To address the most piffling concern first: the cover. Of course you are far too sophisticated to be put off by the shades of pink and cerise which are deemed the only acceptable ones for books by and about women, but still … the hardback was much better, and a foreign edition had a reproduction of Millais's Ophelia, which is highly appropriate (more about her later). Concentrate, instead, on the most important words here: "Emma Forrest", for she can write.
A less piffling concern is the charge of self-obsession that has been levelled at this book. Even the Guardian's John Crace, who tends to be spot-on about these things, had harsh words to say in his digested read, digested. Maybe it is a matter of one's own tolerance for this kind of thing. It is, one would have thought, in the nature of an autobiography to be self-obsessed. Or, to put it more kindly, seriously involved in the examination of the writer's interior state. (I have a hunch that "to be self-obsessed" is a construction that does not exist in the first-person singular.)
This is a memoir of madness, and sanity. Forrest, maddeningly talented, got sent off to New York by this paper ages ago, when she was about nine, to be a correspondent out there. (I exaggerate, but she really did, and does, have a precocious talent.) However, we then enter a familiar tale of self-harm, bulimia, terrible relationships, suicide attempts. Put down baldly like that, you might think there was little to appeal. But her talent, in the form of a style that is both engaging and almost shockingly precise, announces itself immediately. That, and a couple of very amusing vignettes about her parents, show that, however grim things are going to get, we will have a surprising number of laughs along the way. About her father (who pops up occasionally, and sounds absolutely delightful): "He once got a credit card saying 'Sir Jeffrey Forrest' because American Express was dumb enough to send him an application form with the statement 'Print your name as you would wish it to appear.'"
Actually, first of all, she tells us how she used to go to the Tate as a teenager and clock up a lot of hours looking at Millais's Ophelia. (In one sense this book teaches us what we already know: do not get involved with women who have stared long and hard at Millais's Ophelia.) Ophelia returns from time to time. In the bath, with a bottle of pills which she may use to kill herself, Forrest says: "I lie back in the water, my hair floating wet behind my broken mind", which is not just a fine description by any standards, but shows that what is going on is not only self-obsession, but something like detachment from the self: the damaged mind can still detach from itself and look down, like someone having an out-of-body experience.
She is saved, eventually, by her therapist, a man she will only refer to as Dr R, whose kindness, intelligence and good sense are made plausible and manifest throughout the book. Unfortunately, as we know from early on, he died, and Forrest has to deal with this bereavement, as well as the feeling of shameful bereavement that comes from having been screwed over in love. (She was given the boot in the most breathtakingly callous way by an actor she'd been seeing for a year, whom she only identifies as GH, for Gypsy Husband. But it's Colin Farrell, and I can tell you this because it's all over the internet.)
You may still be wondering: what's in it for me? After all, I imagine that, like most readers of the Guardian book pages, you do not live in America, go out with Hollywood stars and have a promising career writing screenplays. But you may self-harm, or have suicidal impulses, or know someone who does: at which point this book becomes very useful indeed. The healthy have a hard time imagining what goes on in damaged minds: we should be very pleased that someone as articulate as Forrest has described it.
