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Beauty Mark: A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe…
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Beauty Mark: A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe (udgave 2020)

af Carole Boston Weatherford (Forfatter)

MedlemmerAnmeldelserPopularitetGennemsnitlig vurderingOmtaler
5617460,627 (3.98)3
Poetry. Young Adult Fiction. Young Adult Literature. Before she was Marilyn MonroeHollywood icon, blond bombshell, and easily one of the most recognizable faces of the twentieth centuryshe was Norma Jeane, a young woman whose early life was filled with traumatic experiences: foster homes, loneliness, sexual abuse, and teen marriage. Despite all she overcame, her hard-won, meteoric rise to stardom was besieged by exploitation, pill dependency, and depression, eventually culminating in her tragic death at the age of thirty-six. In a story at once riveting, moving, and unflinching, Carole Boston Weatherford tells a tale of extraordinary pain and moments of unexpected grace, of gumption and perseverance, and of the inexorable power of pursuing ones dreams.… (mere)
Medlem:BHWolves
Titel:Beauty Mark: A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe
Forfattere:Carole Boston Weatherford (Forfatter)
Info:Candlewick (2020), Edition: Illustrated, 192 pages
Samlinger:2016 books
Vurdering:
Nøgleord:Ingen

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Beauty Mark: A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe af Carole Boston Weatherford

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Viser 1-5 af 17 (næste | vis alle)
This fictionalized autobiography of Marilyn Monroe covers from her infancy to her last days, and her never-ending quest to be accepted and loved. As with many a story about Marilyn Monroe, this book is inevitably sad and covers difficult topics including familial mental illness, foster care, prescription drug misuse, and much more.

The technique used for this particular title was interesting because it's clear the author did her research on the biographical details. (I did not fact-check everything, but I did look up facts here and there when new details I didn't know about Monroe's life were mentioned and I wanted to learn more). However, the book is *not* a biography but instead purports to be from Monroe's first-person point of view, with all her various emotions and inner thoughts revealed.

It's also billed as a novel in verse and, yes, it is built out of many small vignettes only a page or two long. However, very few of these reached anything like poetry, reading much more like prose, and not necessarily always the most lyrical of prose as the author was busy getting dates and facts out there, or summarizing the plots of Monroe's various movies.

Still, it was an overall engaging read, especially if readers don't know a ton about Monroe's background. However, as I mentioned earlier, even folks like me who have consumed a fair number of Monroe biographies can find little details in here that don't always make their way into every biography.

The physical object of this book is also quite lovely. The pages are designed with shimmery golden sidebars or backgrounds, along with spotlight-evoking bits of light peppered throughout. A few pages toward the end have beautiful roses in the background illustrations. It is hard for me to describe, but very nice to see in person. ( )
  sweetiegherkin | Dec 31, 2023 |
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
Loved the style of this book. An interesting insight and personal point of view. ( )
  JHemlock | Jun 23, 2021 |
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
Espresso Shots: Beauty Mark: A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe, by Carole Boston Weatherford

Small-sized reviews, raves, and recommendations.

Like Elvis, Sinatra, and Humphrey Bogart, Marilyn Monroe is an icon. Her status as a pop culture icon obscures the reality of her personal struggles, raw ambition, and preternatural talent. She's been the subject of countless biographies and several movie biopics. Her image appears in the Edward Hopper Nighthawks parody seen in malls across the country. The visual shorthand simultaneously reduces her and deifies her. She is America's Venus, inscribed on the pages of the first Playboy and in the masculine imagination as a kind of ur-sex object. But behind the readymade images and mythmaking, who was Marilyn? What's the story behind the name?

As previous states, Marilyn has been the subject of biographies and movies about her life. Beauty Mark by Carole Boston Weatherford is "A Verse Novel of Marilyn Monroe." For the record, I had never read any biographies about Marilyn Monroe, so I can't be an adequate judge in that department. On the other hand, I'm a fan of long-form poetry, including The Iliad, The Odyssey, Paterson, The Cantos, and Drafts. As opposed to a poetry chapbook or poems selected/collected/complete, the long-form poem has its own set of challenges. Beauty Mark is a slim volume, accompanied by two-color photographs. Weatherford has written several other biographies for children on personalities like Billie Holiday, Harriet Tubman, and Fannie Lou Hamer. With Marilyn, Weatherford is in her element and distilling one's life into the concision demanded by great poetry has proven a success. Beauty Mark operates as an antidote against unwieldy doorstopper biographies and the alleged profundity implied by large page counts.

