Jane Eisner, "Carole King: She Made the Earth Move" (Yale UP, 2025)

Summary

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Podcast Episode Summary

Podcast: New Books Network
Episode: Jane Eisner, "Carole King: She Made the Earth Move" (Yale UP, 2025)
Date: December 21, 2025
Host: Mel Rosenberg (Children's Literature Channel, New Books Network)
Guest: Jane Eisner (Author, Journalist)

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Overview of the Episode

This episode features an engaging conversation between Mel Rosenberg and Jane Eisner about Eisner’s new book, Carole King: She Made the Earth Move, recently released as part of the Jewish Lives series by Yale University Press. The discussion traces Carole King’s artistic journey, her Jewish background, her musical innovation, and the broader cultural and historical forces that shaped her career. Jane Eisner brings both journalistic rigor and personal connection to this biography—the first full-scale biography of King apart from King’s own memoir—offering new insights and untold stories.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Personal and Professional Connection

• Eisner describes her long-time admiration of Carole King, beginning with listening to Tapestry as a teenager in the Bronx. She highlights personal affinities—both grew up in NYC, have curly hair, and value authenticity.

  “The music just spoke to me, as it did to, I think, millions of others since.” (03:38, Jane Eisner)

• Shared a personal, if indirect, family connection to King’s childhood community, Lake Waubeeka in Connecticut. Eisner’s relatives spent summers there, and she got to know King’s extended family and was invited to King’s iconic 1973 Central Park concert.

  “Her connection to that community really interested me. And I argue in the book that it was very important.” (07:38, Jane Eisner)

2. Carole King’s Jewish Background and Identity

• King’s upbringing was immersed in secular, working-class Jewish culture (Brooklyn’s Sheepshead Bay/Gravesend; Lake Waubeeka community).

  “This was a Jewish environment... not what we nowadays think of as religious or observant, but was very Jewish.” (10:26, Jane Eisner)

• Eisner and Rosenberg debate the extent of King’s Jewish influence—Rosenberg finds little trace in her songwriting, while Eisner suggests a more subtle, spiritual connection:

  “I have come to hear some of those songs in a way that you can interpret them as somehow singing to the divine.” (14:20, Jane Eisner)

• King partook in Jewish rituals at life milestones (e.g., bar mitzvah for her son, Jewish weddings, connections with rabbis), but did not foreground Jewishness in her public persona or art.

  “For her, it was this kind of ballast in her life, something that she called upon at different times, but not something that necessarily identified her life.” (21:14, Jane Eisner)

3. Navigating Jewishness in American Pop Culture

• The discussion contextualizes King alongside other Jewish songwriters (Irving Berlin, Gershwin, Paul Simon).

• They explore generational differences—earlier songwriters often disguised or downplayed Jewish identity, while King’s era saw more assimilation.

  “By the time Carole King came of age, there was much more assimilation, there was much more acceptance of Jews in especially cultural life.” (18:03, Jane Eisner)

• Notably, King changed her name from Klein to King not explicitly to mask her ethnicity, but perhaps influenced by earlier examples and the commonness of her birth name.

  "She never said that she changed her name from Klein to King because she wanted to hide her Jewishness. You know, was that a part of it? I don't know. Probably." (21:14, Jane Eisner)

4. Musical Innovation and Influence

• Discussion of King’s early Brill Building songwriting career with Gerry Goffin—emphasizing the collaborative, assembly-line processes of the era.

  “That era of songwriting was very atomized. One person wrote the music, one person wrote the lyrics...” (29:37, Jane Eisner)

• Her shift from writing for others to performing her own material marked a dramatic evolution, culminating in the Tapestry album. Eisner connects the album’s title and centrality of “earth” in its themes to King’s identity as an “earth mother,” domesticity, and environmental activism.

  “To me, the key word is earth... it was a gesture to... her environmental activism.” (25:40, Jane Eisner)

• Analyzes how songs like "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" and "You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman" subverted pop norms, with deep empathy and complex melodies.

