“I considered it elder abuse. She put him through the paces, not only before the debate, but after. She should have gotten him out of there immediately.” — Sally Quinn on Jill Biden and the debate
Today’s guest is amongst America’s most verbal octogenarians. No, not you-know-who. Sally Quinn is the illustrious Washington DC hostess, writer and commentator. The almost 85-year-old does improv comedy every Sunday, ballroom dancing every week and Zen Buddhist meditation every Monday night. Her novel, Silent Retreat, is now out in paperback. And she’s working on her memoir, tentatively entitled Never Invite Sally Quinn.
Certainly Jill Biden won’t be inviting Sally Quinn any time soon to one of her tête-à-têtes. Quinn’s account of what went wrong with the Biden presidency is sharply personal. Her late husband, legendary Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee, had dementia. She watched his cognitive decline from inside, and the parallels with what she observed in Biden were, she tells me, too close for comfort. Jill Biden’s decision to keep Joe running after the debate, when she privately suspected he’d suffered a stroke, was, in Quinn’s word, “elder abuse.”
Silent Retreat, set at a monastery in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, is about the sexiness of silence. A prize-winning reporter and the venerable Archbishop of Dublin fall in love in enforced silence. Anything but elder abuse. But autobiographical? Probably not. As Ben Bradlee used to tease her over breakfast, it’s always been hard for not-silent-Sally to keep her mouth shut.
Five Takeaways
• The Army Brat Who Became Washington’s Most Powerful Hostess: Quinn grew up as an army brat, moving from posting to posting with her military father. She arrived in Washington after college, did a stint as social secretary to the Algerian ambassador, and was then hired by Ben Bradlee to write for the Washington Post’s new Style section — the first style section in the history of American journalism. She and Bradlee eventually married. Their home in Georgetown became the hub of Washington’s social and political life for decades. She describes herself not as a powerhouse but as someone who “really lucked out.” An army brat who knew how to work a room.
• Gerontocracy Is Real — But People Who Keep Going Are Different: Quinn agrees with Samuel Moyn that American gerontocracy is a genuine problem: people who lose their cognitive sharpness should not be running organizations or countries, and the tragedy is that no one can know in advance who will lose it and who won’t. But she draws a distinction: the problem is not old people, it’s old people who have stopped growing. She surrounds herself with younger people, particularly younger journalists, because of their energy, idealism, and optimism. She is still working full time. The issue is not age. It’s vitality.
• Biden and Jill: Elder Abuse: Quinn’s account of the Biden presidency is the most personal Andrew has heard. Her husband Ben Bradlee had dementia. She knows the signs. She watched Biden lose it, got a knot in her stomach every time he spoke publicly. The debate was her worst nightmare. Everyone in the White House knew what was happening and wasn’t telling the truth. And Jill Biden — who now admits she thought he had had a stroke after the debate — raised his arm in a victory salute the next day and took him off to campaign in North Carolina. Quinn’s verdict: “I considered it elder abuse.”
• Silent Retreat: A New Yorker Writer and an Archbishop Fall in Love in Enforced Silence: The novel grew from Quinn’s own annual visits to a Trappist monastery in Virginia’s Berryville. She is a woman who once failed to stay quiet for three days — or so her husband thought — and who found to her surprise that she loved it. The novel: a prize-winning reporter whose marriage is falling apart, and an Archbishop of Dublin whose faith is in crisis, check into the same monastery for a silent retreat. They can’t speak to each other. They speak to the monk instead. The novel is told through those confessions. Kirkus: “an unholy brew of lust and faith.” Airmail: “a bodice ripper with a fillip of Roman Catholic ritual.”
• Improv, Ballroom Dancing, Zen Buddhism, and Dinner by Candlelight: Quinn’s account of how she stays alive at 84 is the most energetic thing in this conversation. Improv comedy every Sunday for two and a half hours — performances after the class, with people half her age. Ballroom dancing every week. Zen Buddhist meditation every Monday night for two hours. Working out every day. Writing her Washington memoir. And hosting small dinner parties — six or eight people, candlelight, good food, a lot of wine — as a form of community-building in what she calls the toxic environment of today’s Washington. The memoir’s title: Never Invite Sally Quinn. Andrew has already secured an invitation to the next dinner party.
About the Guest
Sally Quinn is a longtime Washington Post journalist, columnist, television commentator, Washington insider, and one of Washington’s legendary social hostesses. She is the author of Silent Retreat (Simon & Schuster), Finding Magic, The Party, Happy Endings, Regrets Only, and We’re Going to Make You a Star. She was the founder and moderator of On Faith, the Washington Post’s religion website. She lives in Georgetown, Washington DC.
References:
• Silent Retreat by Sally Quinn (Simon & Schuster). In paperback.
• Episode 2945: Samuel Moyn on Gerontocracy in America — referenced at the opening.
• Ben Bradlee — Quinn’s late husband, executive editor of the Washington Post during Watergate, referenced throughout.
About Keen On America
Nobody asks more awkward questions than the Anglo-American writer and filmmaker Andrew Keen. In Keen On America, Andrew brings his pointed Transatlantic wit to making sense of the United States — hosting daily interviews about the history and future of this now venerable Republic. With nearly 3,000 episodes since the show launched on TechCrunch in 2010, Keen On America is the most prolific intellectual interview show in the history of podcasting.
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