Life of the Party, Signed to Nina Griscom
[Signed Note to Nina Griscom Laid In] Ogden, Christopher. Life of the Party: The Biography of Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman. First Edition. 1994. Book and dust jacket are both in very good condition—there is tape residue on the flyleaf and an unintelligible ownership signature (?) also on that page. Laid in is a cover page from the pre-publication softcover version of the book. On its blank opposite side, Christopher Ogden as written, “Dear Nini, Thanks for your help in setting up my book gigs in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Both went very well. We had fun and moved books—the best possible combination. Thanks too for putting through the SF payment. Grab a [hardcover] book from Jack’s office & I’ll sign it when next I see you—which I hope won’t be long. Bests, Chris Og.”
The problem with attempting to control the narrative is that this act of manipulation can become the narrative. Consider the case of Pamela Harriman and this first biography of her, which she originally authorized before attempting to kill it. A second biography, by Sally Bedell Smith, fared no better. Harriman went so far as to scold her friend Elizabeth Rohatyn, then chairman of the New York Public Library, for allowing Bedell Smith to promote the book at a library event. Did she know that Rohatyn’s daughter, Nina Griscom, helped to promote the much-hated first biography two years earlier? Probably not. The answer may lie in the thank-you note laid into this copy that has only now surfaced, many years after Harriman’s death. A small but delicious irony, and one Pamela would not have appreciated. Those who try hardest to control the narrative seldom do.
“Pamela is not a sulker. She cries when she is hurt or upset, but she does not wallow in self-pity. When she is angry, her mouth stretches taut and flattens across her teeth; her blue eyes turn the color of pond ice, steely opaque. When discouraged, she picks herself up, turns aggressive and seizes the next available opportunity.”
--Christopher Ogden