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If you don’t have a copy of Mary Trump’s book about her crazy Uncle Donald and his family, you can read a terrific review in Critical Mass, The New Republic’s culture and arts section.
“Too Much and Never Enough is full of explanations for Trump’s behavior: abandonment issues, narcissism (a common theme in these psychological explorations), stunted emotional growth, caffeine dependence. All of these have combined to form a 74-year-old toddler who just happens to be the most powerful person on the planet,” writes TNR’s Alex Shephard. “Of course, we don’t need an expert to tell us that Donald Trump is a badly damaged individual.”
As a clinical psychiatrist, Mary Trump brings a family insider’s view to this serious psychological portrait. And it’s not just the president who is being examined. As Alex Shephard points out, “the Trump children each suffered in unique ways … they had many afflictions in common: insecurity, difficulty in relating to others, an all-consuming fixation on money, which is confused with worth.” The matriarch and her two daughters “were confined to gender roles that were rigid even for the 1950s.” The Donald and his two brothers had to “fend for themselves in an environment not unlike The Lord of the Flies. Enamored with the prosperity gospel, Fred Trump Sr. drilled a ruthless code into his sons: Do whatever it takes to get ahead. Emotion of any kind was weakness. Lying, cheating, stealing—all encouraged.”
For more than 100 years, The New Republic has offered some of the best arts and culture coverage anywhere. As mainstream media struggles to blend both sides into its stories, TNR is the independent voice you can trust to get to the heart of the matter.
Donald lived up to the expectations of his father. He was “endlessly rewarded for his mendacity and aggression in the rough-and-tumble world of New York real estate. Fred Sr. showered his son with money, allowing him to create the illusion that he was self-made, a brilliant dealmaker. This phony personal brand would be the foundation of Donald’s successful presidential campaign,” Shephard asserts.
Mary Trump’s family saga skewers Donald and his surviving siblings. “For Mary, these siblings have, for too long, escaped the consequences of supporting their horrible brother,” Shephard concludes.
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