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o l d-----n e w-----l a s t-----n e x t-----m e-----y o u-----m a i l-----n o t e s-----r i n g s-----

fuck flying - teach her to write!

05/08/02 @ 8:40 p.m.

I’ve been reading bits of Victoria Beckham’s autobiography. Not so much that I know what I’m talking about, but just enough to take the piss. It’s just hypnotically bad.
Autobiographies are notorious for their writers putting themselves in the best possible light and for being full of half-truths, and "Learning to Fly" is a great example. It’s as shallow as you’d expect from someone who’s pursued fame for its own sake, and it’s so full of contradictions it’ll make you wonder if her ghostwriters went by the names of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. While she was writing it, she seems to have had no memory of what she’d written three pages earlier.
Explaining that she’s the most successful of the students from her factory - I mean, from her stage school – she recalls a time when her teachers belittled her for her weight and appearance. She tells us "it doesn’t matter what you look like" and all that matters is "hard work, determination and self-belief." It’s a beautiful message, but unfortunately one she’d forgotten by the time she criticised a former boyfriend for being "skinny and gangly", for having no coordination, and for dancing like "Herman Munster". As a further example of how unimportant appearance is to her, she reminds us that she was named Fashion Icon of the Year by Elle magazine in November 2000.
Talking about her debut solo single reaching number two in the charts, she insists she wasn’t disappointed to not make number one. Sales and chart positions aren’t important to an artist like her, and besides, "don’t let’s forget that we were one of the top-selling records of the year." Um...
It’s actually quite endearing that she loses track of herself so easily and so often. At the top of page 61 she describes an ill-fated date with a guy from school, Franco, and says, "that was my one and only school romance." Then towards the bottom of page 61 she says, "since Franco I had been out with a couple of other boys, but just boys from school." She can’t even keep track of what she’s saying for one whole page! Just how short is her attention span?
Contradictions aside, with all her banalities and her vacuous non-insights, she says so much about the nature of celebrity without realising it. The idea that if someone is famous they must have something to say is completely destroyed when she comes out with things like "laughter is the best way of getting out of a depression." A few more examples like that and she might kick off the much-anticipated fame-revolution, where only people with talent and some kind of wisdom will get famous, and people like her and Liz Hurley will be booted back to the supermarkets of the world and made to stack cans of beans for the rest of their lives!
But until that happens, go read her book and take the piss yourself. Incidentally, my absolute favourite bit came when she was describing the moment she found out Geri Halliwell was leaving The Spice Girls: "The words just sat somewhere in my head, like something you wish you hadn’t eaten." Bless her!

b o o k m a r k s-----r u d i e s-----u p d a t e s-----m y--i l l n e s s -----m o v i e--r e v i e w s

Content and layout © Yawner, 2001. Hosted by Diaryland. Best viewed with IE5, probably pants with Netscape.


o l d-----n e w-----l a s t-----n e x t-----m e-----y o u-----m a i l-----n o t e s-----r i n g s-----







fuck flying - teach her to write!
05/08/02 @ 8:40 p.m.
I’ve been reading bits of Victoria Beckham’s autobiography. Not so much that I know what I’m talking about, but just enough to take the piss. It’s just hypnotically bad. Autobiographies are notorious for their writers putting themselves in the best possible light and for being full of half-truths, and "Learning to Fly" is a great example. It’s as shallow as you’d expect from someone who’s pursued fame for its own sake, and it’s so full of contradictions it’ll make you wonder if her ghostwriters went by the names of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. While she was writing it, she seems to have had no memory of what she’d written three pages earlier. Explaining that she’s the most successful of the students from her factory - I mean, from her stage school – she recalls a time when her teachers belittled her for her weight and appearance. She tells us "it doesn’t matter what you look like" and all that matters is "hard work, determination and self-belief." It’s a beautiful message, but unfortunately one she’d forgotten by the time she criticised a former boyfriend for being "skinny and gangly", for having no coordination, and for dancing like "Herman Munster". As a further example of how unimportant appearance is to her, she reminds us that she was named Fashion Icon of the Year by Elle magazine in November 2000. Talking about her debut solo single reaching number two in the charts, she insists she wasn’t disappointed to not make number one. Sales and chart positions aren’t important to an artist like her, and besides, "don’t let’s forget that we were one of the top-selling records of the year." Um... It’s actually quite endearing that she loses track of herself so easily and so often. At the top of page 61 she describes an ill-fated date with a guy from school, Franco, and says, "that was my one and only school romance." Then towards the bottom of page 61 she says, "since Franco I had been out with a couple of other boys, but just boys from school." She can’t even keep track of what she’s saying for one whole page! Just how short is her attention span? Contradictions aside, with all her banalities and her vacuous non-insights, she says so much about the nature of celebrity without realising it. The idea that if someone is famous they must have something to say is completely destroyed when she comes out with things like "laughter is the best way of getting out of a depression." A few more examples like that and she might kick off the much-anticipated fame-revolution, where only people with talent and some kind of wisdom will get famous, and people like her and Liz Hurley will be booted back to the supermarkets of the world and made to stack cans of beans for the rest of their lives! But until that happens, go read her book and take the piss yourself. Incidentally, my absolute favourite bit came when she was describing the moment she found out Geri Halliwell was leaving The Spice Girls: "The words just sat somewhere in my head, like something you wish you hadn’t eaten." Bless her!
	b o o k m a r k s-----r u d i e s-----u p d a t e s-----m y--i l l n e s s -----m o v i e--r e v i e w s







	Content and layout © Yawner, 2001. Hosted by Diaryland. Best viewed with IE5, probably pants with Netscape.