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Towards the end of the nineteenth century and for the first few
years of the twentieth, a strange invasion took place in Britain.
The citadel of power, privilege and breeding in which the titled,
land-owning governing class had barricaded itself for so long was
breached. The incomers were a group of young women who, fifty years
earlier, would have been looked on as the alien denizens of another
world - the New World, to be precise. From 1874 - the year that
Jennie Jerome, the first known 'Dollar Princess', married Randolph
Churchill - to 1905, dozens of young American heiresses married
into the British peerage, bringing with them all the fabulous
wealth, glamour and sophistication of the Gilded Age. Anne de
Courcy sets the stories of these young women and their families in
the context of their times. Based on extensive first-hand research,
drawing on diaries, memoirs and letters, this richly entertaining
group biography reveals what they thought of their new lives in
England - and what England thought of them.
Dazzlingly beautiful, highly intelligent and an extraordinary force
of energy, Nancy Cunard was an icon of the Jazz Age, said to have
inspired half the poets and novelists of the twenties. Born into a
life of wealth and privilege, yet one in which she barely saw her
parents, Nancy rebelled against expectations and pursued a life in
the arts. She sought the constant company of artists, writers,
poets and painters, first in London's Soho and Mayfair, and then in
the glamorous cafes of 1920s Paris. This is the remarkable story of
Nancy's Paris life, filled with art, sex and alcohol. She became a
muse to Wyndham Lewis, Constantin Brancusi sculpted her, Man Ray
photographed her and she played tennis with Ernest Hemingway. She
had many love affairs, the most significant of which are included
in this book: the American poet Ezra Pound, the novelists Aldous
Huxley and Michael Arlen, the French poet Louis Aragon and finally
and controversially the black American pianist Henry Crowder, with
whom she ran her printing press in Paris. She was also shaped by
her lifelong friendship with George Moore, her mother's lover. This
tempestuous tale of passion and intrigue is as much a portrait of
twenties Paris as it is the story of an extraordinary woman who
defined her age.
Dazzlingly beautiful, highly intelligent and an extraordinary force
of energy, Nancy Cunard was an icon of the Jazz Age, said to have
inspired half the poets and novelists of the twenties. Born into a
life of wealth and privilege, yet one in which she barely saw her
parents, Nancy rebelled against expectations and pursued a life in
the arts. She sought the constant company of artists, writers,
poets and painters, first in London's Soho and Mayfair, and then in
the glamorous cafes of 1920s Paris. This is the remarkable story of
Nancy's Paris life, filled with art, sex and alcohol. She became a
muse to Wyndham Lewis, Constantin Brancusi sculpted her, Man Ray
photographed her and she played tennis with Ernest Hemingway. She
had many love affairs, the most significant of which are included
in this book: the American poet Ezra Pound, the novelists Aldous
Huxley and Michael Arlen, the French poet Louis Aragon and finally
and controversially the black American pianist Henry Crowder, with
whom she ran her printing press in Paris. She was also shaped by
her lifelong friendship with George Moore, her mother's lover. This
tempestuous tale of passion and intrigue is as much a portrait of
twenties Paris as it is the story of an extraordinary woman who
defined her age.
Far from worrying about the onset of war, in the spring of 1938 the
burning question on the French Riviera was whether one should
curtsey to the Duchess of Windsor. Few of those who had settled
there thought much about what was going on in the rest of Europe.
It was a golden, glamorous life, far removed from politics or
conflict. Featuring a sparkling cast of artists, writers and
historical figures including Winston Churchill, Daisy Fellowes,
Salvador Dali, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Eileen Gray and
Edith Wharton, with the enigmatic Coco Chanel at its heart,
CHANEL'S RIVIERA is a captivating account of a period that saw some
of the deepest extremes of luxury and terror in the whole of the
twentieth century. From Chanel's first summer at her Roquebrune
villa La Pausa (in the later years with her German lover) amid the
glamour of the pre-war parties and casinos in Antibes, Nice and
Cannes to the horrors of evacuation and the displacement of
thousands of families during the Second World War, CHANEL'S RIVIERA
explores the fascinating world of the Cote d'Azur elite in the
1930s and 1940s. Enriched with much original research, it is social
history that brings the experiences of both rich and poor,
protected and persecuted, to vivid life.
Margot Asquith was perhaps the most daring and unconventional Prime
Minister's wife in British history. Known for her wit, style and
habit of speaking her mind, she transformed 10 Downing Street into
a glittering social and intellectual salon. Yet her last four years
at Number 10 were a period of intense emotional and political
turmoil in her private and public life. In 1912 rumblings of
discontent and cries for social reform were encroaching on all
sides - from suffragettes, striking workers and Irish nationalists.
Against this background of a government beset with troubles, the
Prime Minister fell desperately in love with his daughter's best
friend, Venetia Stanley; to complicate matters, so did his Private
Secretary. Margot's relationship with her husband was already
bedevilled by her stepdaughter's jealous adoration of her father.
The outbreak of the First World War only heightened these swirling
tensions within Downing Street. Drawing on unpublished material
from personal papers and diaries, Anne de Courcy vividly recreates
this extraordinary time when the Prime Minister's residence was run
like an English country house, with socialising taking precedence
over politics, love letters written in the cabinet room and gossip
and state secrets exchanged over the bridge table.
