Rating: 
Summary: A worthwhile read by a stunning woman
Review: Maureen O'Hara's biography is worthwhile reading. She was one of the most extraordinarily beautiful screen stars of all time and she knew and worked with many of the great names of her day. Her personal life is as fascinating as some of her films and full of surprises from this spunky Irish Catholic. There is some dirt about some of the people she knew and did not like, but she left this to a minimum and frankly some of it is juicy and worthwhile knowing. She is frank about her failures in her marriages and some of her film choices and equally proud of her successes, mostly in her professional life (films like Hunchback of Notre Dame, How Green Was My Valley, Miracle on 34th Street and Parent Trap) and with a sadly abbreviated marriage with a famous pilot. There are few of her movie contemporaries left and most of her friends and coworkers are gone now so this is a bit of history, film history about an era that has come and gone and will never be the same. If you are interested in people like John Wayne, John Ford, Henry Fonda, Tyrone Power, Lucille Ball, James Stewart and many of the other legends of Hollywood's Golden Era, this book is full of them and is a fine example of this marvelous woman's life during that era and beyond.
Rating: 
Summary: A Treat for Fans of the Cinema That Was...
Review: Ms. O'Hara's 'TIS HERSELF provides an intimate 'look behind the scenes' of motion pictures--and the people who made them--from Hollywood's Golden Era. Frank, funny, sad... and so much more, this memoir is a treat for fans of cinema, as it once was.
Rating: 
Summary: ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE !!!!
Review: Not since Lena Desmond opened her mouth at the end of MGM's "Singing in the Rain" has a star totally self-debunked their carefully crafted fake and phony public personna as Maureen O'Hara has here in her pathetic memoirs. As a long-time fan of her glowing performances, I wantto scream the question at her "WHY??!!" But having a realistic view of the nature and pathology of actors and the acting profession, I am firmly in touch with the truth behind the pleasingly artificial facades. Along with the extreme narcisism and exhibitionism goes a very sad masochism and strong urge for the self-destruction of the rather hollow human shell that has supported and enabled all this make-believe. O'Hara's book very sadly details what a pathetic human being she truly was. A classic VICTIM personna and a paranoid personality worthy of academic textbook study. On the very first page, the very first sentence, she begins venting and raging her paranoia by venomously attacking her two grade school teachers. They are the "two-headed beast", the evil women who after almost 80 years O'Hara must attack and destroy. The rage the actress still feels towards these harmless women is due to the fact that they treated her bossy, arrogant and insufferably bratty childhood presence with a long-suffering tongue-in-check attitude. That's it. What a little monster Maureen must have been - a child prodigy actress so full ofherself that she could only exist as the center of the universe. This she obliquely and playfully establishes as fact throughout her entire life and throughout the entire book. Her extreme mean-spiritedness, vanity, egoism, and contempt for anyone who doesn't worship her instantly is fully illustrated on almost every page of this incredible book. In her opinion (and she'll quote John Ford on this fact, that is when she isn't demonizing him every other sentence) she is the world's greatest actress. Of course, her career and life have been completely and savagely sabotaged by the evil people around her. Did you know that's why she never was Oscar nominated? Not because she was simply a pleasant, beautifully decorative but mediocre actress, no (remember - she's the world's GREATEST ACTRESS!) - it was because, as Roddy McDougall supposedly explained to her "there were dark forces at work against her in Hollywood and they would never allow her to be recognized or rewarded for her work! O"Hara is everybody's victim here. Her first marriage to a man she only casually dated twice and didn't like was forced upon her. She was packing to go to the US and only an hour before the boat left, little Maureen was talked into coming to his house to say goodbye. According to her, when she arrives a minister and witnesses are there and she submits to a wedding ceremony, frozen in an out-of-body experience and totally helpless to do nothing other than what they instructed her to do. Hmm - if you believe that, you'll happily swallow the rest of her book - the dark conspiracies against her at every turn, the poisoning plots, the lost plum roles - not because her modest talents wouldn't qualify her, no - it was the hateful plots of jealous conspirators. Usually John Ford is the dastardly culprit. If Ford really did do just one of the destructive things O'Hara credits him with, no sane person would have hung around for any more - yet Maureen continually embraces Ford and sticks to him like glue like a second father. Yet for decades she depcts him as the evil force who utterly destroys every aspect of her life time and time again. As if she needed help! Her second husband is an abusive, perpetually drunk lofer, unemployed, short, not goodlooking, and surprise! - a closet homosexual! Of all the men the gorgeous actress could have chosen from, she choses this one - the guarantee of a failed relationship and severe victimhood for her. And she stays with him a dozen years until he totally bankrupts her! Of course, again, this is all due to the work of the evil John Ford. Everybody O'Hara dislikes in this book (and they list the length of the Manhattan telephone book!) is out to get her. And if they're men, they're gay, and disgusting so (including John Ford!). Constantly retreating from the paranoid mess of her life into the warm arms of her fantasy shamrock clovered Irishness and the comfort of her mindless stone-age religion, O'Hara experiences zero human, emotional, or intellectual growth throughout her entire life. Her rampant paranoia triumphs at every turn. She's the greatest blesssing to earth since the invention of fire and everyone is out to get her. I feel that given everything she tells us about herself, this hyper-masculine woman can find the mystery to the pathetic course of her life in the probable fact that had she been born much later in a far less repressed culture, it's obvious she would have been a lesbian. She takes great pains to tell us she isn't a lesbian quite often in her book (she was no where near that elevator when the starlet was molested!) - but this is the only possible conclusion for the facts and attitudes she presents in her book. The constant inferences that she's just one of the guys, and even that John Wayne considers her a man, not a woman, and the fact of her stupid and disastrous attraction to the men who will make her the most miserable and intimacy impossible. She's really a pathetic woman, lost, confused, not at all wise or intelligent. In fact, as she presents herself here, she is one of the dumbest and stupidest woman to have ever crossed the planet. The very epitome of the movie star actress - all fake gloss and no substance. The fact that her simple-minded "fans" are writing rave and flattering reviews of this depressingly revealing book only emphasizes how thoroughly pervasive the shallowness of our culture has become, how empty the minds of media vultures truly are. I guess it's true - birds of a feather flock together.
