Customer Reviews

Beautiful Shadow: A Life of Patricia Highsmith

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Fans of Patricia Highsmith's dark and disturbing fiction will undoubtedly find Andrew Wilson's biography an absolutely fascinating if occasionally harrowing reading experience. Highsmith's life was far from a happy one, in fact in many ways it could be charitably described as a disaster. Wilson movingly details her sad, troubled childhood and adolescence during which Highsmith developed an obsession with gruesome death and decay that would haunt her short stories and novels. As an adult, her many sexual encounters always ended in unhappiness. With advancing age, Highsmith became ever more distrustful and ultimately hateful of humankind. Wilson portrays a supremely talented but cold-hearted, misanthropic woman who was eminently unlikeable, even downright detestable. (One of Highsmith's publishers describes her as "the most odious woman I've ever met.") All of this sadness and despair makes us understand and appreciate her disturbing creations all the more. In addition to providing us with a detailed glimpse into the strange life of one of the finest contemporary thriller writers, Wilson adds much to our appreciation of her art by providing concise and revealing analyses of her best works. So good is this exhaustive biography that once you've finished it you'll want to immediately pick up a copy of NOTHING THAT MEETS THE EYE (or any of the other currently available Highsmith collections) and renew your acquaintance with this excellent, morbidly captivating writer.

"She was a weird, unkind, dissolute person." This is how her goddaughter remembers Patricia Highsmith, and after reading Andrew Wilson's biography, you may think so, too.

In Beautiful Shadow (a reference to the name of the fictional Ripley's home in France, Belle Ombre), Wilson follows Highsmith's life by following her writing, so by the end of the book, you'll have a long list of novels and stories to look for. He examines her influences, her relationships (romantic and otherwise), and her many quirks.

Highsmith was never very popular in the U.S., at least until the movie The Talented Mister Ripley, came out after her death. She was more successful in Europe, where fans even recognized her in the street. Perhaps this explains why she lived most of her adult life in Europe. She was never very comfortable anywhere, even in her own body, according to those who knew her, but she seemed less uncomfortable in Europe.

What sort of a mind comes up with the sort of strange, compelling stories that Highsmith wrote, with their amoral, yet sympathetic characters? Wilson goes a long way toward answering that question in this biography, but some questions remain unanswered, and maybe it's better that way.

This is probably the most insightful, compulsively readable, scholarly biography I've ever read. It delves deep into the heart of the elusive, mysterious Patricia Highsmith and provides answers to all the most important questions. Where did Highsmith get her ideas from? How did she transform her life into art? What made her the woman she was?

It's obvious that I'm not the only one who thinks so. Paul Bailey in the Sunday Times (1 June, 2003) called it `exemplary' and a `triumph'. Craig Brown - who met Highsmith on a number of occasions - writes in the Mail on Sunday, 8 June 2003, that this is a `masterly, utterly absorbing biography...One of the many virtues of Wilson's biography is the seriousness with which he takes the novels, showing them to be deeply attuned to the strange rhythms of guilt, jealousy and fantasy that affect all of us in different ways.'

He also says: 'Now that she is dead, Wilson has delved with extraordinary diligence, and everything he has unearthed is remarkable.....'

The distinguished novelist PD James, in the Sunday Telegraph, 8 June, says this:
`Andrew Wilson's fascinating, beautifully balanced and meticulously researched biography examines the dark obsessions which gave rise to Ripley, telling us as much as we are ever likely to know about Highsmith the woman and bringing us as close to understanding the writer as we are ever likely to get.'

I can't imagine any other biographer getting as close to his subject as this. Don't wait for anything else. Buy this book - now.

