The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst
by David Nasaw
List Price:
Our Price: $5.62
You Save: $11.33 (67%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: David NasawEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2001-09-06
ISBN: 0618154469
Number of pages: 704
Publisher: Mariner Books
Book Reviews of The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst
Book Review: Turns out Orson Welles was right, after all
Summary: 5 Stars
Generally, I like a person better after reading their biography. Jean Strouse's excellent biography of J.P. Morgan left me with more respect and admiration for the man than I'd thought possible. But I did not experience the same warm fuzzy feelings after finishing David Nasaw's "The Chief."
That's not to say that "The Chief" isn't good. It's splendid, actually. Scholarly without denseness, readable without glibness, it moves along at a great pace, and gives readers probably the most complete view of Hearst that's ever been provided, with an excellent utilization of both Hearst's own voluminous correspondence and the reminiscences of hundreds of others who encountered the Chief.
But it sure doesn't make you like him any better.
The Hearst that emerges from Nasaw's scrupulous research and masterful writing is a cheap demagogue whose dime-store populism mutated into self-interested conservatism as his own fortunes grew (in Nasaw's own words, "Hearst grew more conservative as he acquired more to conserve). William Randolph Hearst was, it turns out, precisely what his early detractors, including Theodore Roosevelt, E.L. Godkin, and Joseph Pulitzer, said he was: a pathologically self-interested spoiled brat.
It's impossible to say whether the young Hearst, whose papers championed so many progressive ideals, was genuinely on the side of the angels, or whether he was simply appealing to the working classes (and pretty successfully) in hopes of parlaying his pandering to their discontents into political power, but his subsequent actions suggest the latter. Hearst ended up betraying his original high ideals, neglected his five sons (some of whom eventually lost themselves to obesity and alcoholism), and humiliated his long-suffering wife by embarking on a blatant long-term affair with chorus girl-turned-actress Marion Davies, and then blowing zillions on her career. He bought and bullied his way into Hollywood in order to foist his girlfriend on first MGM and then Warner Brothers before her lack of talent outweighed the money he blew on her, even as she made a habit out of cheating on him (she had a good fling of her own with Charlie Chaplin, among others).
But Willie Hearst wasn't only good at burning gelt on a mediocre actress's career. He was remarkably good at blowing fortunes on himself, too. Detail by nauseating detail, Nasaw chronicles the orgy of self-indulgence that Hearst enjoyed his entire life. I say "nauseating" because the parade of yachts and palatial mansions--including a place in Florida, a walled estate on Long Island, an entire apartment building that served as his New York residence, a German village in northern California, a medieval castle in Wales, a "cottage" for his girlfriend bigger than the White House, and the over-the-top estate at San Simeon that he looted the stately houses of Europe for--leaves one sick to one's stomach. Especially considering he kept glutting his appetite for luxury during the Depression, while the working classes whom he once championed were standing in breadlines and selling apples.
What makes all this even more gut-turning is that he had to wait until the death of his mother (when he was fifty-six), who controlled the purse-strings of his father's estate before he no longer had to ask permission to do whatever he wanted with his daddy's money.
I'll admit that Hearst was no slouch. He was a genius for promotion, a fearless businessman, and a true business visionary. The communications empire of newspapers, magazines, book publishing, radio, and movies that he built is, for better or for worse, the template for modern media conglomerates (so I'd say his influence there was more pernicious than beneficial). But Billy Buster, as his father called him, always remained a petulant little boy. He continually turned on the Democratic Party every time the Party decided that it didn't want him as a dictator. And by bullying, intimidating, and smearing his opponents in his papers, he did precisely what he railed against the turn-of-the-century trusts for doing: using money and privilege to get one's way. David Nasaw does a uperb and highly recommended job of telling the tragedy of how a man of so much ability, vision, and genuine talent was never able to rise above what he was: a textbook case of that revolting blend of arrogance and insecurity that characterizes so many rich men's sons.
Summary of The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst
Named one of the best books of the year by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, Business Week, and GQ, THE CHIEF: THE LIFE OF WILLIAM RANDLOPH HEARST is “an absorbing and ingeniously organized biography . . . of the most powerful publisher America has ever known? (New York Times Book Review). Drawing on papers and interviews that were previously unavailable, as well as on newly released documentation of interactions with such figures as Hitler, Mussolini, Churchill, every president from Grover Cleveland to Franklin Roosevelt, and movie giants Louis B. Mayer, Jack Warner, and Irving Thalberg, David Nasaw completes the picture of this colossal American “engagingly, lucidly and fair-mindedly? (Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.).