  “They really were... had a kind of mystical collaboration... it’s kind of stunning that [Goffin] got into the head, into the heart of a woman...” (29:37, Jane Eisner)

• King’s music evolved from simple, direct songs to increasingly sophisticated melodies as her confidence and artistry matured.

  “It was just a natural evolution of her talent and more of a confidence in her own ability not just to compose, but to write.” (37:01, Jane Eisner)

5. Broader Cultural Context

• The show places King among a cohort of extraordinary, working-class Jewish artists from the NYC public school system—Barbra Streisand, Paul Simon, Neil Diamond, Neil Sedaka.

  “These were all actual peers. They were the same age and... with amazing, amazing talent. But also real deep desire to make.” (35:41, Mel Rosenberg; 35:53, Jane Eisner)

• The conversation touches on the openness of America post-WWII, the role of public transportation in allowing talented youth—especially women—to access Manhattan’s creative industries, and the gradual opening up for marginalized groups.

6. Writing the Biography: Approach and Challenges

• This is the first biography of Carole King outside her own memoir. Eisner’s approach as a journalist was to go beyond memoir, seek omitted stories, and conduct deep research and interviews.

• Notably, Eisner did not get to interview Carole King (who is described as "mediaphobic"), and she found the experience richer for needing to be more analytical and independent in assessing sources.

  “It’s a challenge to write about someone who’s still alive and is so mediaphobic that I was not able to interview her. So I actually think that made for a better book because I could be more analytical.” (41:23, Jane Eisner)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

Carole King's Jewish roots:

“There’s a kind of Jewish life that isn’t what we nowadays think of as religious or observant, but was very Jewish.”
— Jane Eisner (10:26)

On interpreting King's songs:

“I have come to hear some of those songs in a way that you can interpret them as somehow singing to the divine.”
— Jane Eisner (14:20)

Analyzing King’s hit songwriting:

“It’s kind of stunning that he got into the head, into the heart of a woman who has a romantic encounter and then wonders whether it’s going to continue past that evening.”
— Jane Eisner (29:37)

Singer-songwriter shift post-Beatles:

"The Beatles broke up at the very end of the 1960s... that's one of the reasons why the singer-songwriter movement... blossomed."
— Jane Eisner (38:23)

On Tapestry's iconic status:

"You listen to it for the first time... what is that? What she wrote those songs? What is going on here? Who is that?"
— Mel Rosenberg (27:27)

Book title meaning:

“To me, the key word is earth... it was a gesture to... her environmental activism.”
— Jane Eisner (25:40)

On not interviewing Carole King:

"It's a challenge to write about someone who's still alive and is so mediaphobic that I was not able to interview her. So I actually think that made for a better book because I could be more analytical."
— Jane Eisner (41:23)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [02:57] Introduction to Jane Eisner and the cover of the book
• [03:38] Who Carole King is to Eisner personally
• [05:42] Eisner’s indirect family connection to King’s childhood summer community
• [08:51] Significance of Lake Waubeeka and King’s connection to environment
• [10:26] Secular Jewish upbringing and influence
• [14:20] Spiritual readings of King’s lyrics
• [18:03] Generational change in Jewish self-presentation
• [21:14] Jewish rituals, identity, and King’s selective involvement
• [23:30] How and why Eisner wrote the biography; lack of previous full-scale bio
• [25:12] Meaning and choice of the book title, “She Made the Earth Move”
• [29:37] Detailed discussion of songwriting process and collaboration with Goffin
• [33:55] King’s ambition, drive, and context of post-war Jewish America
• [35:41] NYC public school peers (Streisand, Simon, Diamond, Sedaka)
• [37:01] Evolution of King’s music and confidence as songwriter/performer
• [38:23] The Beatles, the rise of the singer-songwriter movement
• [40:32] Cultural moment of “Laurel Canyon” and Tapestry/Blue/Mudslide Slim recording
• [41:23] Reflections on the process and challenges of writing about King

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Additional Insights

• Jane Eisner explores not just Carole King’s well-publicized achievements, but also “omissions” and less-known aspects of her life, particularly the impact of her family and Jewish community.
• The episode offers a nuanced perspective on Jewish identity in 20th-century American culture—sometimes explicitly expressed, sometimes invisible, always influential.
• Carole King is positioned as a pivotal figure bridging the Brill Building era and the singer-songwriter age, with the Tapestry album seen as a watershed moment both musically and culturally.
• Eisner’s work combines journalistic inquiry with musical and cultural history, resulting in new depth to understanding King’s legacy.

