American Heiress (Toobin)

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use these LitLovers talking points to start a discussion for American Heiress...then take off on your own:

1. What was the ideology of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) and what were its goals? How would you characterize the group and its tactics—clever, passionate, inept, foolish, or misguided? What did the SLA hope to gain by capturing Patty Hearst?

2. Toobin presents individual portraits of SLA members. Did those back stories generate any understanding or compassion on your part?

3. What was Patty Hearst like? How would you describe her: as a cossetted, spoiled, rich young woman...as haughty, humble, insecure, or shy? Does Toobin present her sympathetically or unsympathetically?

4. How do Patty's parents come off in this account, her father especially? Toobin praises Randy's "curiosity, his decency and above all his love for his daughter"? Do you agree? What about Patty's mother and her black dresses?
 
5. Talk about law enforcement's bungling of the case.

6. What prompted Hearst's decision to join the ranks of her captors? During the trial, her defense said she acted out of  “coercive persuasion” (what is now popularly referred to as "Stockholm Syndrome"). What was the basis of that defense...and is a convincing one to you? What does Toobin think?

7. Follow-up to Question 6: Was Patty Hearst a victim, or was she responsible for her crimes? Or does the truth fall somewhere in between? Put another way: do you think Hearst's conviction is fair? Should she have been cleared? Or do you think her sentence have been longer?

8. How does Toobin present the Hearst's lawyer, F. Lee Bailey?

9. Talk about Steven Weed. Toobin writes of him:

If there was one point of unanimity among the protagonists in the kidnapping...it was contempt for Patricia’s erstwhile fiance.

Why was he the subject of such loathing?

10. Describe Toobin's reaction toward Patty Hearst's campaign for a presidential pardon even though her sentence had been commuted. What do you think?

11. How familiar were you with the Hearst kidnapping before reading American Heiress? What have you learned after reading it? Were there any surprises?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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