EXCLUSIVE: Teenage Amy Winehouse lamented ‘temper’ that made her ‘physically violent’ in unseen diary entries published in new book
- Amy Winehouse: In Her Words features her teenage diaries, scrapbook entries, scribblings and photos of her growing up
- Scraps of paper featured show early versions of some of her most famous hits
- The book offers a startling description of the troubles that would lead to her death aged just 27 in 2011
Amy Winehouse once admitted that she could get so angry that she became ‘physically violent with those I love’ in a teenage diary entry that has now been made public by her family.
The late singer wrote, ‘I hate my temper’ and ‘sometimes it eats away at me so much’ that she lashed out at those closest to her.
She added that she found herself ‘filled with such hatred that I have to literally lie down to cool myself off’ – in a startling description of the demons which would lead to her death aged just 27 in 2011.
Winehouse’s family have now released a book of her teenage diaries, scrapbook entries, scribblings and photos of her growing up – the proceeds will go to the foundation set up in her name.
The letter casts a fresh light on her later relationships, including her ill-fated marriage to Blake Fielder-Civil and secret relationship with singer Pete Doherty.
Amy Winehouse wrote in her diary that she ‘hated her temper’ which made her get ‘physically violent’. She is seen in a school photo in the new book, Amy Winehouse: In Her Words
Amy wrote about being unable to control her anger on her teen diary. She is seen in another school photo
The diary offers a startling description of the demons that would lead to her death aged just 27
Titled ‘Amy Winehouse: In Her Words’, the book gives an extraordinary and intimate portrait of Winehouse as an emerging talent
Titled ‘Amy Winehouse: In Her Words’, the book gives an extraordinary and intimate portrait of Winehouse as an emerging talent.
There are scraps of paper that show early versions of some of her most famous hits, as well as notes to her family and photos showing her on the cusp of fame.
But it is the letter about her mindset that is the is most revealing abut the struggles that ended her life far too soon.
It appears to have been written while she was still at school in the years leading up to the 2003 release of ‘Frank’ – her debut album that won an Ivor Novello award, Winehouse’s first major honor.
Winehouse wrote that she ‘may be a little eccentric and loud, weird also’ but that was only because ‘not many people know me’.
Most people were just happy to think she was the ‘nutter of the class’, Winehouse wrote.
She added: ‘Well, I’m pleased that I’m different…I love being loud and mouthing off to people; it’s the way I am’.
Winehouse also wrote, ‘I wonder if there’s some guy out there who’s as crazy as me?’ before saying she hoped there is a man who ‘loves the Beatles’ like she does.
She expressed her fear that she was destined to always go out with ‘gorgeous guys with NO BRAIN (one thing I despise)’.
Winehouse and her father Mitch are pictured under speech bubbles the singer wrote. Such was the bond between Winehouse and Mitch that she called herself a ‘daddy’s girl’
The new book features various sketches by Winehouse, as well as writings and song lyrics
‘Sometimes I’m filled with hatred that I can’t control my temper and have to literally lie down to cool myself off,’ Winehouse wrote. She is seen behind a bar
‘Sometimes I’m filled with hatred that I can’t control my temper and have to literally lie down to cool myself off,’ Winehouse wrote.
‘I hate my temper. Sometimes it eats away at me so much that I get physically violent with those I love; however much I say I’m sorry it’s something they can never forget’.
The diary entry shows that Winehouse crossed out ‘victims’ and replaced it with ‘they’.
She went on: ‘Right now I’m writing to release my anger…anything can spark it off. Teachers, family, my own stupidity, the latter usually’.
The book charts Winehouse’s journey from a North London schoolgirl to winning five Grammy awards in 2008, the high point of her career before it fell apart.
Winehouse does not specify who she got violent with but it may have included her mother Janis and her father Mitch.
Such was the bond between Winehouse and Mitch that she called herself a ‘daddy’s girl,’ but according to a 2015 documentary titled ‘Amy’, their relationship was fraught.
In one scene Winehouse expresses her disgust that Mitch turned up in St Lucia filming his own documentary about her, apparently without her permission.
Winehouse is seen saying: ‘Why have you done this to me? You have to come out with a camera crew! Are you only interested in me for what you can get out of me?’
