Book Review: Memories Are Made of This: Dean Martin Through His Daughter's Eyes, by Deana Martin, with Wendy Holden (2004)

The cover of Memories Are Made of This: Dean Martin Through His Daughter's Eyes, by Deana Martin, with Wendy Holden, 2004.

Dean Martin was handsome, charming, funny, and had a terrific way with a song. Martin’s act as a loveable drunk was an invention, but it fooled the public for many years. After his breakup with Jerry Lewis in 1956, Martin needed a new nightclub act. Now he could expand his talents, as he no longer had to be just the straight man to the manic Lewis. Of course, the magic of Martin and Lewis was that Dean was so much more than just the straight man. Dino borrowed some of comedian Joe E. Lewis’ drunk act and made it his own. The transition from comedy duo to solo star was so successful that by 1961, a Saturday Evening Post article largely focused on the discrepancy between the public “Dino” that audiences saw on TV and nightclubs, and the private Dean Martin, who was in reality an early riser so he could get out on the golf course. 

Martin’s daughter Deana gives readers an intimate view of the Dean Martin that few people saw in her 2004 memoir Memories Are Made of This: Dean Martin Through His Daughter's Eyes, written with Wendy Holden. The book is a fascinating look at the handsome, amiable man who succeeded at every medium he tried. Television, movies, records, live appearances, Dean Martin ruled them all.  

Deana was born in 1948, the fourth and final child from Martin’s first marriage to Betty McDonald. While Dean quickly remarried, wedding Jeanne Biegger the following year, Betty never got over the breakup of their marriage and descended into alcoholism. When Betty left her children with her sister Anne, promising to be back in three hours, but then disappeared for three days, Anne took them to Dean and Jeanne’s house. This was the real beginning of Deana’s relationship with her father, who quickly obtained custody of his children from his first marriage.  

Deana grew up in a blended household with six siblings, a very sweet stepmother who she quickly started calling “mother,” and a father who was working constantly.  

Deana’s own personality seems to have been very in tune with her father’s and she realized quickly that she had to adapt to Dean’s schedule and interests if she wanted to spend time with him. High on the list of Dean Martin’s interests was golf. So, Deana gladly went with him to the driving range. Conversation was kept to a minimum. “Happy with his own company and entirely self-contained, he didn’t feel the need, as most of us do, to fill a gap in a conversation with chitchat.” (p.88) The hours Dean spent with Deana at the driving range meant a lot to her: “After years without a father, I was spending time alone with Dad at last, and that, to me, was the greatest prize of all.” (p.89)  

At the very beginning of the book, Deana tells us what her response is when people ask her the question “Was he a good father?” She writes “No. He wasn’t a good father, but he was a good man.” (p.3) It’s an interesting distinction to make, and I think by the end of the book it makes sense.  

For Dean Martin fans, one of the joys of reading Memories Are Made of This is knowing that Dean was just the nicest person. As Deana writes, “My father was, truly, the sweetest man in the world. He had a unique aura and was brilliant at making everyone around him feel good.” (p.79) That’s a true gift, and Martin’s warmth still comes across through the screens today. Whether he’s singing a song or acting in a comedy sketch, it’s impossible to watch Dean Martin and not smile.  

Deana reveals some interesting facts about her father. One of the tidbits I found most interesting was about Dean’s reading habits: “He claimed he’d read Black Beauty in school, and it made him cry, so he decided never to read another book again.” (p.151) On the one hand, as someone who loves books and the written word, I’m flabbergasted that Dean wasn’t a reader. Didn’t he even read Airport, by Arthur Hailey, when he was cast in the movie? But on the other hand, I find it quite hilarious and pragmatic that Dean only read one book. Books make you sad, why read another one? Deana writes that if anyone ever told Dean at a party that they had written a book, Dean would reply “Congratulations, I read one.” (p.151) Which is a very funny and snarky thing to say.  

Dean’s sadness over Black Beauty also connects to his love of horses. Dean rode the same horse, Tops, in many of his westerns. Dean was so sad when Tops died in 1972 that he left the set of the movie Showdown to bury the horse. Universal Pictures sued Dean for leaving the set, but he eventually returned. The writer Nick Tosches felt that Martin leaving the set of Showdown was so significant that he used it as a short prologue to open his 1992 biography Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams. Although in the prologue Tosches doesn’t mention anything about Tops’ death, which seems to have been the catalyst for Martin walking off the set.  

Deana Martin doesn’t dish too much dirt about her father, but she does mention that he had relationships with singer Petula Clark and actress Inger Stevens. I’m not surprised about Dean’s relationship with Petula Clark, as she and Dean had amazing, electric chemistry. Inger Stevens co-starred with Dean in the 1968 western Five Card Stud, which also starred another laid-back icon of mid-century cool, Robert Mitchum. Deana reveals that she had a brief relationship with Mitchum while they filmed Young Billy Young. Deana never told her father about her relationship with Mitchum, which is understandable. (p.164)  

Deana’s special bond with her father was solidified when Dean’s mother Angela taught Deana how to make pasta fagioli, Dean’s favorite. One of the sweetest chapters of the book is when Deana starts making pasta fagioli for Dean after his mother’s death. It was a way for Deana to do something for her father, a man who had everything.  