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Conclusion

This episode provides an in-depth, affectionate, and intellectually rich conversation about Carole King’s life, her art, her Jewish (and American) context, and the unique approach Jane Eisner took in writing her biography. Both fans and newcomers, as well as those interested in music history or Jewish studies, will find much to appreciate in this illuminating discussion.

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Transcript

[Marshall Poe]

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[Jane Eisner]

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[Marshall Poe]

Welcome to the New Books Network.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Hello there to Jane Eisner.

[Jane Eisner]

Hello, Mel.

[Mel Rosenberg]

What a pleasure. From Ramad Gan in Israel all the way to Manhattan in New York.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, the miracle of technology.

[Mel Rosenberg]

The miracle of technology. And we're going to talk about that a little bit. We're going to talk about miracles today. And the miracle we're going to talk about is Jane Eisner and Carol King. And I'm going to introduce myself because I always forget. So I'm Mel Rosenberg and I am usually the host of the Children's Literature Channel, the New Books Network. But today I have a special permission from the powers that be to interview Jane Eisner because I am intrigued by your book on Carole King. And just for full disclosure, I'VE written a manuscript, a picture book manuscript on Carol King myself. Not published yet. Not published yet. So I was delighted that there is an interest in this wonderful, wonderful lady. So, Jane, welcome to the program, and.

[Jane Eisner]

Thank you for having me.

[Mel Rosenberg]

It's a great honor. So a few words about the book. You have a book to wave around. It just was published in September, I think.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, I do. Hold on.

[Mel Rosenberg]

I should have asked.

[Jane Eisner]

Yeah. So here it is. Has a few little markers in it so that I can remember certain passages. Yeah. It was published in September as part of the Jewish Lives series published by Yale University Press.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Okay, wonderful. And just two minutes of who Carole King is for you.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, I been a fan of her music since Tapestry was released in 1971. I was a teenager then. The music just spoke to me, as it did to, I think, millions of others since. And as a person, I connected with her. I was from the Bronx, she was from Brooklyn. She had curly hair like I do. There was an authenticity about her that was very attractive, I think. And I'd follow her career ever since. There were a lot of really good albums that were released after Tapestry. I went to some concerts, I saw the play on Broadway. And when I had the opportunity to write this book, I really wanted to delve into her life. There hasn't been a biography of her.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Published at all, except her own biography of herself.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, she did release a memoir, which, like all memoirs, is really interesting and has a lot of omissions in it. It's how she wanted to be portrayed. It's very courageous in certain parts and kind of mystifying in others. So I wanted to decode that. I'm a journalist. I like to just do my research, interview a lot of people, listen to the music, figure out what I thought about this complicated woman.

[Mel Rosenberg]

I think the complicated is a bit of an understatement, especially after reading your book. But now you've omitted, you see, because you have also a kind of this semi family connection, you know, almost.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, Well, I wouldn't go that close, but that is a little complicated, too. There's a small community surrounding a lake in Connecticut. Carol's father, Sid Klein, remember that she was born Carol Joan Klein. She changed her name. So Sid Klein was the head of the Jewish Firefighters Association. And in New York City, there were many, many Jewish firefighters at the time. And late 1940s, early 1950s, there was a real desire by these firefighters to find a place for their wives and children to go to during the summer. And so he was the instigator of creating this community that has moved from being a summer community, to Jewish firefighters, to an all, all year community, to anyone who wants to buy a house there. And for a time, my aunt and uncle rented a house and then bought a house which is still in the family. And for a couple of summers when I was in high school, I spent several weeks there and became somewhat close with Carole King's stepsisters. Her parents had divorced, married each other again, divorced again, each of them remarried, and they both were really attached to this community. So they both had homes there with their new spouses. And so I knew her mother, and then her father had two children with his second wife. And one of those children was a really good friend of my sister's. So that was my connection to her. And as a result, we were invited to the really iconic concert that Carole King did in Central park in 1973. And after that, the connection kind of waned some, as these things do as you grow older. But it did help me understand a key part of her upbringing. And when I mentioned before about how memoirs sometimes have omissions, this part of her upbringing around what's known as Lake Wabeka, was not even mentioned in her own story, which was one of the things that mystified me. And then I felt like, okay, I got to find out about this. So I tracked down the woman who was her best friend at the time there and was able to interview her. And so her connection to that community really interested me. And I argue in the book that it was very important.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Okay, in what sense? In brief.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, you know, the one time that she had mentioned it was in an interview some years ago, and she sort of joked about it because she eventually moved, after living in New York City and then Los Angeles, she moved to Idaho, which remains her main residence.

