Smith didn’t set out to produce yet another biography of Diana but rather to chart a kind of voyage to the center of her psyche. After formidable research–she scrutinized just about everything previously written, added fresh reporting and interviewed 148 people–she’s come up with an intelligent, evenhanded analysis of a woman who’s got to be described as a dimwit. A deeply troubled dimwit, a dimwit of tremendous charm and magnetism, a dimwit adored by her children and many friends, but ultimately a lot of white space. That wouldn’t have mattered a bit if she’d been able to trot through her paces like a good royal show horse. But Smith emerged from her research believing that Diana struggled with serious mental illness.
Smith is no shrink, and she met Diana only once, briefly; but her careful assessment of Diana as a “borderline personality” is convincing. This disorder–so named because sufferers are worse off than garden-variety neurotics but less incapacitated than, say, schizophrenics–is associated with symptoms familiar to Diana watchers, including bulimia, self-mutilation and volatile mood swings. While many people, including Prince Charles, were aware of her torment and urged her to get help, Diana resisted traditional psychotherapy. Smith says Diana preferred treatments she could control–a disastrous predilection when combined with her taste for sycophants and her aforementioned low wattage. She spent unconscionable amounts of time with astrologers, colonic irrigators, “energy healers” and similar magicians. By the time of her famous TV interview she had mastered the lingo of recovery, but done none of the long, hard work.
Smith has researched her subject as vigorously as if this were a life of Eleanor Roosevelt or Virginia Woolf. It’s an admirable approach, especially by contrast to the gossip and speculation churned out most often in the press, but the materials she’s working with aren’t always up to the challenge. No first drafts of “To the Lighthouse” here. Scholars of Diana have to settle for close critical readings of the Sunday Mirror. Given these limitations, Smith has done a remarkable job extracting what’s genuinely pertinent and interesting about Diana, without pretending it amounts to tragedy. If you’re going to read one Diana book, this should be it. And if you’re going to write one–please don’t.
