Lee: A Romance [Hardcover]

Pamela Marvin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1997

This book provides an intimate glimpse into the life of Lee Marvin from the woman who knew him best. Pamela Marvin met Lee when she was a teenage schoolgirl in Woodstock, New York, and he a wounded hero returning from the war. They fell into a love affair that gradually evaporated when he went to New York to become an actor. Their marriages to other people failed and twenty years later Lee turned up on Pamela's doorstep with his suitcase. They were together until his death. The book celebrates their life together - not only the films but also the fishing exploits - and dramatizes the details of the palimony suit brought against Lee by an ex-lover, a case that made legal history. It also contains Lee Marvin's journals from the battlefields of World War II, as well as an account of the errors and accidents that led to his premature death.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Actor Lee Marvin's widow has written a touching book that concentrates on their years together, though she mentions nearly every performance, from his coffee-throwing hoodlum in The Big Heat through his Oscar-winning gunslinger in Cat Ballou and beyond. Pamela Feeley and Lee Marvin fell in love in 1945, when she was 15 and he was a 21-year-old veteran; they parted in 1948 when he left Woodstock, New York, to pursue his acting career. In 1970, both divorced with children, they met again and married. Instead of the usual "and then he starred in" chronology, Marvin offers chapters on the couple's mutual passions, like fishing and Australia, plus 200 pages on the infamous 1979 palimony suit filed by ex-girlfriend Michelle Triola (who, unsurprisingly, comes across as a vengeful nut). Peculiar though this structure is, it works. As the author moves backwards and forwards in time--opening with Marvin's 1987 burial in Arlington National Cemetery with full marine corps honors, and zigzagging from their youthful romance to their marriage, his war service, the palimony trial, and the final years of ill health--a moving portrait emerges. She is frank about Marvin's drinking and other peccadilloes, but her loving account stresses his generosity, loyalty, and old-fashioned sense of honor. --Wendy Smith --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 436 pages
• Publisher: Faber & Faber; 1St Edition edition (November 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0571190286
• ISBN-13: 978-0571190287
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,968,650 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars LEE MARVIN BIO? DON'T BE FOOLED!, August 14, 2005

By 

The Yid Kid - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lee: A Romance (Paperback)

The title of this book is Lee: A Romance, as if to suggest it is a biography of legendary actor Lee Marvin and the love life the author spent with him. That's NOT what this book is. It is the author's autobiography and her years with and without the famous movie star. His most influential period in film history, the mid and late 60s, is completely ignored. Instead we read about Pame Marvin's countless other relationships! Don't be fooled by this book -- a great biography on the life of Lee Marvin has to exist some time but it certainly is NOT this book!!

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars lee....a romance, June 26, 2001

By 

Dianne B. Brooks (Huntersville, NC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lee: A Romance (Paperback)

WHAT AN INTERESTING AND WONDERFUL STORY OF A TRUE WAR HERO THAT WENT ON TO BECOME A SCREEN LEGEND. PAMELA MARVIN SHOWS LEE WITH HIS GREAT SMILES, ABILITY AND,.....HIS WARTS. I PUT OFF FINISHING THE BOOK FOR SEVERAL WEEKS DREADING THE END OF THE STORY OF MY HERO OF MANY DECADES. ELVIS IS GONE, AND SO IS LEE SOMEHOW, WE NEED MORE OF LEE. THANK YOU PAMELA. PLEASE SHARE MORE WITH US.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Myths of a Legend, June 23, 2011

By 

Mrs. Lynott (West Coast) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lee: A Romance (Paperback)

Lee Marvin was an amazing actor and a troubled soul. Unfortunately there are few books available on this talented man, and even more unfortunately this is one of them. In this book, his last wife, Pamela, tells about what she considers her 'romance' with Lee. If you are at all an analytical reader you can clearly see this book is nothing more than her attempt to make people believe their relationship was more than it was. Yes, the man married her, yes, he stayed with her, but it is clear that she was way more into him than he was to her. The woman seemed obsessed with him from the time they were involved when he was younger until when he passed away. From reading between the lines it is also easy to gather than the woman did all she could to put a chasm between Lee and his children. Yes, the chasm was formed by Lee by his inattentiveness and alcoholism, but it is quite evident that she did all she could to widen it and to make it worse. Funny how in the end she ended up with everything and his only biological children ended up with next to nothing. Yet if you were to read the book written by his first wife, Betty Marvin, she makes it clear that until he married for a second time, he was very supportive of her and their four children. Save your money folks and buy Betty's book instead. Betty is witty, interesting and tells it like it is. Pamela comes across as petulant, weak and obsessed. A huge section of this book is also dedicated to Lee's companion of many years, Michelle Triola. Pamela makes every attempt to make Michelle appear as obsessive and psycho, yet if you were to read the book by Donald Zec you would see how inaccurate that portrait is. Funny as well that although Pamela went through four husbands (and almost lost Lee at one point, she actually refers to it briefly in the book that he stated he was going to leave her but didn't because he was afraid he wouldn't be happy), Michelle went on to a fully functional 35 year relationship with legendary actor Dick Van Dyke. Things to make you go hmmmmmm.