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Dianaworld

byEdward White

An Obsession

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In February 1981 a 19-year-old nursery teacher’s assistant overnight became globally famous. In a frenzy of excitement, jumping every barrier of language and class, a new, overwhelming icon was conjured up.

This is a guide to Dianaworld – the extraordinary hall-of-mirrors through which one young woman, the world’s media, the royal family, and everybody else stalked one another. Fashion-plate, breeder of heirs, role model, fantasy object, saint and sinner, Diana gripped the minds of millions of people in ways which were unique, complex and distressing. After her death, chased by paparazzi through a Paris traffic tunnel, an estimated 2.5 billion people watched her funeral.

Edward White examines Princess Diana as the complex figure she was: a scion of a great aristocratic house, wife of the future king, mother of his heirs, an inspiration and delight to countless people for many years. And yet, of course: a human being inevitably and woefully underequipped either to deal with the horrors of the House of Windsor or control, or even lightly supervise, the Dianaworld she and others had created. This is a wonderful book, both admiring and incredulous, exuberant and melancholy.

A kaleidoscopic portrait of Princess Diana (1961–1997), as viewed by the people whose lives she touched... White takes an evenhanded perspective on his subject... his panoramic approach attests to her lasting influence across the world. This achieves the difficult task of finding a novel take on the much-discussed former royal

Publishers Weekly

About Edward White

Edward White is the author of widely praised The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock and The Tastemaker: Carl Van Vechten and the Birth of Modern America. He has written for publications including the Paris Review. He lives in Kent.
Details
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • ISBN: 9780141999890
  • Length: 400 pages
  • Price: £12.99
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