“Bailey, a former prosecutor, attacked her credibility scattershot, an approach he would use throughout the trial, particularly with female witnesses. ... He accused her, that is--without coming out and saying it--of being a certain kind of woman: conceited, disingenuous, and dissatisfied. The universal misogynist caricature. I'd never gone in for academic gender theories, but Bailey's cross-examination strategy--with Farrar and other women to come--convinced me that the culture of criminal justice has a fundamentally masculine tilt. Repeatedly, in a manner that I suspected was typical in modern courtrooms, he portrayed the female mind as intrinsically unreliable, ruled by emotion, immune to logic, prone to pettiness, swayed by lust, and corrupted by vanity. It rarely spoke plainly. It was seldom candid. It was composed of layers of hidden agendas. It put up a front, behind which was another front. It either aimed to please or to conceal, which were often the same thing. The only way to get the truth from it was to push and prod until it snapped. Make it angry. Make it cry.”
Quote by Walter Kirn
Work
This book recounts the story of Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, a German immigrant who spent decades assuming various false identities in America, most famously claiming to be a member of the Rockefeller family. The narrative follows his elaborate deception, his relationships with unsuspecting victims, and the eventual discovery of his true identity. The case took a darker turn when he was connected to the murder of a California man named Joseph McGowan in 1985, a crime that remained unsolved for years. The author, who had befriended the man known as Clark Rockefeller, provides an inside account of how the imposter lived among elite society while maintaining his elaborate fiction. The book examines themes of identity, deception, and the American obsession with wealth and status. more
Author
Walter Kirn is an American novelist known for his distinctive narrative style and profound social insights. His works often explore the complexities of modern society and the multifaceted nature of human nature. more