The late filmmaker David Lynch’s iconic TV sequence Twin Peaks revolves principally round a easy query: Who killed Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee)? Nevertheless, because the present’s protagonist, FBI agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan), quickly learns, answering this query is not possible with out first answering a far broader query: Who was Laura Palmer? To that finish, Cooper spends the present’s complete first season and a part of its second season steadily turning into acquainted with every of Twin Peaks’ colorfully eccentric residents, studying all the pieces he can about Laura’s life and relationships in hopes of discovering her killer – which he finally (and controversially) does.
But, regardless of the huge quantity of knowledge that the present reveals about Laura, one perspective stays noticeably absent from the present: that of Laura herself. Whereas Lynch would partially rectify this omission in his polarizing prequel movie, Twin Peaks: Fireplace Stroll With Me (1992), which depicts the terrifying remaining week of Laura’s life, Lynch wished to provide Laura the possibility to inform her complete story, not simply her remaining week. So, in 1990, earlier than the present’s second season premiered, Lynch requested his personal 22-year-old daughter, Jennifer, to put in writing The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer, a deeply tragic however empathetic portrait of Laura’s five-year battle with abuse, dependancy, and psychological turmoil earlier than her homicide.
The Trauma of Feminine Adolescence
The primary entry is dated July 22, 1984 – Laura’s twelfth birthday, for which the diary is a gift. She begins the entry by declaring to her diary that “You shall be the one I open up to probably the most. I promise to inform you all the pieces that occurs […] There are some issues I am unable to inform anybody. I promise to inform these items to you.” As the times, weeks, and months cross, she begins experiencing (and chronicling) her preliminary phases of puberty, together with getting her first interval and experiencing burgeoning emotions about boys and intercourse.
Nevertheless, it turns into clear that Laura’s sexual and psychological maturation has been severely stunted, thanks largely to BOB, a mysterious long-haired man who usually seems to Laura at night time and sadistically abuses her emotionally and sexually. BOB’s abuse leaves Laura with immense worry, guilt, and confusion about herself and her sexuality. This spiral of destructive feelings ultimately leads Laura to undertake a self-destructive double lifetime of illicit sexual exercise and, later, substance abuse.
Associated
‘Twin Peaks’ Followers Solved the True Crime That Impressed the Present
David Lynch’s iconic supernatural thriller sequence ‘Twin Peaks’ was primarily based on an actual homicide of a younger girl New York state from 1908.
What distinguishes the e book most from the present is the lurid element with which Laura describes her varied sexual encounters. Freed from the strict censors of cable tv and Hollywood’s score system, Jennifer Lynch contains a number of graphic descriptions of Laura’s personal anatomy and the way it’s affected by each her puberty and her promiscuity.
Certainly, sure sequences — comparable to when a thirteen-year-old Laura and her greatest good friend, Donna, go skinny-dipping with a gaggle of older males (one thing Donna later recounts her personal model of in Season 2) — are so detailed and express that they nearly really feel like erotica (apart from the truth that all of them contain an underage lady). However Laura’s diary has the other impact as most erotic literature, eliciting visceral repulsion at this younger lady’s bodily autonomy being so egregiously violated. This empathetic horror on Laura’s behalf would later type the emotional core of the equally disturbing Fireplace Stroll with Me.
Does Laura Know Who Killed Her?
Provided that Laura’s diary was printed earlier than the premiere of the second season, it is probably that lots of the viewers who bought it have been hoping it might present some clues concerning the killer’s identification, if not reveal them outright. And it does…but additionally does not. Because the diary nears its remaining web page (i.e. proper earlier than Laura’s homicide), it turns into obvious that a number of pages are lacking, pages that the encompassing context signifies would possibly reveal her future killer.
These obtrusive redactions lend this already disturbing e book an much more ominous high quality, creating the impression that there’s a second “creator” of this diary — presumably the killer themselves. Nonetheless, in an interview with the AP’s Deborah Hastings, Jennifer Lynch confidently asserted that “the cautious reader will know the clues and who the killer is.”
Associated
Twin Peaks: The Most Iconic Characters, Ranked
The basic Nineteen Nineties thriller sequence was house to a plethora of iconic characters which might be nonetheless remembered immediately. Listed below are the ten most memorable.
Regardless of its lack of a concrete reply, the e book does strongly indicate that the killer is related with BOB, Laura’s perpetual tormentor, ultimately. However the exact nature of who — or what — BOB is stays ambiguous. He seems to Laura nearly solely at night time whereas she is in mattress, but it surely’s unclear whether or not his “visits” are actual or simply nightmares. Because the diary progresses, BOB himself even begins to manifest within the diary’s very pages, as if possessing Laura as she writes, to demean and threaten her.
Laura herself appears unable to inform whether or not he’s an individual, a supernatural being, or just a dissociative manifestation of her personal broken psyche. For readers who have not seen the present, BOB’s mysterious presence within the diary solely deepens the thriller of Laura’s homicide. However, for individuals who have seen the present and know the reality about Laura’s homicide, he solely makes the reality all of the extra devastating.
Extra Than a Useless Woman
Regardless of Laura’s narrative being largely characterised by unimaginable struggling and lack of company, Jennifer Lynch ceaselessly goes out of her approach to remind us that there’s way more to Laura’s story than simply her abuse and homicide. Fairly than deal with her merely as a thriller to be solved, The Secret Diary gives us with a number of glimpses of who Laura actually was: tutoring the cognitively impaired son of her father’s boss, stitching a Christmas present for Donna, volunteering for Meals on Wheels, or just driving her beloved pony.
Jennifer Lynch advised The Toronto Star that she “knew Laura so properly, it was like computerized writing,” maybe as a result of she herself was barely older than Laura when she wrote the e book. Her capacity to establish with Laura Palmer reveals by way of brilliantly on this e book, which is simply as concurrently lovely and tragic as her father’s legendary TV sequence.
The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer is obtainable for buy on Amazon by way of this hyperlink (the audiobook for which is narrated by Sheryl Lee herself). To search out out the place to look at all three seasons of Twin Peaks and Fireplace Stroll with Me, see this MovieWeb article.