And at the time Mitch’s resulting documentary was aired, Winehouse wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter: ‘WHY don’t my dad WRITE a SONG when something bothers him instead of going on national TV?’
Violence was a feature of Winehouse’s relationships, especially with Fielder-Civil, fueled by drug and alcohol addictions.
The book includes Winehouse’s notes to her family as she was on the cusp of fame. A Mother’s Day card for her mom is pictured above
It charts Winehouse’s journey from a North London schoolgirl to winning five Grammy awards in 2008. Amy is pictured with her mom Janis
Winehouse does not specify who she got violent with but it may have included her mother Janis and her father Mitch. A young Winehouse is pictured with family
They began dating in 2005 and he introduced her to hard drugs, one admitting that it was the ‘biggest mistake of my life’ doing heroin in front of her.
He told a newspaper in 2008: ‘I introduced her to heroin, crack cocaine, and self-harming. I feel more than guilty’.
Winehouse began her transformation into a style icon while dating Fielder-Civil and changed from a wholesome looking young woman to a skinny 50s style pinup with heels, heavy black eye makeup and beehive hairstyle.
Winehouse once admitted that she used to beat up Fielder-Civil if he ‘says one thing I don’t like’.
Speaking a month after their wedding she said: ‘I’m either a really good drunk or I’m an out-and-out s***, horrible, violent, abusive, emotional drunk.
‘I’ll beat up Blake when I’m drunk. I don’t think I’ve ever bruised him, but I do have my way. If he says one thing I don’t like then I’ll chin him. I’m not a fighter, but if I am backed up against the wall I’ll kick the s*** out of anyone.
‘I don’t think your ability to fight has anything to do with how big you are. It has to do with how much anger is in you’.
Winehouse got into fights with strangers too, and in 2006 she assaulted a female fan at the Glastonbury music festival in the UK.
Winehouse wrote that she ‘may be a little eccentric and loud, weird also’ but that was only because ‘not many people know me’.
She went on: ‘Right now I’m writing to release my anger…anything can spark it off. Teachers, family, my own stupidity, the latter usually’
Amy listed some of the goals she set up for herself in one of her notebook entries, seen above
The title track of ‘Back to Black’ is thought to be about Fielder-Civil when it says: ‘I love you much, it’s not enough / You love blow and I love puff’.
Another violent episode happened in 2007 when Winehouse and Fielder-Civil were involved in a bloody bust up at London’s trendy Sanderson Hotel.
At the time Mitch said of his daughter and her husband: ‘He (Fielder-Civil) explained to me that when they’re going into (drug) withdrawal, if they cut themselves, it takes away the pain’.
In 2009 the couple divorced, by which time Fielder-Civil had been jailed for 27 months for attacking a barman and then offering a bribe to cover it up.
In a separate case, Fielder-Civil was accused of offering another prisoner $25,000 to beat up singer Pete Doherty, who was then in a relationship with Winehouse.
Winehouse’s family says in the book that they ‘can’t say we truly understand her’ based on her writings.
The letter casts a fresh light on Winehouse’s later relationships, including her ill-fated marriage to Blake Fielder-Civil
Winehouse and Fielder-Civil began dating in 2005 and he introduced her to hard drugs, one admitting that it was the ‘biggest mistake of my life’ doing heroin in front of her
They say that songs and poems were something she came back to ‘time and time again’ in her happiest periods as well as her ‘darkest moments of addiction’.
Her family write that she was a ‘natural observer of life’ and loved music, once writing out the lyrics to Michael Jackson’s ‘Bad’ in pencil.
She dreamed of being a journalist and used to write stories of what she did with her two best friends.
Winehouse was ‘obsessive’ about documenting things and was constantly scribbling in a notebook.
One of her biggest hits, ‘Rehab’, came to her during an argument with Mitch.
She is said to have interrupted him to scribble some thoughts down – and then carried on with the argument.
Winehouse was such a perfectionist she didn’t let her family listen to her music until it was recorded, the book reveals.
And she was extremely picky about who she worked with, choosing producer Mark Ronson as they were both Jewish and from North London which gave them a bond.
The book says that Winehouse would have been 40 this year and that her addictions ‘robbed her and us of her life’.
With the book her family says they want people to remember Winehouse through her ‘sharp, funny, observant, sometimes heartbreaking and profound’ songs rather than her demons.
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