[Mel Rosenberg]

A great. A great place for Jews to live.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes. And she mentioned that she loved the outdoors in the wilderness ever since her father started this community. But that's sort of it. I do think there's a connection there. The first few years of this community was quite rustic. They lived in these sort of two bedroom cottages. The first year they didn't have running toilets. And I think that sort of spurred her on to have a lasting, lifelong connection to the environment. And in fact, now she's an environmental advocate. There's also another thing, Mel, that I think the community there introduced her to, which is a kind of Jewish life that isn't what we nowadays think of as religious or observant, but was very Jewish. I mean, this was A Jewish environment.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Well, this is where. This is why I'm bringing it up. Because if there's anything that would surprise me about Carol King, it's her, what we call Yiddishkeit. Because, you know, I know you're writing part of a series about Jewish lives and you talk a lot about Jewish writers and singers and, and producers, musicians, and that's wonderful. But Carole King doesn't, Carole Klein, if you will, doesn't come across as a very. As a. As a creative, highly influenced by Judaism. And I'm sure you want to correct me now.

[Jane Eisner]

No, I think you're right. I don't want to elevate her connection to Judaism or the Jewish community. My sense of it is. And what I found interesting was both the atmosphere, the environment at Lake Wabeka, and perhaps even more formative in her childhood and adolescence in a part of Brooklyn, Sheepshead Bay, Gravesend, it's known as now, that part of Brooklyn was really Jewish. It was filled with working class Jews like her parents, children and grandchildren of immigrants who were living in these modest homes and were able to take advantage of terrific public education. Certainly many of them belong to synagogues, but they were not what we would think of as Jews who have kind of the two pillars of Jewish life today, which is connection to and remembrance of the Holocaust. So. And connection to Israel. And some of that was understandable.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Or some religious bit.

[Jane Eisner]

Exactly. There were some observant Jews in that community. There are a lot more now. But they felt very Jewish. You know, they had seders. They, you know, just had this kind of secular Jewish, you know, I don't know what the right word is. I actually think the best way to describe it is like the Hillunim in Israel.

[Mel Rosenberg]

This was crossing my mind. I, to an extent, am one of those Hilo name, if you want to call them secular Israelis. The show is, of course, about you and your wonderful book, but I think it's completely different. And it did cross my mind when I was talking to you and reading this and we'll save this for our coffee in Manhattan. But if the book that I've written that I told you about, a children's book, is about a girl who goes from door to door. And there's nothing Jewish about the story except everything about the story is Jewish. When you read the story, you'll see the story written by a Jewish guy about the Jewish experience. I don't find in Carole King this secular Judaism. And this for me, is a. Is a mystery because she did grow up a Jewish. She was in this environment, she was the Jewish community in Brooklyn and she went to camp and so on. And I don't see that anything rubbed off on her writing. The same way that you haven't written the book about Paul Simon yet, but when you do, there is a very.

[Jane Eisner]

Good book that recently came out about him, so. Well, you know, I want to disagree with you slightly.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Good.

[Jane Eisner]

I think there were times in her adulthood where she was connected to some form of Judaism, for sure.

