Mariah Carey is larger than life. The endlessly talented songstress is captivating with every move she makes. Her much-anticipated new memoir is no exception.
The Meaning of Mariah Carey is the singer's take on her own life. Mariah's rags-to-riches story has been part of the lore and allure around the star. But her childhood was more difficult than anyone could have known.
Born to an interracial couple who split early on, Mariah bounced between many homes on Long Island. She experienced domestic violence at a young age. She has no allies in this experience, as she was seriously mistreated by her older sister.
Mariah also talks about the racism she experienced as a biracial child. The world's need to align her with her whiteness rather than her blackness seeped into her early career. She claimed that her marriage to Sony executive Tommy Mottola further reinforced those ideals.
It was writing and music that comforted Mariah through it all. She's told her truth and explored all the sides of herself. With this memoir, she does it again.
Mariah may live a glamorous life many would kill for today, but the road to get there was not an easy one. Mariah has been through a lot in her 50 years. Now, she's sharing her story as only she could, in her new memoir The Meaning of Mariah Carey.
Mariah was the child of a black father and a white mother. She struggled with her racial identity as she bounced between homes in Long Island after her parents split. She lived in predominantly white neighborhoods that didn't accept her biracial background.
Mariah recalled a teacher telling her she used the wrong colors when drawing a picture of her family as a little girl.
"A brew of self-consciousness and embarrassment boiled up from my feet to my face," Mariah said of the incident.
She compared racism to being "a first kiss in reverse," explaining, "Each time, a piece of purity was ripped from my being."
In a discussion of the memoir with CBS This Morning's Gayle King, Mariah recalled being bullied at a sleepover.
"It was my 'friends,' and they were having a sleepover and so they invited me. Mind you, we had to drive to this place, which was like hours away [in] the Hamptons. I was literally stuck there when this incident took place," she said.
"They pretty much got me in a room, cornered me, and started using the N-word over and over."
"The venom and hate with which these girls spewed this … chant was so strong, it quite literally lifted me out of my body," Mariah wrote in the book.
"I was disorientated and terrified and I thought that maybe, if I held on and just kept crying, surely a grown-up would come and stop the assault. But no-one came."
Mariah's home life wasn't much better. She recalls experiencing domestic violence at a young age.
"By the time I was a toddler, I had developed the instincts to sense when violence was coming," she wrote.
She recalled fights between her father and older brother, Morgan. "It was not uncommon for holes to be punched in walls or for other objects to go flying."
Mariah recalled another occasion where she was 6 years old. A family friend called the police when Mariah's mom had been assaulted. Mariah overheard police talking about her, noting, "If this kid survives it will be a miracle."
Mariah also talks about her older sister, Alison, from whom she's estranged. Alison was in and out of Mariah's life throughout the years. Mariah describes her as a person who'd often put her in danger.
She recalled one incident where Alison gave her a valium. Mariah was 12. "Within minutes (I think) I was in a heavy, scary darkness, pushed down into a place beneath sleep, and I couldn't pull myself out," Mariah wrote.
Mariah also claims Alison "tried to sell me out to a pimp." Alison was dating a guy named John, whom Mariah would later discover was running a prostitution ring. Alison allegedly tricked Mariah into hanging out with him alone. They played cards and went to a drive-in movie.
"Almost immediately John put his arm around me," Mariah writes. "John pushed in closer and forced a hard kiss on me. I was nauseous and scared; I felt immobilized."
Thankfully, someone saw the incident and so John left.
Alison was also responsible for Mariah getting some serious burns. Mariah was on the phone with their father one day. She tried to pass the phone to Alison, who threw hot tea on her. Mariah passed out and awoke in the hospital with third-degree burns on her back.
"It took years before I could accept a simple pat on the back," Mariah wrote. It was the last straw for Mariah.
"Her arson was deliberate — she burned my back and my trust."
Mariah turned to music to get through the difficult times. When that talent put her in Tommy Mottola's orbit, she found herself in trouble once again. For one, Tommy was also interested in erasing her identity as a Black woman.
"He tried to wash the 'urban' (translation: Black) off of me. And it was no different when it came to the music," Mariah wrote.
Mariah explains that this is why she didn't lean more into the R&B side of her catalog until after that relationship was through.
Tommy was also controlling and abusive in his own ways. He had Mariah constantly surrounded by armed guards. In one incident she describes, she decided to go to Burger King with rapper Da Brat to get french fries while working on a remix of "Always Be My Baby" with producer Jermaine Dupri. The armed guards drew their weapons on Jermaine, demanding to know where Mariah was within minutes of her leaving the house.
As they returned to the house, Da Brat told Mariah what she was going through wasn't fair.
"This ain't right. You done sold millions of records, girl. You live in a [expletive] palace," she told Mariah. "You have everything, but if you can't be free to go to Burger King when you want, you ain't got nothing. You need to get out of there."
