Why did The Princess Bride captivate America into the 12 months of Watergate? Nathaniel Rich revisits William Goldman’s classic and finds it grippingly readable—and bluntly truthful.
In 1973—“the 12 months of infamy”—the last American bombs were fallen on Cambodia, OPEC issued an oil embargo, the stock exchange crashed, and Woodward and Bernstein revealed that there was clearly more towards the Watergate break-in than had first showed up. Also by US criteria, it had been minute of extravagant uneasiness, disillusionment, and mania. In the middle of this maelstrom arrived a strange and determinedly anachronistic brand new novel by William Goldman. It told the fairy-tale tale of a Princess known as Buttercup, her abduction by the wicked prince and a six-fingered count, and her rescue with a soft-hearted giant, a vengeance-mad swordsman, and a debonair masked hero known as Westley. It is hard to consider a novel that bears less connection to its time compared to the Princess Bride. Continue reading “United States Bride”