[Mel Rosenberg]

But Jane, in her songs.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, that, you know, that depends on how you hear of them, Mel. I have come to hear some of those songs in a way that you can interpret them as somehow singing to the divine. I would argue that. I don't mean that's the only interpretation. You think of a song like one of her most famous. You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman. Clearly, that's a woman who is singing about a man and the way she feels. But it has. First of all, it was written for Aretha Franklin, and so it has a real church kind of cadence, a real gospel cadence. It's kind of remarkable that Carole King and her first husband, Gerry Goffin, two Jewish kids from New York City, could write this song for a gospel singer from the South. But they did. But again, it's sort of how you listen to it. There's another song, you Light Up My Life. I think you really listen to that, not just as a love song to a man, but really something that emanates from somewhere else. And, you know, she also sends that, one of her, again, most iconic songs, you've Got a Friend. She has written that that sort of came to her from someplace else. It just came through her. So, you know, again, what's so amazing about her music is that you can interpret it in different ways. It means different things to different people. So I'm not sure that's a Jewish impulse so much as a spiritual one.

[Mel Rosenberg]

This is intriguing because you've written. You wrote in your book about so many Jewish musicians. We're not going to have time, Jane, to talk about everything. It makes me very upset. I'm not a journalist. Journalists know how to focus. Idols know how to focus. But, you know, if we talk about Irving Birgit. Right. Who wanted so badly to be an American, but the. Everything about his right thing and his music is Jewish like Christmas.

[Jane Eisner]

I don't know. Is that Jewish?

[Mel Rosenberg]

No. But a lot of his other songs. We're not going to talk about the Irving Berlin now, but we can another time. Is there a book about him in the series?

[Jane Eisner]

Yes. There is. It's very, very good. Very good.

[Mel Rosenberg]

That's too bad because he's quite a character. So this is what I'm going to now say something and you can criticize me, of course, and I hope you will because my job here is not to be right, it's to be interesting is to say that Irving Berlin, he tried in a sense to hide the fact that he was Jewish. He wanted to be American. He wanted to be 150% American, right? God bless America and I'm Jesus boy, this yada yada. Some of his songs, melodies are very, very Jewish, as with the Gershwin's. And I'm thinking that a few generations later, people like Carol King and Paul Sager, part of their Jewishness is their resistance to, to appearing as a Jewish musician. I'm going to now stop because you're not going to agree with me and I want to talk about other things.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, I don't know if it was resistance so much as a natural progression. Remember as you hinted at, you know, Gershwin and Berlin and they changed their names too. They work living and writing and creating at a different time for Jews. By the time Carole King came of age, there was much more assimilation, there was much more acceptance of Jews in especially cultural life. Similarly, as you know, as a woman, she was able slowly, slowly to break into that and really made remarkable strides as a woman. But I think that their Judaism didn't. I think they sense that their Judaism didn't stop them. Now at the same time, she changed her name from Klein to King.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Then she added an E to Carol.

[Jane Eisner]

She did well, that was because there were so many Carole Kleins in her school.

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[Jane Eisner]

I don't think so.

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[Jane Eisner]

Yeah.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Jane, I don't, I don't want. I'm crazy about Carol King. I would love to meet her. I'm a huge groupie. I spent a year writing a manuscript about her. Let's. I want for the record, I'm crazy about her. Sorry, go ahead.

[Jane Eisner]

No, I'm just saying that, you know, she never said that she changed her name from Klein to King because she wanted to hide her Jewishness. You know, was that a part of it? I don't know. Probably. But I do think it's important to mention that the kind of Jew she was meant that there were times in her life when she absolutely dipped into Jewish ritual. For example, she insisted that her son. She has four children, her youngest is a boy. She insisted that Levi gets have a bar mitzvah. She has to this day, a relationship with a rabbi in California who officiated at her mother's funeral at one of her daughter's weddings. And so I think for her, it was this kind of ballast in her life, something that she called upon at different times, but not something that necessarily identified her life.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Something that you have in times of need that perhaps you won't need.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, in times of need or in times of joy. But both her first two husbands were Jewish. She was married in Jewish ceremonies. But that didn't stick.

