Dead End Gene Pool by Wendy Burden

Tuesday, 03 August 2010 08:32

In 1955, Wendy Burden was born into a life of opulence, surrounded by butlers, chauffeurs, chambermaids and museum-worthy art from the likes of Klee, Kline and Mondrian. But her family’s wealth and prestige come at a price.

Story by Danielle Hipps

In her memoir, Dead End Gene Pool, released this spring by Gotham Books, the great-great-great-great granddaughter of shipping and railroad entrepreneur Cornelius Vanderbilt sheds light on the dark secrets of the elite, from her father’s suicide to her absent mother to loads and loads of booze. Burden’s humor keeps this sad story about a crumbling, dysfunctional family afloat. Her interjections of jokes about flatulence and her fascination with death and gore—she aspires to be a mortician, models herself after Wednesday Addams and imagines herself embalming her brother—infuse a light likability to a tale that’s otherwise a bit tragic.

Laced with allusions to great New England society figures like Brooke Astor, the book is a bit confusing at times for this young Southerner with little concept of twentieth-century Northern wealth, but may be perfect for someone closer to Burden’s age. There also isn’t much mention of Vanderbilt’s influence, aside from the wealth, so it’s more like we’re taking a peek at a typical dysfunctional family who masks its problems with extravagant spending and hired help.

Although we’re inclined to like Burden because she’s telling the story, she presents herself as a lovable black sheep, one who seeks the macabre as a way to distance herself from her refined, yet pretentious relatives whose massive mansions are like ivory towers. She’s a tour guide for the blueblood world most readers will never enter—and her tales affirm that there’s a certain freedom and stability that come with budget constraints.

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