Rachel Maddow: A Biography

by Lisa Rogak

Overview

The first biography of the most popular anchor in cable news.

Rachel Maddow has beaten the odds in a way that’s novel in today’s America: she uses her brain.

In a world of banal and opinionated soundbites, she regularly crushes Sean Hannity’s ratings thanks to her deeply researched reports. And in our highly polarized world, Maddow amiably engages the staunchest conservatives, while never hesitating to expose their light-on-facts defenses.

As a result, she's become the top anchor for MSNBC and a beloved representative for all that progressive America holds dear. The news that Maddow was the first publicly-out lesbian to anchor a prime-time TV news show seemed almost anticlimactic to her millions of viewers, who will be surprised and intrigued by little-known details of her life, as written by New York Times bestselling biographer Lisa Rogak.

Growing up in a conservative California town – and viewing herself as a perennial outsider – helped spark an early interest in activism. After attending Stanford and Oxford, she opted for a minimum-wage job as a radio DJ in a tiny Massachusetts market while finishing her Ph.D. She planned to pursue a career as an activist, but 9/11 changed all that, so she returned to local radio where she could help listeners by "explaining stuff." A stint at Air America raised her national profile, which led to her groundbreaking MSNBC show where she dissects the news of the day with an approach found nowhere else on TV.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250781369
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	08/31/2021
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	112,125
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.80(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

LISA ROGAK is the author of numerous books, including And Nothing But the Truthiness: The Rise (and Further Rise) of Stephen Colbert. She is the editor of the New York Times bestseller Barack Obama in His Own Words and author of the New York Times bestseller Angry Optimist: The Life and Times of Jon Stewart. Rogak lives in New Hampshire. Learn more on her website.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Chapter 1 "Who Is That Kid and Where Did She Come From?" 7

Chapter 2 Breaking Free and Coming Out 21

Chapter 3 Activism and Oxford 37

Chapter 4 Love and Radio 49

Chapter 5 Switching Gears 65

Chapter 6 Air America 75

Chapter 7 Taking Off 87

Chapter 8 Punditry 101

Chapter 9 A Show of Her Own 113

Chapter 10 Off the Clock 133

Chapter 11 Behind the Scenes 149

Chapter 12 Branching Out 169

Chapter 13 Settling In 191

Chapter 14 The 2016 Elections and What's Next for Rachel 203

Acknowledgments 221

Notes 223

Index 261

Editorial Reviews

"Flattering...pleasant...thoroughly researched." —Publishers Weekly

"Thoughtfully explores how Maddow became the legend she is today. " —BookRiot

"Exceptionally well researched, written, organized and presented, Rachel Maddow: A Biography is an impressively informative biography and unreservedly recommended." —Midwest Book Review

"Rogak creates a compelling biography...Rachel Maddow is an affectionate portrait of its subject." —Philadelphia Gay News

From the Publisher

2019-09-15
Journalist Rogak (Angry Optimist: The Life and Times of Jon Stewart, 2014, etc.), who has profiled Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, rounds out her take on controversial TV personalities with a breezy biography of MSNBC anchor and political pundit Rachel Maddow.

Rachel, as the author chummily refers to her, has spoken candidly about herself in many print interviews, speeches, and talk show appearances, material that Rogak liberally mines. The result is a book so filled with quotations that it reads like a very long interview. Readers will discover that Maddow first came out as an undergraduate at Stanford, where she became "the most visible out lesbian on campus" and involved herself in gay and lesbian organizations. She also devoted herself to AIDS activism, choosing courses that would give her a rigorous background in public policy and health policy. A stellar student, she won a prestigious Rhodes scholarship that funded a doctorate program at Oxford, where she wrote a thesis on "HIV/AIDS and Health Care Reform in British and American Prisons." Returning to the U.S., Maddow continued activism and floated among menial jobs before she landed a gig at a local radio station, where "she was surprised to discover that the thing she enjoyed most was to provide her own spin on the topics of the day." Rogak reiterates Maddow's goal to "help people" by "disseminating information backed by knowledge and fact and tempered with concern and more than a little bit of humor." In 2004, she graduated from the local station to the newly formed Air America, where she started as a "rip-and-read newsgirl" and ended with her own two-hour show. In 2008, MSNBC offered her an exclusive contract. Among Rogak's revelations is Maddow's love of making artfully crafted cocktails; her meticulous pre-show preparation, spurred by her fear of failure; and her reluctance to marry her beloved partner because of "qualms" about assimilating into the mainstream and losing her identity with gay culture.

Maddow's own voice dominates a brisk, largely by-the-numbers biography.

Kirkus Reviews