” was released recently in its first paperback edition.

Kilian leaves the reader with a sense of who Barbara Bush, or “Bar,” as her friends call her, is and what it is like to have one’s life unfold before public eyes. It’s not a book heavy on details of Mrs. Bush’s life as a child or a teen. Actually, it’s not a traditional chronicle at all, but offers select details pertinent to understanding Mrs. Bush’s own views of her marriage and family life, and of her place in the political arena.

The book, however, is not about politics.

Barbara Bush, who already had a strong devotion to family, God and country, developed an incredible stamina, strength of character and practical endurance for the long haul from the lean days when George Bush was in the oil fields of Texas to make his fortune and she was home with their children. Those qualities got her through the tragic loss of one of their daughters and provided stability to the family when her husband entered political life.

Kilian gives wonderful glimpses into what it was like for Barbara Bush to live in China when George Bush was made ambassador there during the Cold War, and the book also offers highlights of the subsequent road to the White House. The author weaves throughout how Barbara Bush’s strong character emerged and stayed in the forefront, even as she tried to keep it in check by promoting her husband’s work and downplaying her own role.

Barbara Bush became, and still is, a vehement advocate for literacy, and Robert McCloskey’s “Blueberries for Sal” and “Make Way for Ducklings” have been heard in some unlikely places around the world. She established the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy, which still is trying to stamp out illiteracy in the United States and beyond.

Kilian, a journalist and news editor for Scripps Howard News Service, described from Mrs. Bush’s perspective the emotional toll of the Gulf War and George Bush’s loss of the White House to Bill Clinton in a way that is consistent with the rest of the book – interesting and engaging.

The Bushes have strong Maine ties, with their home in Kennebunkport, and Mrs. Bush is scheduled to read from one of McCloskey’s books at 3 p.m. Wednesday, June 23, at the Farnsworth Art Museum as part of the current exhibition “The Stories They Tell II: A Tribute to Robert McCloskey.” Reservations may be made for the reading at 596-6457. The exhibition closes June 27.