In this biography, Baker, all illusions exposed, becomes fascinating, endearing, exasperating, and abundantly alive all over again.
Josephine Baker
The Hungry Heart
Description
Based on twenty years of research and thousands of interviews, this authoritative biography of performer Josephine Baker (1906-1975) provides a candid look at her tempestuous life. Born into poverty in St. Louis, the uninhibited chorus girl became the sensation of Europe and the last century's first black sex symbol. A heroine of the French Resistance in World War II, she entranced figures as diverse as de Gaulle, Tito, Castro, Princess Grace, two popes, and Martin Luther King, Jr.
Yet Josephine was also, as one critic put it, "a monster who made Joan Crawford look like the Virgin Mary." Jean-Claude Baker's book also reveals her outbursts that resulted in lasting feuds, her imperious treatment of family and entourage members, and her ambivalent attitudes concerning her ethnic background.
Reconciling Josephine's many personas—Jazz-age icon, national hero of France, proponent of Civil Rights, mother of children from across the globe—Josephine: The Hungry Heart gives readers the inside story on a star unlike any other before or since.
Reviews
Mesmerizing…irresistible…perversely fascinating…a killer achievement. Here is Josephine stripped of glamour and defenses…one of the most paradoxical figures in twentieth-century entertainment.
The writer's bewitchment is contagious. [Josephine's] exotic beauty, flaming ambition, flashing eyes, rolling hips, small and large peculiarities seduce the reader.
Spiced with some of the best anecdotes in print, and even spicier photos.
