How Barbra Streisand Transformed Childhood Hardships Into a Career That Spanned Generations

Barbra Streisand is a perfect example of a woman who has achieved success despite the hurdles she faced. Perhaps it could even be said that her success was largely due to those obstacles. This year, the diva turned 81, and as a tribute, we want to tell you a little bit of her story, which makes us admire her even more.

“The kid who had a good voice and no father.”

Barbra was born in Brooklyn, USA, in the early 1940s to a Jewish family. Unfortunately, she lost her father when she was too young to hold any memory of him. Diana Ida Rosen worked as a school secretary and met Emanuel Streisand, a grammar and literature teacher, whom she eventually married.

After the birth of their first child, came a baby girl, whom they named Barbara — she would later drop the “a” for her stage name. However, when Barbra was just 15 months old, Emanuel tragically died after suffering an epileptic seizure. The family was devastated, and Diana, along with her two children, moved into her mother’s house.

Barbra Streisand told Oprah Winfrey that in school she was known as “the kid who had a good voice and no father.” Emanuel was a constant absence in her life, even in the toughest decisions of her career. She asked her mother why she never talked about her dad, and she said she didn’t want Barbra to miss him.

Instead, the presence that marked her throughout her life was that of her mother — a woman who was so broken by the death of her husband that she raised her without any affection and who became her fiercest critic.

A jealous mother and an indifferent stepfather

Streisand has spoken openly about the lack of support she received from her mother and stepfather when she was young. In an interview with the New York Times, she recalled how her mother told her she was not pretty enough, and she would be better off becoming a typist. Streisand also revealed that she disliked singing in front of her mother because it always embarrassed her. “Other people were praising my voice, but my mother would say, ’It’s not good enough, it’s not strong,’” she confessed.

Also, Barbra spoke about the unkind treatment she received from her stepfather, Lou Kind, who never liked her and made her feel like she was a horrible being when she was just a child: “I tried to make him like me for a while. I tried calling him Dad and got him his slippers at night when he came in. I’d get down on my belly and crawl, so I didn’t walk in front of the TV while he watched wrestling. But did he like me? No way.”

These experiences have shaped Streisand’s life and have led her to become an advocate for self-esteem and self-confidence and to fight against stereotypes of beauty in the entertainment industry.

Perhaps because she had become a widow so suddenly, Diana saw her daughter through frustration. Before becoming a secretary, she had been a soprano herself but was too shy to sing in public.

During an interview, Barbra was asked whether her mother might have been jealous of her career, and she answered affirmatively: “Yes. And that was staggering for me to learn. She never praised me to my face, but I have a feeling she praised me to other people. And she wasn’t a toucher. She never hugged me or said words like, ’I love you’. I just couldn’t please her, but I owe her my career.”

Barbra remembers that after her father passed, they lived with her grandparents. She and her mother slept in the same bed and her older brother slept on a cot. They didn’t even have a living room.

Then her mother sent her to a camp she hated. When she went to pick her up, a man was sitting next to her mother. That’s how Barbra learned that her mom had remarried, and she would have a sister, Roslyn.

Barbra would sit on the stoops of her neighborhood and sing as a consolation. She was invited to sing at weddings and camps, but it was only at the age of 13 that her mother let her record a few songs. By 16, she was living on her own and making her way in the entertainment world but was often told she was too ugly and should have a nose job. When Barbra was 18, she turned up to sing at a nightclub and thought: “This could be the beginning of a big change in my life.” And so it was, and since then her career has grown stronger.

Despite the harshness with which her mother treated her, she believes she did love her, in her own way: “I’m sure she loved me in the way she knew how. For her, love was food. She didn’t encourage me to become an actress — maybe she didn’t want me to experience rejection. She never thought I would make it.”

However, Barbra Streisand was able to turn this negative and sad part of her life into something positive and is now grateful: “Today, I can look at it and go, ’Thank you, Mom,’ because if you had believed in me, I probably wouldn’t have amounted to what I am today, because I wouldn’t have had to seek your approval.” None of those sad situations affected her determination to become a star. Overcoming each of those conflicts may have given her the strength to find true love and become one of the most prominent women in the entertainment industry.

Her achievements are extraordinary. Barbra is an American singer, actress, and director. She has had a career spanning more than six decades and has had success in multiple fields of entertainment. She is one of the few artists to have been awarded an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony. All were achieved through perseverance and a talent that has managed to shine brightly, leaving behind indifference and contempt.