Diva Prose: Bernadette Peters

Thinking about diva-ness in relationship to Bernadette Peters is a curious task because while she’s often called a diva, writers usually clarify that she doesn’t demonstrate the typical negative traits associated with divas, to the point that Frontiers even published an article about her called “The Anti-Diva Diva.” This paradox arises from the slippage between the two definitions of diva—distinguished female singer and temperamental woman.

What follows may at times veer into the “trashy cadences and idioms of” what Koestenbaum calls “diva prose,” as I defend and construct Bernadette Peters as diva through Koestenbaum’s words.