“Outstandingly researched, elegantly but not flamboyantly written, and fair in its conclusions about Hearst?s astonishing career? (Wall Street Journal), THE CHIEF “must be regarded as the definitive study . . . It?s hard to imagine a more complete rendering of Hearst?s life? (Business Week).
“Outstandingly researched, elegantly but not flamboyantly written, and fair in its conclusions about Hearst?s astonishing career? (Wall Street Journal), THE CHIEF “must be regarded as the definitive study . . . It?s hard to imagine a more complete rendering of Hearst?s life? (Business Week).
The epic scope of historian David Nasaw's biography matches the titanic personality and achievements of William Randolph Hearst (1862-1951), who built "the nation's first media conglomerate" from a single San Francisco newspaper. Based on previously unavailable sources, including Hearst's personal papers, Nasaw's long but absorbing narrative gives a full-bodied account of the often contradictory mogul: "a huge man with a tiny voice; a shy man who was most comfortable in crowds ... an autocratic boss who could not fire people; a devoted husband who lived with his mistress." Wife Millicent Hearst and actress-inamorata Marion Davies also emerge with more complexity than in previous portraits like Orson Welles's Citizen Kane, whose factual inaccuracies Nasaw dissects. The author tempers the usual simplistic account of Hearst's political evolution from fire-breathing leftist to red-baiting conservative, calling him "a classic liberal" who believed in less-is-more government and deplored fascism as much as communism. Fresh insights and elegantly turned phrases abound in Nasaw's depiction of Hearst's activities as newspaper publisher, movie producer, and politician, but what's even more intriguing is the poignant personal drama of a man born "in the city of great expectations on the edge of the continent" who was buried 89 years later in San Francisco, "the place he used to know." --Wendy Smith
Business Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Business Books
Discovering the Possible: The Surprising World of Albert O. Hirschman (Titles from the Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies)by Luca Meldolesi
University of Notre Dame Press; Published: 1995-04; Hardcover; Book
Price in other shops:
What You See Is What You Get: My Autobiographyby Alan Sugar
Macmillan UK; Published: 2011-02-24; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $4.00
Price in other shops:
Sloan Rules: Alfred P. Sloan and the Triumph of General Motorsby David Farber
University Of Chicago Press; Published: 2002-11-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $16.40
Price in other shops:
The Hancocks of Marlborough: Rubber, Art and the Industrial Revolution - A Family of Inventive Geniusby John Loadman, Francis James
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2009-11-23; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $27.00
Price in other shops:
William Beveridge: A Biographyby Jose Harris
Oxford Univ Pr (Txt); Published: 1977-09; Hardcover; Book
Price in other shops:
The Accidental Investment Banker: Inside the Decade that Transformed Wall Streetby Jonathan A. Knee
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2006-08-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $5.50
Price in other shops:
The Vital Few: The Entrepreneur and American Economic Progress (Galaxy Book)by Jonathan Hughes
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 1986-06-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $32.35
Price in other shops:
The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Centuryby Steve Coll
Penguin Audio; Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2009-03-31; Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.62
Price in other shops:
The Other Side of Wall Street: In Business It Pays to Be an Animal, In Life It Pays to Be Yourselfby Todd A. Harrison
FT Press; Published: 2011-05-22; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $14.61
Price in other shops:
Mr. China: A Memoirby Tim Clissold
HarperBusiness; Published: 2005-02-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $19.50
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
William Randolph Hearst: The Early Years, 1863-1910by Ben Procter
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 1998-04-16; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $19.90
Price in other shops:
Julia Morgan, Architectby Sara Holmes Boutelle
Abbeville Press; Published: 1995-08-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $23.82
Price in other shops:
All the President's Menby Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein
Pocket Books; Published: 2005-06-24; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.05
Price in other shops:
Personal Historyby Katharine Graham
Vintage; Published: 1998-02-24; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.98
Price in other shops:
Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism (Turning Points in History)by Bob Edwards
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; Published: 2004-04-26; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $2.99
Price in other shops:
Winchell: Gossip, Power, and the Culture of Celebrityby Neal Gabler
Vintage; Published: 1995-09-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.55
Price in other shops:
The Publisher: Henry Luce and His American Century (Vintage)by Alan Brinkley
Vintage; Published: 2011-04-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.19
Price in other shops:
Hearst Castle: The Biography of a Country Houseby Victoria Kastner
Harry N. Abrams; Published: 2000-11-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $30.00
Price in other shops:
The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearstby Kenneth Whyte
Counterpoint; Published: 2009-12-08; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.66
Price in other shops:
The Times We Had : Life with William Randolph Hearstby Marion Davies
Ballantine Books; Published: 1977-03-12; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.16
Price in other shops: