Americas
![Drew Gilpin Faust - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B001JS4HTW.jpg)
Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury
A memoir of coming of age in a conservative Southern family in postwar America.
To grow up in the 1950s was to enter a world of polarized national alliances, nuclear threat, and destabilized social hierarchies. Two world wars and the depression that connected them had unleashed a torrent of expectations and dissatisfactions―not only in global affairs but in American society and Americans' lives.
A privileged white girl in conservative, segregated Virginia was expected to adopt a willful blindness to the inequities of race and the constraints of gender. For Drew Gilpin, the acceptance of both female subordination and racial hierarchy proved intolerable and galvanizing. Urged to become "well adjusted" and to fill the role of a poised young lady that her upbringing imposed, she found resistance was necessary for her survival. During the 1960s, through her love of learning and her active engagement in the civil rights, student, and antiwar movements, Drew forged a path of her own―one that would eventually lead her to become a historian of the very conflicts that were instrumental in shaping the world she grew up in.
Culminating in the upheavals of 1968, Necessary Trouble captures a time of rapid change and fierce reaction in one young woman's life, tracing the transformations and aftershocks that we continue to grapple with today.
Includes black-and-white images
To grow up in the 1950s was to enter a world of polarized national alliances, nuclear threat, and destabilized social hierarchies. Two world wars and the depression that connected them had unleashed a torrent of expectations and dissatisfactions―not only in global affairs but in American society and Americans' lives.
A privileged white girl in conservative, segregated Virginia was expected to adopt a willful blindness to the inequities of race and the constraints of gender. For Drew Gilpin, the acceptance of both female subordination and racial hierarchy proved intolerable and galvanizing. Urged to become "well adjusted" and to fill the role of a poised young lady that her upbringing imposed, she found resistance was necessary for her survival. During the 1960s, through her love of learning and her active engagement in the civil rights, student, and antiwar movements, Drew forged a path of her own―one that would eventually lead her to become a historian of the very conflicts that were instrumental in shaping the world she grew up in.
Culminating in the upheavals of 1968, Necessary Trouble captures a time of rapid change and fierce reaction in one young woman's life, tracing the transformations and aftershocks that we continue to grapple with today.
Includes black-and-white images
Editorial Reviews
"Shining forth is the resolve to fight for equity that has shaped [Faust's] life, through her youthful activism as a college student in the 1960s and, later, as a historian of the South." ―Martha Southgate, The New York Times Book Review
"In a powerful new memoir, Dr. Drew Gilpin Faust details her experiences shedding the expectations of her insulated upbringing and the thoughtful courage it took to transcend the antiquated racial and gender biases of the time. This intricate narrative encapsulates the not-so-pleasant conflicts many struggled to overcome during the turbulent post-World War II period. Few overcame as successfully as Dr. Faust, and this publication should inspire those of us confronting similar challenges in today's America." ―Congressman James E. Clyburn
"Such a wonderful book. I can't wait to give copies to my daughters. All young women should read this book. And everyone else, too." ―Sally Mann, author of Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs
"In Necessary Trouble [Faust] has given us a cogent, clear-eyed account of a violent, vexed era and a glimpse of the first part of a considered life. Perhaps some of her good sense and moral strenuousness will rub off, enough to help us cope with our own turbulent time." ―Adam Begley, The Spectator
"Drew Gilpin Faust's memoir is both a moving personal narrative and an enlightening account of the transformative political and social forces that impacted her as she came of age in the 1950s and '60s. It's an apt combination from an acclaimed historian who's also a powerful storyteller." ―Barbara Spindel, Christian Science Monitor
"Faust nimbly blends the personal and the political in this affecting memoir . . . Faust pulls off a brilliant synthesis, grounding the macro stresses of the period in her quest to distance herself from her culture of origin and sharpen her political sensibilities." ―Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
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"In a powerful new memoir, Dr. Drew Gilpin Faust details her experiences shedding the expectations of her insulated upbringing and the thoughtful courage it took to transcend the antiquated racial and gender biases of the time. This intricate narrative encapsulates the not-so-pleasant conflicts many struggled to overcome during the turbulent post-World War II period. Few overcame as successfully as Dr. Faust, and this publication should inspire those of us confronting similar challenges in today's America." ―Congressman James E. Clyburn
"Such a wonderful book. I can't wait to give copies to my daughters. All young women should read this book. And everyone else, too." ―Sally Mann, author of Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs
"In Necessary Trouble [Faust] has given us a cogent, clear-eyed account of a violent, vexed era and a glimpse of the first part of a considered life. Perhaps some of her good sense and moral strenuousness will rub off, enough to help us cope with our own turbulent time." ―Adam Begley, The Spectator
"Drew Gilpin Faust's memoir is both a moving personal narrative and an enlightening account of the transformative political and social forces that impacted her as she came of age in the 1950s and '60s. It's an apt combination from an acclaimed historian who's also a powerful storyteller." ―Barbara Spindel, Christian Science Monitor
"Faust nimbly blends the personal and the political in this affecting memoir . . . Faust pulls off a brilliant synthesis, grounding the macro stresses of the period in her quest to distance herself from her culture of origin and sharpen her political sensibilities." ―Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
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Readers Top Reviews
Constant Reader
The story is great. Ms Gilpin Faust is an excellent writer but her narration skills are lacking. This excellent book deserves an excellent narrator and I wish she had let go of the project long enough to find one.
Sheryll LubitzCon
This book is about speaking up and speaking out for Civil Rights.
MargoSheryll Lubi
Good trouble, resistance, and active engagement is a necessary trouble to get you out of a troubled heart and experience peace of mind.
Kenji YoshinoMarg
In challenging times, my greatest solace can often lie in remembering that there are still thoroughly admirable human beings who live among us, not as hallowed historical figures but as living, breathing icons. Drew Faust is such a person. Her memoir, which bridges the gap from her first grief to her first vote, is a chronicle not only of a time, but also of the "vale of soul-making" that forged one of the great educational leaders of our time. By the end, the fact that Faust made history as the first woman President of Harvard is the least of it. This is a deeply personal history of a historian who herself made history--and lots of necessary trouble along the way.
