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A review by fields
Changing by Liv Ullmann
3.0
Liv Ullmann is remembered for her performances which were often quiet but intense and evocative. I admire her acting, how she haunts. But her memoir is not haunting in the same sense: it is real; as much as she is real within it. Yet her realness does not simplify her.
This book is for her daughter, Linn. It is, perhaps, for her alone. Her motherhood, which is of both, guilt and love, seems to be written across these pages.
She speaks of her childhood and her first encounter with death (“One day I buried all my dolls at his grave. I didn't want him to lie there alone. I stole flowers from other graves to brighten the place up for Papa and the dolls. All the grownups were angry. And Mamma spoke about death so it became as beautiful for me as love. I hoped I would die soon.”).
Of her marriage. The theater. Hollywood, the discomfort of fame. She matures, she loves. She is longing, helpless, sensitive. She is free. Among fjords, she is free. Unknown in the dark of Oslo, she is free. Among her heather, her trees, in Trondhjem.
As an explorer of poetic cinema, I was very grateful for her insight into Ingmar Bergman the partner, the friend, and the (demanding) director—
“Ingmar writes that perhaps there are no words that reach us, that perhaps there is no reality. That reality exists only as a longing.”
I appreciated her attention to details, e.g. describing sheep giving birth in the frozen March (“the small one remained lying on the ground, while blood and slime turned to ice on its body”).
I enjoy diaries/memoirs for their ability to unravel the famed author/actress/etc. from the inevitable layer of “the mysterious”: the diary shows us the real earth, the real body, behind what has formerly been mythologized. The diarists can be admired for more earthy qualities, which are often as poetic as their literatures and performances. And Liv the diarist is vulnerable, flawed, tender, and poetic.
“We stare out into space, never to exist again.”
This book is for her daughter, Linn. It is, perhaps, for her alone. Her motherhood, which is of both, guilt and love, seems to be written across these pages.
She speaks of her childhood and her first encounter with death (“One day I buried all my dolls at his grave. I didn't want him to lie there alone. I stole flowers from other graves to brighten the place up for Papa and the dolls. All the grownups were angry. And Mamma spoke about death so it became as beautiful for me as love. I hoped I would die soon.”).
Of her marriage. The theater. Hollywood, the discomfort of fame. She matures, she loves. She is longing, helpless, sensitive. She is free. Among fjords, she is free. Unknown in the dark of Oslo, she is free. Among her heather, her trees, in Trondhjem.
As an explorer of poetic cinema, I was very grateful for her insight into Ingmar Bergman the partner, the friend, and the (demanding) director—
“Ingmar writes that perhaps there are no words that reach us, that perhaps there is no reality. That reality exists only as a longing.”
I appreciated her attention to details, e.g. describing sheep giving birth in the frozen March (“the small one remained lying on the ground, while blood and slime turned to ice on its body”).
I enjoy diaries/memoirs for their ability to unravel the famed author/actress/etc. from the inevitable layer of “the mysterious”: the diary shows us the real earth, the real body, behind what has formerly been mythologized. The diarists can be admired for more earthy qualities, which are often as poetic as their literatures and performances. And Liv the diarist is vulnerable, flawed, tender, and poetic.
“We stare out into space, never to exist again.”