I am a serious Highsmith fan and have read many literary biographies...and, unfortunately, find Wilson's to be an extremely poor and disappointing example. Granted, PH had very many affairs, but Wilson treats them in a rushed, perfunctory way, so that I often couldn't determine how one relationship ended. For example, Highsmith's entire affair with Lynn Roth, which lasted for nearly a year in the early 50s, is dispatched with two lines of text. Similarly, a passionate affair with Ann Clark is suddenly defunct, with no explanation other than Wilson's usual default that PH chose women who were bad for her. I found the psychologizing generally unilluminating and tedious--who could not determine from PH's novels that she was obsessed with identity and duality? Wilson, however, hammers at this repeatedly, combined with his interest in her poor relationship with her mother and its links to her romantic and sexual life. The most apt words I can think of for the book are "inert" and stagnant" -- unfortunately it becomes a tedious sewing together of summaries of her many novels with superficial and repetitive filler. I don't know if Wilson needed to do more research or needed greater depth and sensitivity in recounting PH's life (he's a journalist, and this book does read in a very rapid, just-the-facts way), but to me the book is enormously unsatisfying. It compares very poorly with, say, Nancy Milford's biography of Edna St. Vincent Millay.

This is a stunning biography -- well written, well researched (exhaustive) and well structured. Patricia Highsmith helped Andrew Wilson by generating a detailed journal of her life but this biography uses that as a foundation, not the complete story. This is a terrific overview of one of the most under-rated crime / mystery / fiction writers of the century. Sure, Highsmith didn't always hit the mark. But she took chances, she probed her inner pscyhe, which was dark and tortured, and used it as a springboard for the over-arching point of view for her writing and for plotlines and characters. Any writer out there who is stuck for ideas, read this. Highsmith, it seemed, trained herself to dig deep into her imagination and subconcious for ideas -- at the same time as she consumed small newspaper tidbits and larger themes from the news to generate material. I had read all her major novels and a few of her short stories, but had no idea the pace she kept at producing fiction, particularly short stories. This biography is also an unflinching look at somebody who followed nobody else's model and who found a way to live as herself in a very uncomfortable world. I've never met (on page) anybody who was so productive and so self-destructive, who studied relationships in fiction and couldn't maintain one in private. I think Wilson's work here is masterful and represents a significant contribution to 20th century writing and authors.

Beautiful Shadow is a well documented, well written, and thorough enough account of the life of Patricia Highsmith. It treads that most precarious ridge of balancing excellent detail without bogging down narrative action.

But perhaps it is simply because Highsmith is such an interesting figure that is the foundation of this biography. This biography is a thorough account of Highsmith's life from birth to death, with excellent chapters on her life as an expatriate in England, France, and Switzerland whereas Marijane Meaker's previous treatment was the thinly disguised novel that was only a chapter Highsmith's life: her U-Haul lesbian tale "Highsmith: A Romance of the 1950's."

The biography flinches not from Highsmith's prickly personality, alienation of friends, alcoholism, later dementia, and dysfunctional family but all this dirty laundry is a contrasting backdrop to a successful and at times genius career as a writer. In addition, it does appear that Highsmith had long periods of relative stability in both romance and platonic friendships, particularly in rural France.

Mercifully, Highsmith's being a lesbian is only part of the story, and neither overwhelms her full biography, nor becomes the only focal point. Rather, in contrast, Highsmith's craft and careful consideration of money matters are what really drive this biography of one of the 20th century's most fascinating and complex writers.

Some biography's can be completely tedious and dull. This was interesting and fast paced. I felt that Highsmith's relationships (sometimes just sex) were covered well. Two of the women must still be alive because they could not be named. One was a married woman in Europe that Highsmith saw for four years. I think the biographer went to the nth degree to find out who she slept with etc. I don't think everyone involved wants all the details exposed since some of them were married and their children might have some reservations about such revelations.
Highsmith was a strange customer and an underappreciated writer, mostly because of the genre she was in. I am particularly fond of the fact that she carried her pet snails all over Europe with her-under her breasts!!!!

After reading all 22 of Highsmith's novels, I devoured this book about her life. An absolutely fascinating read, highly recommended if you're a fan of her writing. She had an incredibly interesting life.

Awesome to step into the aura of an amazing and colourful woman so full of life. A descriptive and frighteningly personal biography

This is an impressive work of conjecture based on interviews, diary notes and the author's obvious adoration of his subject. Unfortunately, much of it seems only that: his opinion and theory. As interesting as the work of the prolific Highsmith continues to be, the writer herself comes off pretty thoroughly unlovable and not altogether fascinating. The good news, however, is that the biography succeeds in stimulating one's desire to explore Highsmith's works beyond the RIPLEY stories and STRANGERS ON A TRAIN. I've already ordered several and look forward to reading them.