[Mel Rosenberg]

It's something interesting. And now let's talk about Jane. You've spent most of your adult career as a very Jewish journalist, you know, and you presided over the forward, I want to call it Derrick Forward, because that's how I knew it when I was a kid growing up in Canada, this very prestigious and quite ancient Jewish newspaper. And so after such an illustrious career, you've interviewed presidents and prime Ministers. And I get to interview you today. What brought you to write this book? And how did you. Did Yale come to you? I should mention Yale or university press, so prestigious in this wonderful series. How did you get this book deal?

[Jane Eisner]

Well, I was approached by one of the editors of the series who asked me to propose a subject of a biography. And again, I had been interested in Carole King all my life. There was not at that a full fledged biography of her alone. There was a book written about 20 years ago called Girls Like Us, which was a kind of group biography of Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon. A terrific book. I highly recommend it. But nothing about her specifically and in particular, nothing that really dissected her music, which was one of my goals in this book. So I still had to write a book proposal the way authors do, but there's no doubt that I had an opportunity that kind of eased the way into my writing this book. And I'm very proud to be part of this series, Mel. I mean, I think.

[Mel Rosenberg]

And you should be. Now, the book. First of all, the book is wonderful, and it touches on so many different aspects, and I'm jealous in a very good way. And I have lots of questions to ask you. So let's go back to the question you called the book. Carole King. She made the Earth. Okay, that. That is a very interesting name for a book because in the context of the song, when you talk about this in your book, it's a sexual reference.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, it is. I mean, it's the opening song on Tapestry. It's just got an absolutely recognizable melody. I mean, I bet most people would know exactly what the song is. Yes.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Under my feet. I mean, like a lady, you make my heart start to tremble and beat whenever you. Okay.

[Jane Eisner]

I didn't know you can sing so well. The. The. The opening chords are just recognizable, I think. You know, I think it's one of the songs that. That everyone. They can hear it and they know that it's her. It was somewhat innovative and a little controversial because it does talk not, you know, fairly explicitly about woman's sexuality. But that's not the only reason. I also feel that to me, the key word is earth. So when she was in Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles at the second stage of her career, when she truly became a singer songwriter, that sang her own songs, and that was different than what had happened in New York. She also was kind of an earth mother. There you look at the COVID of the album Tapestry. She's sitting in her home by the window, actually knitting a tapestry Sitting under curtains that she sewed herself, you know, her hair free. I mean, it was a very domestic scene. And I think that has always been a part of her. And then I also thought it was a gesture to, as I mentioned before, her environmental activism. The fact that she really has pushed for certain legislation that would protect, especially the Rocky Mountains. So that's why I chose that title.

[Mel Rosenberg]

That's excellent. I must say that you were. You're much younger than me, and you have a birthday coming up soon, so. Mazalto. We're not going to get into them. I was 21. I'm 74 now. So, like, when. When Tapasy came out, I was 20. And, you know, Jane, I remember listening to it for the first time. I mean, how many records do you remember listening? Yes, and especially so Far Away. Yes, so far Away. Does men hardly stay and say who the. Is that amazing? What is that? What she wrote those songs? What is going on here? Who is that? And a lot has been said about Tapestry. It's one of the best albums that ever was. And you write in your book, which I find incredible music theory. And you talk about her own style of writing music and how deceptively simple it appeared. But it started out simple, like one of my favorite songs from. From 1960, will you still love me some More? Which. Which I think is a real iconic song in her life because she was 17 or 18 and she wrote it. And. And everybody thinks, including me, that she wrote the. The words and Jerry maybe wrote the music. And it's the opposite. The. The music is very simple. That is very, very, you know, fif. And then.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, except that. Let me just interrupt you for a minute. I agree with you. Except that the melody in that song was something new, because 1950s music was kind of boppy and didn't have much melody. And what she did in that song. And you're right, she wrote the music. She did not write the lyrics. Her then husband, Jerry Goffett, did, which.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Is also crazy, because how could Jerry write this song about a girl afraid of committing herself? These are incredible people.

