Synopsis: (as told by the back of the book)
When Carrie Fisher recently discovered the journals she had kept during the filming of the first Star Wars movie, she was astonished to see what they had preserved – plaintive love poems, unbridled musings with youthful naivete, and a vulnerability that she barely recognized. Today her fame as an author, actress, and pop-culture icon is indisputable, but in 1976, Carrie Fisher was just a teenager with an all-consuming crush on her costar.
With these excerpts from her handwritten notebooks, The Princess Diarist is Fisher’s intimate and revealing recollection of what happened on one of the most famous film sets of all time – and what developed behind the scenes. And today, as she reprises her most iconic role for the latest Star Wars trilogy, Fisher also ponders the joys and insanity of celebrity as well as the absurdity of a life spawned by Hollywood royalty whose lofty status has ultimately been surpassed by her own outer-space royalty. Laugh-out loud hilarious and endlessly quotable, The Princess Diarist brims with the candor and introspection of a diary while offering shrewd insight into the type of stardom that few will ever experience.
Morgan’s thoughts:
This was my first adventure into Carrie Fisher’s writing and, my god, I enjoyed it. I love Star Wars – my parents introduced me and my younger brother to this series at a young age and we quickly took of on our own with the obsession. When we’d go on vacation, we’d bring our box set with us and watch 2 of the movies a day every day, starting again at the beginning each time we reached the end. So it was my love of Star Wars that brought me to this piece.
But I left it with a love of the writer herself. Carrie Fisher’s voice is captivating. She details from her perspective in 2016 the experience of booking and creating this role with the perfect amount of snark and reverence. She knows how much Princess Leia means to so many people out there but does not shy away from any of the realities of the set of the first Star Wars. She does not shy away from detailing the trials her mother, Debbie Reynolds, faced after her initial stardom faded. She does not shy away from telling her experience of her affair with Harrison Ford. She describes her naive, 19 year old self with such confidence, it seems impossible that she could ever have been so shy or insecure – which is why the diary entries are the perfect complement to the memories.
These diary entries are easily some of the best writing I’ve ever experienced. I’ve reread that section three times since finishing the book last week. They are a blend of verse and prose – the poetry slipping seamlessly into the journal entries which start to sound like poetry themselves. They are honest in both content and style. I’ve never experienced writing that so perfectly encapsulated vulnerability.
Neither section of this book could exist so successfully without the other. I would highly recommend this for anyone looking for a laugh, a walk down memory lane (if you’re a Star Wars fan), or an experience of a 19 year old girl in a new world where she knows no one.
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