Treetops
A Memoir About Raising Wonderful Children in an Imperfect World
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
In this compelling companion volume to her acclaimed memoir Home Before Dark, Susan Cheever once again gives readers a revealing look into her famous family, whose secrets and eccentricities parallel their genius and successes. Set against the backdrop of Treetops, the New Hampshire family retreat where the Cheevers still summer, and going back several generations, this powerful remembrance focuses on Susan Cheever's mother's family, and includes portraits of her great-grandfather, Thomas Watson, who invented the telephone with Alexander Graham Bell, and her grandfather Milton Winternitz, a brilliant doctor who built Yale Medical School. And of course there is her beloved and talented father John Cheever, the accomplished author who became one of the most well-known writers of the century, often using his family as material. Perhaps most riveting about Susan Cheever's second biographical masterpiece is its exploration of the lives of the Cheever women. At once a unique family portrait and the tale of every family, Treetops draws us effortlessly into a fascinating yet endearingly familiar world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This measured, absorbing reminiscence by the daughter of John Cheever and the great-granddaughter of Thomas Watson--who with Alexander Graham Bell devised the telephone--explores what her family's myths ``reveal and what they hide.'' One revelation is the link among the family's famous men--the talent, determination and timing that made successes of Watson, his son-in-law Milton Winternitz, (former dean of Yale Medical School), and John Cheever himself. What the myths do not reveal are the lives of the women--stubborn, gifted and seemingly strong, yet shaped by the men they ``happened to end up with.'' Helen Watson Winternitz graduated from medical school, but never practiced medicine. Elizabeth Kimball Watson is reduced to a line in her husband's autobiography. Mary Winternitz Cheever is the only female in the clan to have prevailed, maintaining both her family and a career as a college teacher. From the cluster of New Hampshire family cottages called Treetops, Cheever ( Home Before Dark ) sheds light on an American dynasty and on the very different lives of its men and women--the former self-directed and linear, the latter social and mosaic-like. The book's shortcoming: Cheever's reflections are less deep than the family would appear to call for. Photos not seen by PW .
