The perennial girl-child of a creepy, Svengali-like mother, Wright seems to have lived the life of a doll as much as a human being could. Her life is truly in the realm of too-disturbing-for-a-storybook, too-bizarre-to-make-up. There is also a bunch of Lonely Doll sequels.Īnd of course it turns out that Wright herself had quite a uniquely twisted psyche of her own. The book's rather lovely and artful and sick and clearly meant to sear itself deeply into the mushy psyches of young readers. The story contains lots of dress up, an infamous spanking scene, and a profound childhood fear of abandonment - in other words, it's made to order for the twisted, confused brains of little girls. If you don't know it, The Lonely Doll is a memorably creepy story illustrated by black and white photographs, about a blonde doll who lives unhappily all alone until two bears come to stay with her. I don't think Jean Nathan's the greatest biographer who's ever lived, and I felt her pop-Freudian analysis of Wright left a lot to be desired (okay, it annoyed the crap out of me, though that's a personal pet peeve), but Nathan does deserve real recognition for unearthing the hitherto untold story of this extremely fascinating woman.ĭare Wright is the author of a famous 1957 picture book for small children.
The Secret Life of the Lonely Doll is definitely a four-star book. This biography of Dare Wright had a lot of flaws, but a year later the story's still imprinted in my generally flaky memory, and I can't deny that I sat down and inadvertently read the whole thing in one sitting, sooooo. its terrifying to witness, but apart from that - not truly remarkable. and its the same thing - relentless photographing of each other - beauty transformations involving makeup and hair color changes - a fug of cigarette smoke. but i know a mother daughter pair like this.
and a mother as self-absorbed and delusional as miss edith should have been left to fend for herself long before it got to that point. sleeping in the same bed together well into the daughter's fifties is just plain absurd. much like three or four women cannot be around each other without spontaneously engaging in lesbian pillow fight action, mothers and daughters living together their whole lives leads to emotional claustrophobia and, eventually, insanity. mothers and their daughters should not spend this much time together. instead, it is as tragically funny as watching grey gardens - maybe a little sadder. i think i expected something more tragic and explosive than this.
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