Palace Aide Attacks Tina's Income From Diana Industry ; Pandora

Jun 20, 01:59 AM

Current Headlines: By OLIVER DUFF

A spiffing turn-out at the Serpentine Gallery on Monday for the launch of Tina Brown's Princess Diana biography: Martin Amis, Jack Straw, Maurice Saatchi, Melvyn Bragg, Kathy Lette, George Osborne, Jonathan Dimbleby and other assorted news anchors and dress designers. The proceedings were rather jolly - until the former Palace spokesman Dickie Arbiter, left, decided to piss in the champagne, accusing Brown, right, of wreath chasing.

Walking a furrow ploughed by Craig Brown's scathing review of the book, Arbiter tells Pandora: "I was called upon [by Tina Brown] to give a number of quotes, but there really is nothing new to write. Much of it is regurgitated and lifted from other books. Tina is talking to the same old suspects, including me: there are some people in the [Royal] household who just won't talk."

He adds: "In my opinion, everyone who writes a book is cashing in, and quite frankly there is nothing more to write on Diana."

Piers Morgan was complimentary about Brown's book but added: "If Diana were the Royal icon, Tina is the media icon - she's the media version of Diana, written and gossiped about. It's all about global brand Tina." The interior designer Nicky Haslam used the occasion to plug his own autobiography, out later this year.

Brown defended her tome, telling me: "There's lots of new stuff. I did 255 interviews, so it offers a lot of fresh insight into Diana. My favourite stuff came from her early life. I see Diana as a fictional heroine and my novel as a psychological thriller." Cheers!

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