Imelda Marcos/the Rise and Fall of One of the World's Most Powerful Women

Journalist Pedrosa calls Imelda Marcos the ``great what-might-have-been of Philippine politics.'' The poverty and misery of Imelda's childhood drove her to invent an aristocratic background for herself and to live extravagantly and imperially instead of empathizing with the poverty and nationalism of the people. In Pedrosa's view, Imelda was more than a jet-setter; she was an equal partner with Ferdinand in the Marcos dictatorship. Pedrosa's perspective is founded in strong Philippine nationalism and resentment of American influence in the Philippines. Occasional lapses where Pedrosa assumes the reader knows about Philippine life and history mar an otherwise valuable book, as does the lack of bibliography. But the book does provide a Philippine viewpoint on a woman whose lifestyle has received considerable attention. For academic and larger public libraries. Mark K. Jones, Cincinnati Copyright 1987 Cahners Business Information.

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Halfway through this dated expose of ``Meldy,'' husband ``Ferdie'' and Meldy's jet-set ``gang,'' the reader is told that the first portion of the bookwritten by this Filipino journalist on information gathered from a servant in the First Lady's childhood household, from her music teacher and from a cousinwas published in the Philippines in 1970, and that although the Marcoses failed to ``squelch'' it then, the book was banned two years later. If Meldy's countrymen were titillated by revelations that, contrary to her aristocratic image, she belonged to the poor branch of her illustrious family, that this child of a second marriage lived with her mother and siblings above a garage while her father and his first set of children lived in the manse, today's readers will be boredas they also will be at the material about the Marcoses' opulent lifestyle, which is covered in the newer section of the book, taking us up to their fall, which isn't exactly news either. Photos not seen by PW. First serial to the Star. (April 20) Copyright 1987 Cahners Business Information.