[Jane Eisner]

They really were. And I think the two of them had a kind of mystical collaboration that created these songs. I agree with you. It's kind of stunning that he got into the head, into the heart of a woman who has a romantic encounter and then wonders whether it's going to continue past that evening. And I think it was one of their really amazing talents that they were able to. To create music that had its origins about situations or feelings that they did not necessarily have, but could imagine. Will youl Love Me Tomorrow is one example. Natural Woman is another example because it has such a gospel feel. And, you know, I think it is true that a lot of people do hear those songs and think she wrote the lyrics as well. But in fact, that era of songwriting was very atomized. One person wrote the music, one person wrote the lyrics. One person was the producer, one person performed it, another person sold it. That's the way music was created. And what is known as the Brill Building era, which is actually a real building near Times Square. And there was another building.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Yeah, there's a few buildings that house these fantastic creatives.

[Jane Eisner]

Exactly. And a lot of them were Jewish. A real lot. Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann, Bert Bacharach.

[Mel Rosenberg]

And how their friends and competitors.

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, exactly, exactly. Especially Cynthia and Barry were very, very close friends. Still are. But they were competitive, too, because there was a lot of pressure for these pairs to write music that would feed this growing market of teenagers and young adults who wanted to hear these songs on the radio.

[Mel Rosenberg]

In one sentence. I mean, I think it comes across clear that Carol has always been. Been fiercely competitive. In one sentence, where do you think he's going?

[Jane Eisner]

I think she had both innate talent and innate ambition. And again, I think this goes back to her childhood. Her mother was very influential, really pushed her. I don't mean it wasn't in a mean way, but she really kind of encouraged her daughter. A lot of protected her in certain ways. You know, when she was part of a musical group in high school and it looked like they were going to get a small contract, she, you know, helped it happen that it was just about Carol, not the three other members in this group. And the other members knew it because Carol had so much talent, both in writing and she had that stark talent.

[Mel Rosenberg]

And so what was her role of her dad did beyond Daddy drive me to Manhattan. What was.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, and in fact, he didn't do that. She took the subway. Yeah. You know, he's a little bit more of a fuzzy figure in her life, because especially she was a teenager, young teenager, when her parents first divorced. And she lived with her mother. Her father lived nearby. He would definitely be in her life. And I think there was still a lot of love there. But the main parent was her mother.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Yeah, but still, in families like this, you know, it's a lot about, like, for me, also, we grow up with this need to show people that we can succeed. Yes.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, especially because, remember, this was a neighborhood where so many of the people like her were Children or grandchildren of immigrants. So there were newcomers to America, and America was opening up to them. After World War II, there was a lot of antisemitism here. By the mid-50s, that had decreased markedly. Lots of reasons for that. So they weren't necessarily stopped in their career by being Jewish. Things were starting slowly to open up for women. So that too enabled her to really kind of push open the door of the record industry, which she did quite forcefully starting in high school. I mentioned the subway. You can't discount that. Suddenly there was access. I rode that subway from Sheepshead Bay to midtown Manhattan. It's a long ride, but you could do it. And it was cheap. Still is, relatively. And. And that meant that someone like her, whose father was not gonna drive her around, could still do this on her own. And I think that was really important. And not just her. I mean, you've mentioned some of the other people who were her peers. Barbra Streisand from Erasmus High School. Carol King went to Madison High School. They were rivals. There was Paul Simon in Queens. There was Neil Diamond. I mean, to me there's. And these are.

[Mel Rosenberg]

And Neil Tadaka.

[Jane Eisner]

Exactly. And these were all actual peers. They were the same age and.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Same age Jewish kids. And.

[Jane Eisner]

Exactly.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Incredible.

[Jane Eisner]

With amazing, amazing talent. But also real deep desire to make.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Was like, oh, you're not going to take me. It's okay, I know where the subway is. I'm going to tell you. Listen, this is my. This is. When I. When I think about it, and this is my take. I might be. I might be. I might be wrong. Let. So what is, in your opinion, the reason? I mean, two things here, Jane, and this comes across very clearly in your book. The transition from simple chord progressions and bass lines and lovely melodies to more complicated, more complicated music. Was this because of the development of the music of the Beatles? To what do you attribute this? And then I'm going to ask the next question. We know the story of James Taylor, kind of pushing her to the microphone to sing at the college performance. Was there something else leading up to that? I mean, because her peers were producing albums.