Rating:
Summary: A clan of longtime fans.
Review: Our family was so looking forward to this book - it was very informative and written with style. While the book was enjoyable and true heart was definitely in it - I was disappointed that yet another well known Irish female was able to accomplish so much professionally yet still so completely unable to make good choices or handle the circumstances they find themselves in regarding men and money. Time and again even after problems were recognized - nothing was done - just ignored - let go etc. Tis not our faith or our fate to do so. We were expecting more " I can, I will and I do"We thank you for writing your own book and sharing your story with us. Your films continue to give our family members of all ages untold joy and entertainment.
Rating: 
Summary: Save Your Money
Review: Reserve from the library instead of buying for your personal collection. Sadly disappointed in her memoir, and it would have been better for Ms. O'Hara to keep her Hollywood secrets to herself. I find it difficult to believe a woman of her intelligence surrendered to the various aspects of her life that were oppressive ie husbands and lack of control involving her finances. Irish Blarney is utmost throughout the pages of this book.
Rating: 
Summary: who knew?
Review: The Queen of Technicolor doesn't come off nearly as pretty in black & white print--and in her own words, no less. Fiery, fiesty and strong-willed? Definitely? Difficult, self-sabotaging and possibly paranoid? Well, judge for yourself. According to O'Hara, Walt Disney cursed her on his deathbed, John Ford somehow squelched her Oscar nomination (even though the votes were already in--and she was to be nominated for a Ford picture!), a cinematographer deliberately photographed her badly because he didn't like the sports team she was rooting for(!!)--and on and on. A bad marriage, a Broadway flop, a failed movie comeback--everything's always someone else's fault. Such a delightful presence onscreen, it's too bad her messy personal life was mostly one battle after another.
Rating:
Summary: THAT RED HEAD OF HERS IS NO LIE!
Review: Those are more than just lines from Barry Fitzgerald in "The Quiet Man" film of 1952. Whether she is Mary Kate Danaher or Katie McLintock on that silver screen, she personified the image of a "real" woman. In her memoir "Tis Herself" she opens her heart to share the happy and sad times in her life, from her beginning in pictuesque Ireland, her career in Hollywood, to the many other experiences along the way. As her beloved friend, Duke Wayne, might say, she "shoots from the hip," re-visiting the tough times as well as the good ones. As designer/editor of her website at since 1996, I have awaited the writing and publication of this book as eagerly as any of her thousands of fans. Being a part of the team that pays tribute to this extraordinary lady has been an adventure in itself. John Nicoletti, a gifted writer, who worked with Maureen O'Hara for over 6 years, takes her words and transfers them to paper via computer with great sensitivity. It is as if she is in the room with you, candidly speaking her mind. Thanks Maureen, John, and Simon and Schuster for packaging this wonderful story. "Time and Tide"..may wait for no man...but thank God..it waited for this woman. Readers are going to LOVE this book!
Rating:
Summary: Very Straightforward
Review: Tis Herself is a very blunt and straightforward story of not only the her life and work but of the studio system and how a strong woman can still make foolish mistakes in terms of love and relationships.
For myself the most interesting bits concerned the fact that she was basically a worker, trying to live modestly. It is very interesting to see her trying to make ends particularly with a drinking husband blowing her dough.
Once of her strengths was the fact that she saw herself as a worker and not in the way that celebs today see themself. Looking at things in that light a lot of the book makes plenty of sense.
I was bothered by her words about Che who frankly was a murderous bastard. I suspect his Irish grandmother and the fact that being Irish she knew of the violence of revolution and either was unaware of this history or excused it at the time because of the Irish violence that was glorified to some degree in her youth. Of course one tends to give people they know a pass and I think that is what she did here.
A very worthwhile book, an easy read.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing, but...
Review: To be honest, I was unhappy with this book, which I had awaited for years. Most of it is your typical Hollywood star whose personal life is a mess. Her description of John Ford is particularly creepy, but her personal choices in men weren't much better. However, her chapter on her last experiences with John Wayne was sweet and poignant and made the book worth the read.
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