For a biography to be beautifully written from beginning to end and possess the sort of narrative momentum usually associated with fiction is rare indeed, and a treat to be savoured. Such a book is Barry Paris's study of the life of Greta Garbo. Never having been a Garbo fan, I opened it dutifully, only to be enslaved from page one. Garbo is more of a challenge than most ("She would make a secret out of whether she had a boiled egg for breakfast," remarked one exasperated ex, Cecil Beaton) and Barry Paris has risen to the challenge in magnificent style. He recreates for us the chubby young Swede with crooked teeth and fuzzy hair, the gauche film star whose beauty was surpassed only by her naivete, the cantankerous old woman who wanted to be left alone, but who couldn't manage on her own. He sets the record straight with regard to certain popular misapprehensions, and he makes mince meat of previous biographers. Along the way there are dozens of intriguing cameos; my favourite is the story of a musical necktie which Garbo presented to the pianist Edward Viertel, who premiered some of Arnold Schoenberg's most successful piano works. Viertel hated the tie, but gave it to Schoenberg, who loved it - an unusual take on the master's somewhat stern, austere image. Garbo's effortless cool, however, dominates the proceedings, and the fact that she was more absent than present from most of her own life touches her life story with the restless, searching quality of a good detective tale. "There was nothing really so mysterious about Garbo, but people wouldn't believe it," says Barry Paris. Six hundred fascinating pages later, it's less believable than ever.
