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3.86 AVERAGE
3.86 AVERAGE
An absolutely stunning biography. I wrote my masters thesis on Miller's wartime work, several years before this came out, and went into this biography assuming I knew most everything within. I was completely wrong. Burke's biography not only sheds light on the nook-and-crannies of Miller's life and career, but paints an undiluted portrait of her. Through extensive research and numerous personal interviews, Burke accomplishes what can only be described as THE definitive biography of the artist.
I first discovered Lee Miller through a podcast episode about a year ago, and was struck by how beautiful and mysterious she was. I hadn’t delved too deeply into her life or work, until a exhibit of her photography came to a local museum of mine. As soon as I entered the gift shop, I picked up this book, and started the audiobook as I sat in the cafe where they served versions of Lee’s dishes as a special nod to her culinary career.
What an absolutely fascinating, complex, and extraordinary woman and artist! I also read that Kate Winslet and Jude Law will be making a movie about Lee, expected to drop sometime in 2022 or 2023.
What an absolutely fascinating, complex, and extraordinary woman and artist! I also read that Kate Winslet and Jude Law will be making a movie about Lee, expected to drop sometime in 2022 or 2023.
I got interested in Lee Miller because I heard a little bit about her on a podcast and that Kate Winslet is going to play her in an upcoming biopic. She's a really interesting woman with a really interesting life, but this biography was a little more dry and academic than I was looking for personally. Also it's frustrating when it refers to an image and then the image isn't there! And I know it's expensive to print images, but, like, argh. Anyway, still excited for the movie but wouldn't necessarily recommend this book to the layperson. It was kind of a slog for me to get through.
Biography, Lee Miller
Carolyn Burke knows her topic & brings a broad view of Lee Miller's wonderfully diverse life to any reader like myself who's not familiar w/this remarkable woman. Burke's interpretations of Miller's photographs are both technical & easy to understand as expressions of Miller herself. Many times in reading this bio, I wanted to know more clearly who Lee Miller was, where the motivation & strength came from to be the type of person she was in a time w/such different expectations of who she should be. I wanted to know more the nuances of Millers character, why she could be well loved yet beastly to people most close to her, including her son. Rather than give insight into this contradiction, I felt that sometimes Burke gushed about her subject. However, not an overall disappointment because w/those unanswered questions, Burke has set me on the trail of the amazing yet elusive Lee Miller.
Carolyn Burke knows her topic & brings a broad view of Lee Miller's wonderfully diverse life to any reader like myself who's not familiar w/this remarkable woman. Burke's interpretations of Miller's photographs are both technical & easy to understand as expressions of Miller herself. Many times in reading this bio, I wanted to know more clearly who Lee Miller was, where the motivation & strength came from to be the type of person she was in a time w/such different expectations of who she should be. I wanted to know more the nuances of Millers character, why she could be well loved yet beastly to people most close to her, including her son. Rather than give insight into this contradiction, I felt that sometimes Burke gushed about her subject. However, not an overall disappointment because w/those unanswered questions, Burke has set me on the trail of the amazing yet elusive Lee Miller.
Miller's life story reminded me of the movie, "Plenty." After living through and photographing World War II, life lost its edge.
A very readable, sympathetic, and unflinching account of the life of a remarkable woman. Highly recommended for fans of photography, surrealism, and a good old adventure story.
Although I was keen to read about the enigmatic Lee Miller, whose photographs include images of her coterie of fabulous artist friends and also harrowing images of WWII, I can't say I finished the book knowing much more about her than I had before I started it. I couldn't really make out anything about who Lee really was as a person except that she was a rather talented photographer and muse to Vogue and the Surrealist artists, and she was also a beautiful free spirit, which explains her hold over people like Man Ray and Roland Penrose. Aside from her sexual energy and beauty, what other affect did she have on people? How was she as a friend, a sister, a daughter, or as a fellow artist? Although I admire her talent and her desire to live in a very modern and unabashed way—namely, to go through life living like a man--I found that there wasn't much about Lee I could identify with, which I suppose made it hard for me to like her. Also, I got bored about half way through the book (the fact that this coincided with the end of Lee's professional life as a photographer and the beginning of her quiet decline into crochety old age wasn't lost on me). It was sad to see her not live up to her full potential during the latter stages of her life; it was as though she was waiting for it to end already (the biographer implies that she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and kept her emotions deeply buried after the end of the war). Also, I found it difficult to visualize much of the artwork described in the book and lamented that there weren't more pictures for me to peruse. Often the author would go into great detail about a given photo, and I found it supremely frustrating not to see for myself what she was describing. Overall, a disappointment.