An American actress based in a European city. A very young actress with an opening film featuring sexual scenes that her mother forces to censor. A woman who reaches her peak in cinema as a tormented dancer and becomes the face of a major luxury brand. These are some of the passages that Rachel Cusk includes in Life of M (Faber & Faber), her latest novel, according to reviews in the Anglo-Saxon press. By connecting the lines left by the Canadian author, it is easy to reach Natalie Portman.
This is where the new literary soap opera that has erupted in the United Kingdom and has spread worldwide begins.
"Gossip in the old-fashioned way," "literary assassination," "a book worthy of admiration, but not of love," or "a calculated form of humiliation" are some of the terms that the American and English press are dedicating to Life of M, which has already become popularly known as the unauthorized biography of Natalie Portman, a great admirer of Rachel Cusk with whom she seemed to have a kind of friendship that now seems definitively broken. Because all the threads left by this novel - straddling reality and fiction like much of the Canadian author's work - depict the career of the actress, an Oscar winner for Black Swan, precisely the film in which she portrayed a tormented dancer.
That is one of the clearest points that point to Portman as the protagonist of the work, but there are many more. The sexual scenes that her mother requested to censor? That happened in the first film experience of the actress, Léon, where she played a 12-year-old girl obsessed over by her much older hitman neighbor. Based in a European city? For years, the actress has had Paris as her main residence, alternating with Los Angeles. Face of a luxury brand? Portman is one of the visible faces in Dior advertisements and an ambassador for Miss Dior.
Furthermore, according to reviews in the Anglo-Saxon press, there is something else that suggests that Life of M. is an unauthorized biography of the actress. In its final scene, a conversation unfolds between M., the protagonist, and the narrator. The main character says: "I don't like how you portray me." And the interlocutor defends herself by stating the following: "It's not you... It's no one". In fact, there are media outlets already suggesting that this conversation could have actually taken place, that Portman may have commissioned a biography from Cusk and upon seeing that she portrayed her as a cold and calculating person, may not have agreed to authorize it.
The actress had also used several works by Rachel Cusk in her book club and had interviewed her on her Instagram channel. Portman even dedicated a post on her Instagram account to her book Parade. "We will always admire Rachel Cusk and her way of breaking with form and narrative conventions.Parade is a reflection on art, love, and femininity, where we follow G, an artist who starts painting in reverse," reads the post just before the book was released.
The career of the Canadian author has been marked by controversy almost from the beginning for portraying her experience as a mother with excessive harshness, for revealing the end of one of her marriages, and for the threat of a lawsuit from a group of people who recognized themselves in one of her books. Cusk has addressed the controversy surrounding this latest novel in an interview with The New York Times, stating that efforts are being made to turn her work "into some kind of trial or legal battle".
"What I have done belongs much more to a world in which fame, and these people who are so well-known yet so unknown, are part of contemporary consciousness," the Canadian author points out. And she concludes: "If my work does not involve delving into unexplored areas of contemporary consciousness, then I don't know what it is". However, from Natalie Portman's circle, they convey to The Telegraph that Rachel Cusk's team is "definitely fueling" the rumors because they believe it will lead to higher sales of Life of M.
The press has also passed judgment with mostly negative reviews of the work and, in some cases, with harsh adjectives towards the author's work. The Sunday Times labeled it as "a calculated form of humiliation" towards the actress. The New York Times used the term "gossip in the old-fashioned way" to refer to it. And, going a step further, The Telegraph pointed to it as a "literary assassination." "When it comes to literary assassinations, Cusk's on M is cunning and subtle, but no less lethal. It gives the impression of an author tearing off the limbs of a person one by one, like a child would with an insect, without the slightest consideration for the suffering or dignity of the creature," reads their review.