George W. Bush and Bill Clinton

Two weeks ago, Decision Points, George W. Bush’s memoir covering fourteen of the pivotal moments of his presidency, came out to mostly good reviews. Even Bill Clinton and the New York Times had good things to say about it. There is also a well balanced article on the Christian Science Monitor detailing the global response to the memoir. Since its release, it has made it to Number One in Amazon’s list of bestselling books, Number One New York Times bestseller in hardcover non-fiction, and countless other accolades.

After leaving office in 2009 with approval ratings of 22%, something he really should have won an award for, he has found redemption in a literary career. Not only is his memoir doing well financially, but it has helped to flip the perception by many of his critics who have slanderously accused George W. Bush of being inarticulate and called into question his ability to read and write.

Decision Points presents a man very different from the one we know from his speeches and television interviews; this man is smart, eloquent, and literate. Nay, hella literate. In his memoir, he even writes about the competition he had with Karl Rove involving the reading of history books. Sadly, Bush only managed to read 95 history books per year, or 150 pages per day, while Rove read 110 history books a year. What surprises many of his critics and supporters is that George W. Bush is not a literary elitist and has no qualms crossing genres. During his eight years in office, he has read the Bible (according to Rove, “cover to cover,” every year no less), the Aquariums of Pyongyang by North Korean dissident, Kang Chol-hwan, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, The Stranger by Camus, and let’s not forget the literary genius of The Pet Goat Bush was so engrossed in for seven minutes after he was informed of the attacks on September 11.

There have been some articles, mostly blogs, written about the many instances of creative liberty used in his memoir where Bush creates the illusion that comments were made directly to him, or that he was even present in certain situations. Ryan Grim of the Huffington Posts uses examples like excerpts used in retelling of stories from New York Times articles found through google, or giving the impression McCain said something directly to him, when in fact he was talking to reporters. Ryan Grim and the Huffington Post, however, are careful not to use incendiary words like plagiarism or liar. Instead, they opt for words like lifted and scene fabrication. Read the article here.

The reason they are being careful is that these kinds of liberties with the “emotional truth,” are used by creative writers of non-fiction all the time, but never to the degree in George Bush’s memoir; there is no real precedent that I can think of. The function of “the emotional truth” is to allow the use creativity to revisit description, punch up dialogue, ignore certain truths and facts that distract from the story, or to inject reflection to a moment from the past, that perhaps never took place.

Take the late Frank McCourt’s memoir, Angela’s Ashes, where at age fourteen, he is able to recall in vivid detail his inner turmoil with such poignancy: “My eyes are red and oozing yellow, there are matching red and yellow pimples all over my face and my front teeth are so black with rot I’ll never be able to smile for the rest of my life.” (305)

When it was discovered that James Frey used this exact same technique, but perhaps with sinister motives, it caused a public outcry against him and a nationally televised on-air dress down by Oprah herself. But lifting passages and anecdotes through google, is considered “public domain,” and this seems to make it not plagiarism. I had a student last year who plagiarized an analytical paper by using comments made on Amazon.com. I still considered it plagiarism. Perhaps I was wrong and should have commended her for her ingenuity, eh?

The memoir would probably have shattered the perception of George W. Bush being, let’s face it, illiterate, even to someone who didn’t like his politics – me – if there was a consistency with what he said on television and what he wrote in his memoir. On television, he sounds like the same George W. Bush I’ve seen for eight years, bumbling through speeches, and mixing up his words. In his interview with Matt Lauer, his argument for the use of waterboarding is that a lawyer told him it was legal, but he couldn’t possibly have acted quicker during Katrina because he didn’t have the proper legal documents. And this view is different in the memoir, where he actually does admit his failings in his handling of Katrina. Although he still makes some of the same claims he has made over the years, the writing in the memoir makes George W. Bush sound articulate with relatively well thought out decisions. Until he opens his mouth and elaborates.

So I am of course ever so slightly skeptical that George Bush, the same man who said “We spent a lot of time talking about Africa, as we should. Africa is a nation that suffers from incredible disease” even wrote this memoir, aside from the anecdotes about dog pooh and poisoning a fish by pouring vodka into its tank. That’s right, I said it: George Bush didn’t write a majority of his own memoir.

George Bush has a ghostwriter, and and his name is Christopher Michel, frequently referred to as the voice of Bush. Christopher was his speech writer so knows how the former President speaks. Christopher Michel, an ex-Yalie, now in his late 20s, prefers the term “collaborator,” which is apparently the “industry term.”  Bush also acknowledges in the memoir that a lot of the research was conducted by Peter Rough. I’ll leave it up to you to make the decision of whether Christopher Michel, Peter Rough, and George W. Bush collaborated on his memoir, or whether they acted as Ghost Writers.  Here is a link to an interview Christopher Michel gave to a very nervous and careful reporter for One Dublin.