The Glass Castle

Archival Summary & Scope

Jeannette Walls delivers a spectacular memoir of resilience, offering a revelatory look into a family that was both deeply dysfunctional and uniquely vibrant. Her brilliant, charismatic father captured his children's imaginations with lessons in physics and geology when sober, but became destructive when he drank. Her mother, a free spirit who abhorred domesticity, resisted the responsibilities of raising a family.

The Walls children were forced to provide for themselves—feeding, clothing, and protecting one another—as they navigated a nomadic and impoverished upbringing. While the children eventually found their way to prosperous lives in New York, their parents followed them, ultimately choosing to remain homeless. The Glass Castle is a testament to the intense love and loyalty found within a peculiar family, illustrating their remarkable journey from neglect to redemption.