Powell/Shapiro Response

The differences in Powell’s memoir and Shapiro’s biography are extremely evident. Shapiro writes for Julia Child to make her seemingly serious and intelligent by mentioning things like “Even the other stations in what was called educational TV would have been unlikely to take a chance on a plain-faced, middle-aged woman who did difficult cooking with a lot of foreign words in it.” Then going on to mentioning how her show picked up pace in Boston due to the city’s teeming educated population. Shapiro writes as Child being a professional, one who can get things done. Whereas Powell’s memoir illustrated Julia’s cooking in terms of comedy and struggle vs. cooking in terms of importance and triumph. Shapiro gives power to Child’s. She makes the chef seem like a born natural television personality, mentioning how Child’s squirmed as she watched the filmed version of herself, though went on to convince the viewing audience of her natural, disorganized stage presence. I’d say that Shapiro brought about the humorous side of Julia by explaining how even though the chef was a good performer, she couldn’t manage to muster up on-air gimmicks to keep her show moving slowly. So when Shapiro shares how once Childs went on to share the piece of raw meat that was laying out was actually from the shoulder of the animal, as while demonstrating the location on herself as she pointed out her shoulder. This for me entails a bit of awkwardness, which entails a bit of humor. 

I enjoyed Powell’s writing for it was most definitely the more authentic persona. I say this because the memoir never took Julia in all seriousness like Shapiro did. It made Childs seem modest and easy-going with her laid back jokes and apathetic approach to difficult life situations.