[Jane Eisner]

Well, to your first question, I think it was just a natural evolution of her talent and more of a confidence in her own ability not just to compose, but to write. So you mentioned so Far Away. That was a song she wrote. Music and lyrics. It grew out of her life. She was touring by then. She was married to her second husband, Charlie Larkey. She had children at home. You know, she knew she needed to tour for her career. She Wanted to tour, but she was torn. And, you know, that's one of the songs that has spoken to me. I don't know if I said that. Right. That still speaks to me decades and decades after I first heard it. And I think, to try to answer your question, that was just one example of the evolution and the confidence that she had that she could indeed write these songs.

[Mel Rosenberg]

And.

[Jane Eisner]

And it's true that there were other albums at the time, but Tapestry was different. You know, you mentioned the Beatles. You know, there's a classic thing that Gerry Goffin and Carole King wanted to be like Paul McCartney and John Lennon. And McCartney and Lennon were known to say they wanted to be confident.

[Mel Rosenberg]

You mention this in the book, and it's so. It rings true. I mean, the Beatles, the incredible thing about Carole King is that together with Jerry, they had huge shifts in the 60s that people don't associate with them. Like change that the Beatles covered, Right?

[Jane Eisner]

Yes, yes. But the Beatles broke up at the very end of the 1960s. And that, I think, was one of the reasons why the singer songwriter movement, which grew up in Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles, I think that's one of the reasons why it blossomed. You know, I'm an oldest child. I have a younger sister. When I went off to college, I know that that created more room for my sister to develop and to do her thing, not in relation to me. And, I mean, that's a little bit of an analogy, but I think it's like that. So the Beatles are now separated, obviously.

[Mel Rosenberg]

So they sucked up Everybody's oxygen until 1969.

[Jane Eisner]

Yeah, to some degree they did. And then there's this opportunity to create a different kind of music, folk music, more political music. Her music is not so political. But you think of things like what Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young wrote and other examples of that. And I do think it enabled them to think about writing and singing, performing both live and on records in new ways. And what I find just remarkable was In January of 1971, in adjoining studios, Carole King was recording Tapestry, Joni Mitchell was recording Blue. James Taylor was recording Mudslide Slim. They played and sang on each other's albums.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Carol snuck into Joanie's studio to play the piano. Yes, yes. By the way, this is all in your book, and I. And I love you for that. So we're coming towards the end of this wonderful interview. What can you do? I told you, we'll have to have another one. This is just too much fun. I think you have to write a book now. Okay. What would be if you were going to now write another book following this beautiful book about Carol King. And we're going to mention again that it's published just about two months ago with Yale University Press, and it's called Carol King, she Made the Earth Move. And I really highly recommend it. I enjoyed it on so many levels. What is going to be your next book?

[Jane Eisner]

Well, that's something I think about morning and night. I don't know, really. It's a challenge to write about someone who's still alive and is so mediaphobic that I was not able to interview her. So I actually think that made for a better book because I could be more analytical. But still, that was a challenge. I love the historical research in this. I loved my own challenge of learning to play her songs, some of her songs on the piano so that I could better describe their originality. I'm not really sure, Mel, I mean, if you have suggested.

[Mel Rosenberg]

Jane, we're going to send everybody away to run out and buy your lovely book and we're going to reconvene in about two minutes and share some ideas. It was a real honor for me. It's a little bit outside my comfort zone, even though I do love music and I'm a musician sometimes, but usually I interview children's book authors. So this was a rare privilege for me. And I'm Mel Rosenberg and I've been with the wonderful, wonderful Jane Eisner, who's celebrating this wonderful new book and a birthday coming up soon and Hanukkah next week. And it's been a real joy to have you on the New Books Network. And we're going to say goodbye to everybody and we're going to run out and come back and just have the tete a tete and talk about your your next book. So bye bye everybody else. Happy Tanuka, Merry Christmas, Merry everything. Happy New Year, and we'll see you again soon.

[Jane Eisner]

Bye.