The Diary of Frida Kahlo

Finally, I was able to get hold of it, having waited for it for almost three months - as there is just one copy in my local library.  The book feels heavy, I mean literally heavy, the paper is thick and the hard cover is really hard. It feels valuable. On opening it, I see a photo of Frida lying on her bed, wearing her famous Mexican clothes, a lot of jewellery on her ears, neck and fingers, and flowers in her carefully pinned hear.
 

The introduction to the diary is written by none other than the most famous Mexican writer - Carlos Fuentes. On the first page of the introduction he writes:

"I only saw Frida Kahlo once. But first, I heard her. I was at a concert in the Palacio de Bellas Artes...(...)..as Kahlo entered her box in the second tier of the theater, all of these splendors and distractions came to naught. The jangling of sumptuous jewelry drowned out the sounds of the orchestra, but something beyond mere noise forced us all to look upwards and discover the apparition that announced herself with an incredible throb of metallic rhythms and then exhibited the self that both the noise of the jewelry and the silent magnetism displayed. It was the entrance of an Aztec goddess....."

In the part titled 'Suffering: Murdered by Life', Carlos Fuentes writes:

"...is pain something that can be said at all? It is undescribable, writes Virginia Woolf. You can know the thoughts of Hamlet, but you cannot truly describe a headache. For pain destroys language. (...)  Frida Kahlo had a Dog called Pain, more than a Pain called Dog. I mean, she directly describes her own pain, it does not render her mute, her scream is articulate because it achieves a visible and emotional form. Frida Kahlo is one of the greatest speakers for pain in a century ....."

"Frida Kahlo, as no other artist of our tortured century, translated pain into art. She suffered thirty-two operations from the day of her accident to the day of her death. Her biography consists of twenty-nice years of pain. From 1944 on, she is forced to wear eight corsets. In 1953, her leg is amputated as gengrene sets in. She secretes through her wounded back, "smelling like a dead dog". She is hung naked, head down, from her feet, to strengthen her spinal column. She loses her fetuses in pools of blood. She is forever surrounded by clots, chloroform, bandages, needles, scalpels..."

Her complicated relationship with Diego Riviera described in section "Politics: A Bomb Wrapped in Ribbons":

"Frida and Diego: She admitted that she had suffered two accidents in her life, the streetcar accident and Diego Riviera. Of her love for the man there can be no doubt. He was unfaithful. She reproached him: How could he consort with women unworthy of him or inferior to her? He admitted it: "The more I loved her, the more I wanted to hurt her." She riposted with many lovers, both men and women. He tolerated the women who loved Frida, but not the men."

In section "Dressed for Paradise" I find:

"Necklaces, rings, white organdy headgear, flowery peasant blouses, garnet-colored shawls, long skirts, all of it covering the broken body. Yet dress was a form of humor, too, a great disguise, a theatrical, self-fascinated form of autoeroticism, but also a call to imagine the sufferering, naked body underneath and discover its secrets."

At the end of the introduction, I see this little sentence:

"She will never close her eyes. For as she says here, to each and every one of us, "I am writing to you with my eyes"."

 

And then, there follows a short essay by Sarah M.Lowe about Frida's diary. It is about how the diary is unique, how it was never meant for public, that it is full of sketches/pictures but yet it is not a real typical artist's sketchbook as she did not really transform the drawings from the diary into  paintings (with one exception), and about Frida's style and some interesting background information.
Here is an interesting extract from the essay:
"Her thousand-year Mexican heritage offered solace. By combining Communism with this conviction, Kahlo fashioned an ideal that was uncomplicated by the realities of the two regimes, for neither the bloodthirsty, class-divided aspects of the Aztecs, nor the authoritative, regimented practices of Stalin are considered. Kahlo distills and purifies her vision of her two faiths, honoring them as idealized powers that gave her strength, especially as she saw her life drawing to an end.
Kahlo kept this diary for the last ten years of her life, and it documents her physical decline. Dated pages are sporadic, and thus it is difficult to discern the chronology. But an awful progression - regression - is unmistakable, as Kahlo faces the loneliness and terror of her illness."

And then, there is another photo of Frida. This time she is standing. Earrings, neclaces, rings, and Frida lost in thought. Her face always so serious.

 

Now, I move onto the actual diary which is the real photocopied thing. I mean, it is so colourful! Her handwriting. Her drawings. Personal diary, so artistic.

So beautiful.

The diary is very personal, only Frida could know what she meant. There are pages full of words and expressions only - somehow connected. Even though there is a translation into English and explanation at the back of the book - it is impossible to know their full meaning. There are letters intended for her friends and her beloved Diego. The Diary is written in Spanish of course but I have seen one page in german (since Frida's father was a german-hungarian, she could speak and write german).
It feels strange to be reading someone's personal diary that was never meant for anyone else but the person who was writing it.
I see a lot of sadness and pain, and a bit of humor and playfullness ... 
I have not finished it yet. I will keep on reading...

Couple of days later.
Just finished reading it. Some pages are really difficult to read as Frida's handwriting gets barely legible sometimes - she must have been in pain- so it is good to have a translation at the back of the book. I really enjoyed reading it.
Good bye Diary.