"An irresistible biography of the accomplished, controversial actress whose roles on screen and off helped define a generation. Whether you love Jane Fonda or abhor her, Jane Fonda is a detailed and generous exploration not only of the contradictory world Fonda grew up in but of the many people who shaped her." -Jeannette Walls, author of The Glass Castle
Patricia Bosworth has gone beyond the image of an American superwoman to reveal a Jane Fonda more powerful and vulnerable than ever expected. Fonda emerged from a heartbreaking Hollywood family drama to become a '60s onscreen ingénue and then an Oscar-winning actress. At the top of her game she risked all, rising up against the Vietnam War and shocking the world with a trip to Hanoi. While becoming one of Hollywood's most committed feminists, she financed her husband Tom Hayden's political career in the '80s with exercise videos that began a fitness craze and brought in millions of dollars. Just as interesting is Fonda's next turn, as a Stepford Wife of the Gulfstream set, marrying Ted Turner and seemingly walking away from her ideals and her career. Fonda's multilevel story is a blend of the deep insecurity, magnetism, bravery, and determination that has fueled her inspiring and occasionally infuriating public life.
"The definitive portrait of a woman conflicted, torn between ferocious ambition, family, and feminist causes." -Gail Sheehy, author of Passages
"The Private Life does Jane Fonda the service of making us remember why she was relevant in the first place: the movies. Bosworth's thorough account of this wild, uniquely twentieth-century Hollywood life makes Jane Fonda the actress even more intriguing." -San Francisco Chronicle "Distinguished celebrity biographer and Vanity Fair contributing editor Bosworth recounds the life story of an American icon in all its heady--and at times, unabashedly scandalous--glory. With consummate skill and insight, the author follows Fonda... Bosworth's coverage of Fonda...is as epic as the life that she chronicles. Reading to savor."
-Kirkus, starred "[Bosworth's] remarkable reconstruction of long-ago events has a fly-on-the-wall viewpoint, written with such intimacy that it sometimes generates the strange sensation of being present with Fonda and her friends... Bosworth has succeeded in capturing Fonda's step-by-step transformation from wide-eyed, apolitical ingenue to the poised personality of recent decades."
-Publishers Weekly, starred "Watching Jane Fonda wrestle with her many passions has been one of the most fascinating stories of the past fifty years. Brilliant, beautiful, achingly vulnerable, self-wounding and yet with a Joan of Arc sense of self-determination whenever she steps into the spotlight. Fonda is one of the greatest film stars to ever appear on the screen. Her life deserves to be re-evaluated as it is in Patricia Bosworth's Jane Fonda: The Private Life of a Public Woman."
-Alec Baldwin "Patricia Bosworth has written an irresistible biography of the accomplished controversial actress whose roles on screen and off helped define a generation. Whether you love Jane Fonda or abhor her, the Private Life of a Public Woman is a detailed and generous exploration not only of the contradictory world Fonda grew up in but of the many people who shaped her."
-Jeannette Walls "Bosworth's expedition into every corner of Fonda's life makes for far more than a spellbinding biography. It sweeps the reader into a cultural history of the '60s, '70s, and '80s, when this female icon helped define the causes of the era. The access gained by Bosworth is impressive-lovers, stepmothers, and ex-husbands share their secrets, adding to what will certainly become the definitive portrait of a woman conflicted, torn between ferocious ambition, family, and feminist causes. Bosworth's rendering of Fonda's interior chaos becomes a revealing pr
