A N Wilson's acclamation of Tina Brown's The Diana Chronicles as a masterpiece has been vigorously contested. But that label must surely be attached to her epic acknowledgments. Someone has evidently told her that a serious work of cultural history - or, as she terms it, "my maiden foray into long-form non-fiction" - must begin with a monumental list of thank-yous, and she does not disappoint.
But do the thank-yous have to be quite so effusive? Surely, a touch of academic austerity would have served Brown's purpose better. Royal biographers Robert Lacey, Anthony Holden, Kenneth Rose, Hugo Vickers, Jonathan Dimbleby and Ingrid Seward are "titans"; photographer Annie Leibovitz is applauded "for her time and her talent"; Brown's "incomparable claque of supportive girlfriends" are thanked for their pep talks "whenever I was flagging"; her children George and Izzy are humbly saluted for "merry boosterism"; and she calls her husband Harry Evans "Christlike". After five pages of specific acknowledgments comes a magnificently eclectic list of 266 names, arranged alphabetically and accorded "thanks and appreciation": Mikhail Baryshnikov, Tony Benn, Manolo Blahnik, Professor David Cannadine, Jimmy Choo, Max Clifford, Alain de Botton, Michael Eisner, Mohamed Al Fayed, Stephen Fry, the fifth Earl of Lichfield, Eve Pollard, Colin Powell, Lord Rees-Mogg, John Travolta. The great, the good, and Henry Kissinger. But what qualified them for inclusion?
But do the thank-yous have to be quite so effusive? Surely, a touch of academic austerity would have served Brown's purpose better. Royal biographers Robert Lacey, Anthony Holden, Kenneth Rose, Hugo Vickers, Jonathan Dimbleby and Ingrid Seward are "titans"; photographer Annie Leibovitz is applauded "for her time and her talent"; Brown's "incomparable claque of supportive girlfriends" are thanked for their pep talks "whenever I was flagging"; her children George and Izzy are humbly saluted for "merry boosterism"; and she calls her husband Harry Evans "Christlike". After five pages of specific acknowledgments comes a magnificently eclectic list of 266 names, arranged alphabetically and accorded "thanks and appreciation": Mikhail Baryshnikov, Tony Benn, Manolo Blahnik, Professor David Cannadine, Jimmy Choo, Max Clifford, Alain de Botton, Michael Eisner, Mohamed Al Fayed, Stephen Fry, the fifth Earl of Lichfield, Eve Pollard, Colin Powell, Lord Rees-Mogg, John Travolta. The great, the good, and Henry Kissinger. But what qualified them for inclusion?
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