Memories Are Made of This is a charming and touching look at Dean Martin, one of the great entertainers of his time.  

Book Review: 1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left a memoir by Robyn Hitchcock (2024)

The cover of Robyn Hitchcock's 2024 memoir 1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

The signed bookplate inside my copy. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

Robyn Hitchcock, singer, songwriter, guitarist, and all around groover.

The British singer, songwriter, and guitarist Robyn Hitchcock has always been a devotee of psychedelia, and in his new memoir 1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left, Hitchcock takes us through the happenings of that year, musical and otherwise. Hitchcock turned 14 years old in March of 1967, but the narrative begins a year earlier, when Robyn entered Winchester College, a boarding school founded in 1382. 

It was during 1966 that Hitchcock discovered the music of an American singer and songwriter. “He seems to emphasize every word he sings—and there are many of them.” (p.30) It’s Bob Dylan, and the course of Robyn’s life is irrevocably altered. 

1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left is an evocation of that time in adolescence when, for some of us, music takes on an almost mystical import, and each passing month seems to bring about a further evolution of our personalities into a different self. 

Hitchcock describes the differences at Winchester between the “meatheads” and the “groovers”: “The meatheads are into sports, alcohol, talking about sex, and the Beach Boys. The groovers favor Beat poetry, jazz, and incense sticks.” Things shift when the Beach Boys release “Good Vibrations” and the groovers dig it. Robyn asks a groover friend, “The Beach Boys are for all these beerfucker types, you know—the meatheads—aren’t they?” The groover responds, “No, man, you’ve gotta dig it: the Beach Boys are cool now—this stuff is beautiful, man. It’s like jazz with voices, you know?” (p.59-60) 

Robyn’s family background was quite interesting. His father was Raymond Hitchcock, a painter and novelist, and his mother was Joyce Hitchcock, who studied history at Cambridge University, “where she eventually became one of the first generation of women to be allowed to graduate with an official degree.” (p.13) 

Hitchcock has some mixed feelings about his privileged education, writing “One of the main functions of private education in Britain is to stunt people emotionally and then send them out to run the country.” (p.96) 

It’s no surprise to anyone who knows Hitchcock’s lyrics that he is an astute observer, and he turns many memorable phrases throughout the book. One of my favorites was the way he describes the cover of the Incredible String Band’s album The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion: “The saturated joy of it, the intricacy: everything seems to be turning into something else when you look at it closely: which, for me, is what defines psychedelia.” (p.145) I also love the way Hitchcock describes the autumn of 1967: “The sunsets of 1967 are particularly vivid: flaming pink, orange, and purple silhouette the trees rising out of the white miasma.” (p.153) 

I’ve been a fan of Robyn Hitchcock’s music for a long time, so it was a delight to read 1967 and learn more about his background and how the music of the 1960’s affected him. I’m so glad that Robyn Hitchcock wrote this memoir, and it was a pleasure to read it. 1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left is a fascinating glimpse into what makes Robyn Hitchcock tick, and how he developed his own unique artistic style. I’d highly recommend it to anyone interested in 1960’s pop culture. 

Book Review: Florence of Arabia, by Christopher Buckley (2004)

The Australian cover of Florence of Arabia, by Christopher Buckley, 2004. 

Christopher Buckley’s 2004 novel Florence of Arabia is a satire of the Middle East. I know, perhaps not the most likely subject for a satirical novel published in the immediate wake of 9/11 and the United States’ invasion of Iraq. But Buckley makes it work.  

The titular character is Florence Farfaletti, a State Department official who wants to bring women’s rights to the Middle East. Easier said than done. Especially when countries like Wasabia, which has a dismal record on women’s rights, is a close ally of the United States, due to the fact that Wasabia is swimming in oil. Of course, Buckley is a satirist, so there’s no way a country like Wasabia could actually exist. Wink wink, nudge nudge.  

Florence’s memo about her plan to bring women’s rights to the Middle East puts her on the radar of a mysterious government official who finances her covert operation. Florence and her team head to Matar, a more liberal emirate. Matar borders Wasabia, and thanks to Winston Churchill, Matar has ocean access while Wasabia does not.  

Florence of Arabia is a satire, but it still exists in the real world. Some awful things happen in the course of the novel, which feels true to what would actually happen if someone tried to bring women’s rights to the Middle East.  

One of my favorite lines in the novel was from Bobby Thibodeaux, a CIA operative. Speaking of the Middle East, he says to Florence “Don’t you understand that since the dawn of time, startin’ with the Garden of Eden, nothing has ever gone right here?” (p.113) 

Buckley also mocks the haplessness of United States foreign policy. As a crisis unfolds, he writes of the U.S. politicians: “There were those who urged caution, and those who urged that now was a time not for caution but for boldness. Then there were those who urged a middle course of cautious boldness.” (p.158) 

In Florence of Arabia, Christopher Buckley gives us an interesting heroine who is easy to root for, more than a dash of action and intrigue, and enough ideas to power this excellent novel, which turns twenty years old in 2024 but still provides much food for thought.