My Sister Jackie

This year marks 25 years since Jackie Kennedy Onassis died, and had she lived she would she would have been 90 in July. A fascinating extract from a new biography about Jackie and her only sister Lee Radziwell unties the tangled relationship between the siblings who were alike in so many ways, even loving the same men.

Jacqueline Kennedy, the greatly admired former First Lady, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma at the age of 64. The illness spread rapidly through her body, and Jackie opted to die at home, in her spacious apartment in Manhattan.

Sister Lee Radziwill rushed to Jackie’s side. For a brief time, their long, complicated relationship seemed to melt away and they were just as close as they had been in their youth. She died at home on May 19, 1994 –ironically on her father “Black Jack” Bouvier’s birthday – surrounded by her family.

Lee wept. But when Jackie’s 38-page will was read, Lee discovered that substantial cash bequests were left to family members (including Lee’s two adult children), friends, and employees – but nothing to her.

Sibling rivalry It’s been 24 years since the death of her celebrated sister, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, an international icon. In her slow escape from the Kennedy mystique – and from her sister’s long shadow – Lee has retreated ever more into her own exile.

Growing up, both girls had adored their father, so it’s likely that the seeds of Jackie and Lee’s later estrangement were planted early in life, when it became clear that Jackie was their father’s favourite. She was first-born and was named after him, and she “actually looked almost exactly like him, which was a source of great pride to [him],” Lee said.

To this day, Lee still wants to be written about apartfrom her sister. Would she have been famous without her? She never wanted to be the footnote in Jackie’s story.

“To be with him when we were children meant joy, excitement and love,” Lee wrote about her father, Black Jack Bouvier III, a stockbroker with a seat on Wall Street, known for his dark good looks and roguish behaviour. Lee still refers to him as “dashing.”