The other man behind Prince Harry's memoir
CHOICE OF TOP GHOSTWRITER SHOULD EXCITE READERS AND HORRIFY THE ROYAL FAMILY
He has bared his soul to Oprah, bantered with James Corden and launched a celebrity-packed podcast. Now, Prince Harry is set to reveal all in print, announcing the publication of his “intimate and heartfelt memoir” in 2022 with Random House, which he is writing “not as the prince I was born, but as the man I have become.”
The Duke has reportedly been given a US$20 million advance — a figure some publishing sources suggest is excessive, but is dwarfed by the reputed US$65 million the same publisher paid the Obamas for their joint memoirs — and said he would give “proceeds” to charity.
If we're being literal, he isn't solely writing the book, which has apparently been in development for the past year. Prince Harry has employed the award-winning journalist and author JR Moehringer, who has an impressive track record with ghostwriting candid yet canny autobiographies.
There were certainly softer options available, if the Prince just wanted to put out a toothless tome with some hazy empowerment messages (more in line with his wife's children's book, The Bench). But working with Moehringer is a statement of intent: that this book may actually have something to say. Readers should be salivating. The palace should be very afraid.
Indeed, the Royal Family is unlikely to be given advance sight of the memoir, although the publisher will be required to show them any extracts that could be considered defamatory. Buckingham Palace aides have so far refused to comment. Although clearly shocked — staff were blindsided by the announcement and family members are only thought to have been told hours earlier — they insist they do not want to “fan the flames.”
Can the same be said for the Duke? Moehringer has spoken of the importance of candour when writing a memoir: “Of (those) I've read that have failed for me, often the reason they fail is that the writer has decided not to bare his or her soul,” he said in 2005. “You feel the writer is holding back. Part of the pleasure of reading a memoir is feeling that someone is confiding in you, that they are being honest.”
Born John Joseph Moehringer in New York City in 1964, as he recounts in his own memoir The Tender Bar, he was always known as JR, short for junior — an awkward moniker since his DJ father abandoned him as a child. To fill that void, Moehringer devoted much of his early life to seeking replacement father figures, which led to him spending long hours in a local bar called Publicans with his Uncle Charlie and his drinking buddies.
That might sound morose, but Moehringer — a natural raconteur — spins those experiences into entertaining anecdotes, soon to become a Hollywood movie, produced and directed by George Clooney for Amazon.
The tale has an uplifting ending, too. Moehringer, who was raised by his single mother in Long Island, won a place at Yale University, although he had to take in laundry to earn money to support his studies. He then pursued a career in journalism, beginning as a news assistant for The New York Times, and received a Pulitzer for feature writing in 2000.
But the story that brought him popular attention was the one he wrote for the Los Angeles Times Magazine in 1997 about a homeless man claiming to be boxing legend Bob “Bombardier” Satterfield. In 2007, the article was turned into a film, Resurrecting the Champ, starring Samuel L Jackson and with Josh Hartnett playing Moehringer.
Like The Tender Bar, it's another tale exploring complex father-son relationships — a prevailing theme for the writer, and a likely point of connection with Prince Harry. The latter has already spoken about his difficult relationship with the Prince of Wales, and we can surely expect more of that in this tell-all memoir. It's clearly still important to Moehringer, who last month retweeted a message on Father's Day about how we should be grateful to “the non-fathers who take up the role from time to time.”
In 2009, he brought his eye for vivid detail and strong sense of story to another format: ghostwriting celebrity autobiographies. Tennis great Andre Agassi had read The Tender Bar and asked Moehringer to collaborate on his memoir, Open. Rather than the usual inspirational tale of overcoming adversity and acquiring wisdom on the way to the top, the resulting book was a bracingly honest confession from a talented athlete who grew to hate his sport.
Moehringer also had success ghostwriting Shoe Dog in 2016, a memoir by Nike co-founder Phil Knight.
Under normal circumstances, authors, including Moehringer, consult a raft of family and friends when penning their autobiographies. But these are hardly normal circumstances, and with relations between the British and Californian branches of the Royal Family at an alltime low, the prospect of Prince Harry doing the same seems unlikely.
Were the book to be published solely in the U.S., the royals would have little chance of legal retaliation as their freedom of speech laws are so strong. Experts said that as it was also being published in the U.K., the Duke's team would be foolish not to run anything of legal concern past Buckingham Palace, but it is unlikely they will be inclined to edit the tome to suit them. Similarly, the palace might feel that a complaint about any one observation might suggest it was giving tacit approval to everything else.
PART OF THE
PLEASURE OF READING A MEMOIR IS FEELING THAT
SOMEONE IS CONFIDING
IN YOU.