The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
“This isn’t a hairdo, it’s a hair don’t.”
“I never had what I wanted because I would never want what I had.”
“I need a vacation from myself.”
“I wish you would love me more so that I could love you less.”
The Princess Diarist is a book written by Carrie Fisher. It is based around the journals she wrote while filming the first Star Wars film. It also covers the affair she had with Harrison Ford. It is a personal and emotional look at what she was feeling and thinking during that time in her life. It also shows some actual excerpts from her writings from that time. It touches briefly on her childhood and her famous mother. Carrie talks about fame, drugs, and alcohol. It is an intimate look at her and the time she spent on the most famous film set of all time.
This was a quick read. Carrie tells a lot of stories. I liked how she referenced old Hollywood especially surrounding her parents. She also talked a lot about sex. When she referred to gay men, that made me happy. Especially during a time when it wasn’t as readily accepted in public. She started the book describing events of 1976 and there were a lot of things mentioned. It was information overload but some of it was cool to delve deeper into online. There were some points she made and thoughts that she expressed that resonated a little bit with me like “Back then I was always looking ahead to who I wanted to be versus who I didn’t realize I already was”. There was one specific event that she recalled that I was surprised to read about because it was so closely aligned to something I said. A few years back at a friend’s wedding during the summer, when it was exceptionally hot, and I was standing up, I walked up to the bar to ask for the largest legal-size glass of water they could serve me. Carrie asked “’Could I have a Coke with ice, please? In as big a glass as you’ve got?’” and I smiled. She was kind of funny too but overall I felt she was trying too hard. The book, in general, seemed very manic and all over the place. It was like she was desperate for the reader to like and understand her. There were a lot of parts that felt like rambling and using too many words. Was she just needing to write so she had enough for a book? I think she even hinted at it too when she said “I try to put the feelings into thoughts or words but it always seems to come out in disjointed sweeping statements. Adolescent jargon peppered with random selections from a fairly gaudy vocabulary.” However, when the actual diaries were brought in, I thought that much of her writing was very insightful and revealing. Some of the words I liked were brogue, garrulous, assignation, and louche. A couple whole pages really resonated with me but here is a small excerpt from page 117. “How do you think people see you? Or don’t you let them near enough to see. You make up their minds for them…You make people come to you and, when they eventually do, you punish them with your smugness.” There was also a part about spending time making mountains out of molehills. One of the rare instances I grabbed something from the Acknowledgements…when she was acknowledging Paul Slansky. “We row-row-rowed these words gently till I screamed – wearily, wearily, and finally cheerfully, this manuscript we redeemed.” I thought it was ingenious. I like Carrie Fisher as a person and her work in Star Wars but I am not sure about this literary side of her. This is exactly the type of book to read if you are in love with Princess Leia or Star Wars.
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