Summer Reading Challenge: Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait

I still remember how fascinated I was by the film, A Streetcar Named Desire, when I first saw it. I was in high school and we had been studying the play in literature.
There on the schools television flickered to life this intense, grown-up (well for a teenager!), and complicated story. There was Marlon Brando's intense masculinity and sexuality, the atmospheric, moody music and cinematography and the ethereal, tormented, flighty, mysterious Blanche DuBois-Vivien Leigh.
I confess I have only seen a handful of Vivien's films, though I have watched Gone With the Wind many times, but I have always been fascinated by her, and her life. And I have long wanted to read this book having followed Kendra Bean for some time on Instagram, and having enjoyed reading her blog dedicated to Vivien and Larry.

Vivien took great care to play roles that appealed to her and that she thought would show off her talents. That she played the two most famous literary Southern Belles with such skill is an amazing feat for an English actress. Watching Gone With the Wind and Streetcar it is so easy to forget that she wasn't American!
I found it fascinating how Vivien played so many strong, yet ultimately tragic women-Scarlett O'Hara, Cleopatra, Emma Hamilton, Anna Karenina and Blanche DuBois. In many ways each of these characters reflected something of herself-she was both an incredibly strong, passionate, dedicated woman, but she also experienced great sadness and immense loss.

The other major part of Vivien's life and this book, is her relationship with Laurence Olivier. Their relationship was passionate and tempestuous, both were strong-willed and extremely dedicated to their work.
I was surprised to learn that for a long time Vivien was regarded as a lesser actor to Olivier, and many thought she was only on the stage because of him. Their's is a tragic story, they both loved each other dearly, but ultimately were unable to be together. As Vivien reflected,

"There are only two things in my life which I am absolutely certain I would do over. The first is that I should become an actress-the second, that I should marry Laurence Olivier." p. 169

The book also deals with Vivien's struggles with mental illness, she suffered from bipolar disorder. Having experienced my own battles with mental illness I was inspired by Vivien's story. Though her illness caused her immense unhappiness and problems she remained a consummate professional and a kind hearted, generous friend. Despite what she suffered she did not let it stop her work or her dreams.

New York, 1963

This is a beautiful book and a beautiful tribute to a fascinating, talented woman who left an undeniable mark on cinema history. I feel I learned so much about Vivien, and I look forward to watching more of her films.

"I was not cast in the mold of serenity and in any case, although you may succeed in being kind at twenty you cannot be calm, with all your life still before you, and your ambitions unfulfilled"
-Vivien, p. 24

"Actual beauty-beauty of feature is not what matters, it's beauty of spirit and beauty of imagination and beauty of mind. I tried in Streetcar to let people see what Blanche was like when she was in love with her young husband when she was seventeen or eighteen. That was awfully important, because...you should have been able to see what she was like, and how this gradually had happened to her...you have to evoke this whole creature when she was young and when she was tender and trusting, as opposed to what she had become-cynical and hard, mad, and distressed and distraught."
-Vivien, p. 137

"I have always tried to tackle things that I thought were beyond me"
-Vivien, p. 149

"I don't think life can be considered in terms of depression and elation. I just don't understand people who say they plan their careers...Planning means that the chance opportunity, the unexpected challenge, cannot be seized. And these are the things that make life exciting."
-Vivien, p. 237

Summer Reading Challenge: Dutch Girl: Audrey Hepburn in World War II

I've been very excited to read this book, being both a massive Audrey Hepburn fan, and a bit of a World War Two history buff!

Whilst most people are aware that Audrey grew up in Nazi occupied Holland, her reluctance to talk about this aspect of her life led many biographers to gloss over it. However, as author Robert Matzen realised, to understand what happened during the Second World War is to understand Audrey and her views about life.
Audrey lived through the Nazi occupation, the Battle of Arnhem and the hunger winter of 1944. She lost close family and friends, and many times her own life was in danger. I really hadn't realised just how close the battle was to her home, and how relentlessly and devastatingly her village was bombed.
Matzen's book is meticulously researched, he's cleared up many points that were either hinted at, or ignored, in previous Audrey biographies-such as her involvement with the resistance, her parents stance on the war, and her family background. We learn about her difficult, but close, relationship with her mother, her passionate dedication to ballet and her work helping in a hospital run by the Dutch resistance.

Audrey with her mother Ella Van Heemstra, 1942

Audrey with her beloved Aunt Meisje and Uncle Otto

Many of Audrey's experiences were incredibly harrowing and traumatic but she retained her love of dance, children and nature. Matzen does a wonderful job of setting the scene, he tries to make you feel as if you are experiencing the sights and sounds of battle, and I think this is crucial in trying to understand just what it was Audrey lived through as a young woman.

Audrey experienced so much in her early years, more than many experience in a lifetime, but despite the horrors she saw, she remained a loving and kindhearted person, devoted to helping others, I have so much respect for how she lived her life, she really was a special soul.
I recommend this book to anyone who may wish to learn more about Audrey, Dutch Girl, does an amazing job of highlighting an essential part of her life story.

Audrey dancing in 1942

"There's a curious thing about pain. In the beginning, it's an enemy, it's something that you don't want to face or think about or deal with. Yet with time it becomes almost a friend. If you've lost someone you love very much, in the beginning you can't bear it, but as the years go by, the pain of losing them is what reminds you so vividly of them-that they were alive. My experiences and the people I lost in the war remain so vivid to me because of the pain."
-Audrey, p. 105

"I don't think you ever forget anything, totally, but life, and especially time, gives you a way to deal with it, to live with it. I have a good cry every so often, like everyone else."
-Audrey, p. 150

"My childhood in Arnhem and in Velp was the most important part of my youth, I was ten when the Germans invaded the Netherlands and I was fifteen when it was all over. They were very delicate, precious years. I experienced a lot then, but it was not all misery. The circumstances brought family and friends closer together. You ate the last potatoes together."
-Audrey, p. 236

Audrey's wartime identity card

Summer Reading Challenge

I'm pleased to say that this year I will be taking part in Out of the Past's Summer Reading Challenge (or Winter if you're me!) I participated in 2016, but only managed to read four books, this year I'm hoping to read the full six!

The books I have chosen are:

1. Dutch Girl: Audrey Hepburn in World War Two by Robert Matzen

2. Julie Christie by Melanie Bell

3. Billy Liar by Keith Waterhouse

4. Julie Christie by Michael Feeney Callan

5. To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway

6. Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait by Kendra Bean

(I think Julie Christie might be my theme this year!)

If you would like to participate all the details can be found here-Happy Reading!