Marilyn Monroe’s Unpublished Poems: The Complex Private Person Behind the Public Persona

 

"Did you ever begin Ulysses? Did you ever finish it? Marilyn Monroe did both. She took great pains to be photographed reading or holding a book — insistence born not out of vain affectation but of a genuine love of literature. Her personal library contained four hundred books, including classics like Dostoyevsky and Milton, and modern staples like Hemingway and Kerouac. While she wasn’t shooting, she was taking literature and history night classes at UCLA. And yet, the public image of a breezy, bubbly blonde endures as a caricature of Monroe’s character, standing in stark contrast with whatever deep-seated demons led her to take her own life."

read the article by Maria Popova >>

Marilyn Monroe’s Unpublished Poems: The Complex Private Person Behind the Public Persona | Brain Pickings