Caroline Kennedy Speaks about Jacqueline Kennedy Interviews


September 28, 2011

Caroline Kennedy stands behind a podium, The George Washington University

Caroline Kennedy spoke Monday night in GW’s Lisner Auditorium about her mother’s love for her family and strong opinions on politics, as well as her own favorite excerpts from recently released audio conversations between Jacqueline Kennedy, B.A. '51, and historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr.

The talk, titled after Ms. Kennedy’s new book, Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy, was cosponsored by GW and Politics and Prose bookstore. Historian Michael Beschloss and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Director Michael Kaiser also discussed Jacqueline Kennedy’s commitment to the arts and her participation in the oral history interviews, which were recorded in March 1964. Now, 50 years after President Kennedy’s inauguration, Mrs. Kennedy’s recorded conversations with Mr. Schlesinger provide insight into President Kennedy’s administration that was previously missing, Mr. Beschloss said.

“There was one voice that was lacking, and that was Jacqueline Kennedy’s,” he said. “As a result of this oral history, we’re able to restore that voice to the mix.”

Mr. Kaiser said that Jacqueline Kennedy transformed the way that Americans think about the arts. “More than anything, more than anyone, she knew that the arts were at the very core of our human condition,” he said. Her many arts-related projects were focused on making the fine arts accessible to a wider audience and a regular part of American life.

Ms. Kennedy said the underlying goal of her mother’s oral history interviews was to capture her memories of her husband and his administration while they were still fresh. “It took a lot of courage to be as honest as she was,” Ms. Kennedy said. “She felt she was doing it for my father and for history.”

In today’s world of “cautious political memoirs,” it might be surprising to hear some of her mother’s statements and opinions on the tapes, Ms. Kennedy said. When she first read the transcripts and listened to the tapes, she struggled with the question of whether she should edit them at all before their release. There were repetitions, comments that might seem embarrassing, and views which her mother, if still living, would clearly no longer espouse. But ultimately, she decided against doing any editing.

“I decided I really didn’t have the right to alter the historical record, and I had confidence that people who listened and read the book would come to the same conclusion,” Ms. Kennedy said.

While in some of the conversations on the tapes, Mrs. Kennedy sounded “like a 1950s housewife,” because of her focus on her husband and children, Ms. Kennedy asked the audience to remember that when her mother became first lady, she was only 31, had a newborn baby and was totally overwhelmed by the prospect of being a public figure. President Kennedy’s advisers considered his wife “a political liability,” Ms. Kennedy said. They thought she came across as elitist. But in reality, Mrs. Kennedy was a careful student of public policy who read and commented on many of President Kennedy’s CIA briefings and other memoranda.

Ms. Kennedy said her mother was “insightful, irreverent and, despite her repeated protestations to the contrary, full of opinions…. In so many ways, both public and private, she defined the role of the first lady for the modern age.”

Her own favorite sections of the interviews, Ms. Kennedy said, were her mother’s descriptions of their special family times—especially her mother’s descriptions of Caroline and John playing in President Kennedy’s room while he was eating breakfast, visiting his office and hiding under the desk, and listening to their father tell them bedtime stories.

“Most of all, my mother was a patriot,” Ms. Kennedy said. “She shared my father’s belief that American civilization had come of age, and she wanted to share it with the world. She believed her time in the White House was the greatest privilege, and she worked hard to be worthy of that honor. She loved my father, and her courage held this country together after his death.

The presentation included a DVD featuring clips from the audio interviews and photos of President and Mrs. Kennedy. Ms. Kennedy also signed copies of her book.