The verse novel chronicles Marilyn Monroe (neé Norma Jeane Mortenson) through a trouble childhood, multiple marriages, modeling and acting gigs, and her eventual death. Her battles with booze and pills is here, along with marital clashes where feminine domesticity and personal career aspirations fight for supremacy. Midcentury Modern had great interior design, but feminism had yet to emerge from its Neo-Victorian sarcophagus. What was more scary to those manly men: the atomic bomb or an ambitious woman? Behind every man is a woman. Or, a modern modified version: In front of every woman is a goddamn coward. Funny how history can turn presumed gender norms into objects of laughable ridicule. Then again, history has given us a second-rate actor and a ninth-rate reality game show host as president, so who am I to judge?

The poetry itself ranges from long narrative poems to shorter impressionist works. The majority are poems spoken by Marilyn herself. As she struggles to fulfill her childhood dream for greatness, she also struggles for personal agency against parents, spouses, and the larger society.

"Daydreams disregard reality.
Imaginings were my salvation."

She confronts the frightening consequences of miscarriage:

"Miscarriage Blues: Ectopic Pregnancy, 1957"

The woman I need
most disappoints me over
and over. Mother.

The role I want most
dies inside of me again
and again. Mother.

About those Playboy photos:

Like cats, nude photos have nine lives.
The shots that I was paid fifty dollars for
as a starving starlet twice appeared
in calendars and threatened my budding career.
But I turned what could have been a ruin
into a reward. And I prayed that was the last act.
Then, two years later, the photos, like a phoenix,
rose again — this time in the very very first issue
of a new men's magazine called Playboy.

The expressions may come across as cliched (cats with nine lives, a rising phoenix, etc.), yet they describe what's occurring with efficiency and clarity. The photos wouldn't go away, but this time around they were a benefit not a hindrance.

Overall, Beauty Mark chronicles Marilyn Monroe's life with a reassuring simplicity and accessibility. This is a poetic biography with no age barriers or the necessity of footnotes. It distills the life of its subject, with all its complexities and contradictions, into an entertaining story. It is emotionally engaging without resorting to the cheaply manipulative stunts so endemic in cinematic biopics. The book is short, but not slight. It is accessible without kowtowing to the lowest common denominator. All in all, it is an enjoyable read.

https://driftlessareareview.com/2021/03/07/espresso-shots-beauty-mark-a-verse-no... ( )
1 stem kswolff | Mar 7, 2021 |
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
This is a collection of poems telling the life story of Marilyn Monroe. Despite her dumb blonde, sexpot image, she remains a damaged innocent looking for love. A surprisingly worthwhile read.
  varielle | Oct 30, 2020 |
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
I thought this collection of short poems was very well written and told the story of Marilyn in such a beautiful way.

It was very close to what a journal or diary of hers might read like. ( )
  miamismartgirl09 | Oct 1, 2020 |
Viser 1-5 af 17 (næste | vis alle)
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Poetry. Young Adult Fiction. Young Adult Literature. Before she was Marilyn MonroeHollywood icon, blond bombshell, and easily one of the most recognizable faces of the twentieth centuryshe was Norma Jeane, a young woman whose early life was filled with traumatic experiences: foster homes, loneliness, sexual abuse, and teen marriage. Despite all she overcame, her hard-won, meteoric rise to stardom was besieged by exploitation, pill dependency, and depression, eventually culminating in her tragic death at the age of thirty-six. In a story at once riveting, moving, and unflinching, Carole Boston Weatherford tells a tale of extraordinary pain and moments of unexpected grace, of gumption and perseverance, and of the inexorable power of pursuing ones dreams.

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