It was a love affair that burned intensely. In this extract from the new book Furious Love, we reveal the undying passion between Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton through his intimate letters to her.
When asked by Time magazine, a few years ago, to name the five great love affairs of all time, the Texas-born gossip columnist Liz Smith didn’t even have to think about who would occupy first place. The Burtons, of course. Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor “were the most vivid example of a public love affair that I can think of”. Their 13-year saga was the most notorious, publicised, celebrated and vilified love affair of its day.
Indeed, their 10-year marriage, followed by a divorce, remarriage and a final divorce, was often called “the marriage of the century” in the press. “On the face of it,” said Liz Smith, “Elizabeth Taylor was just totally arrogant. She’d walk out in capri pants and her Cleopatra make-up and her kerchief, and go off to a local restaurant and drink up a storm with Burton. That’s part of what excited the public: her vulgarity and her arrogance and the money. Oh God, their love story had everything.”
It also brought us the modern brand of celebrity: the relentless paparazzi, the continuous press exposure, the public airing of private grief. In short, it brought us “Liz and Dick”, a tabloid shorthand that they hated, but that stood for their extravagance and all-too-public lives.
They were Hollywood royalty. But like any other married couple, they had to deal with family squabbles, balancing two careers – in short, the real marriage of two people trying to live their lives together.
Your say: What do you think of Elizabeth Taylor?
Extracted from Furious Love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton and the Marriage of the Century by Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger. Published by JR Books in hardback, $49.99, on July 15, and distributed by Scribo (in Australia) and Hachette (in NZ). Read more of this exclusive extract in the July issue of The Australian Women’s Weekly. Out now with our Silvers Sirens on the cover.
Subscribe to The Weekly and receive a BONUS Yes to Carrots Skincare pack, valued at $43.90!
Related stories
Native ad body.
Native ad body.
.png?resize=380%2C285)
Native ad body.