The lives of the three daughters of Lord Curzon: glamorous, rich,
independent and wilful. Irene (born 1896), Cynthia (b.1898) and
Alexandria (b.1904) were the three daughters of Lord Curzon,
Viceroy of India 1898-1905 and probably the grandest and most
self-confident imperial servant Britain ever possessed. After the
death of his fabulously rich American wife in 1906, Curzon's
determination to control every aspect of his daughters' lives,
including the money that was rightfully theirs, led them one by one
into revolt against their father. The three sisters were at the
very heart of the fast and glittering world of the Twenties and
Thirties. Irene, intensely musical and a passionate foxhunter, had
love affairs in the glamorous Melton Mowbray hunting set. Cynthia
('Cimmie') married Oswald Mosley, joining him first in the Labour
Party, where she became a popular MP herself, before following him
into fascism. Alexandra ('Baba'), the youngest and most beautiful,
married the Prince of Wales's best friend Fruity Metcalfe. On
Cimmie's early death in 1933 Baba flung herself into a long and
passionate affair with Mosley and a liaison with Mussolini's
ambassador to London, Count Dino Grandi, while enjoying the
romantic devotion of the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax. The
sisters see British fascism from behind the scenes, and the arrival
of Wallis Simpson and the early married life of the Windsors. The
war finds them based at 'the Dorch' (the Dorchester Hotel) doing
good works. At the end of their extraordinary lives, Irene and Baba
have become, rather improbably, pillars of the establishment, Irene
being made one of the very first Life Peers in 1958 for her work
with youth clubs.
A wonderful portrait of British upper-class life in the Season of
1939 - the last before the Second World War. The Season of 1939
brought all those 'in Society' to London. The young debutante
daughters of the upper classes were presented to the King and Queen
to mark their acceptance into the new adult world of their parents.
They sparkled their way through a succession of balls and parties
and sporting events. The Season brought together influential people
not only from Society but also from Government at the various
events of the social calendar. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain
chaperoned his debutante niece to weekend house parties; Lord
Halifax, the Foreign Secretary, lunched with the Headmaster of
Eton; Cabinet Ministers encountered foreign Ambassadors at balls in
the houses of the great hostesses. As the hot summer drew on, the
newspapers filled with ever more ominous reports of the relentless
progress towards war. There was nothing to do but wait - and dance.
The last season of peace was nearly over.
How did a photographer who was a relentless playboy, an unashamed
womaniser and a leather-clad motorcyclist marry the Queen's sister
and become the Establishment figure Lord Snowdon? The brilliantly
talented Antony Armstrong-Jones often humiliated Princess Margaret,
yet he was compassionate to the causes he cared about. Since his
death in 2017, Snowdon still hasn't escaped the limelight, as more
and more is revealed about his wild and intriguing life. Written
with exclusive access to Snowdon and the people closest to him,
this book uncovers the real man and his times. Addressing the facts
behind the myths - the secret courtship of Margaret, the love child
born just weeks after the royal marriage, the affairs on both
sides, the suicide of one mistress and the birth of an illegitimate
son to another - this is a balanced yet no-holds-barred account of
Snowdon's life.
An extraordinary account - from firsthand sources - of upper class
women and the active part they took in the War Pre-war debutantes
were members of the most protected, not to say isolated, stratum of
20th-century society: the young (17-20) unmarried daughters of the
British upper classes. For most of them, the war changed all that
for ever. It meant independence and the shock of the new, and daily
exposure to customs and attitudes that must have seemed completely
alien to them. For many, the almost military regime of an upper
class childhood meant they were well suited for the no-nonsense
approach needed in wartime. This book records the extraordinary
diversity of challenges, shocks and responsibilities they faced -
as chauffeurs, couriers, ambulance-drivers, nurses, pilots, spies,
decoders, factory workers, farmers, land girls, as well as in the
Women's Services. How much did class barriers really come down? Did
they stick with their own sort? And what about fun and love in
wartime - did love cross the class barriers?
Diana Mosley was a society beauty who fell from grace when she
left her husband, brewery heir Bryan Guinness, for Sir Oswald
Mosley, an admirer of Mussolini and a notorious womanizer. This
horrified her family and scandalized society.
In 1933, Diana met the new German leader, Adolf Hitler. They
became close friends and he attended her wedding as the guest of
honor. During the war, the Mosleys' association with Hitler led
them to be arrested and interned for three and a half years.
Diana's relationships with Hitler and Mosley defined her life in
the public eye and marked her as a woman who possessed a singular
lack of empathy for those less blessed at birth.
Anne de Courcy's revealing biography chronicles one of the most
intriguing, controversial women of the twentieth century. It is a
riveting tell-all memoir of a leading society hostess, a woman with
intimate access to the highest literary, political, and social
circles of her time. Written with Mosley's exclusive cooperation
and based upon hundreds of hours of taped interviews and
unprecedented access to her private papers, letters, and diaries,
Lady Mosley's only stipulation was that the book not be published
until after her death.
The adventurous young women who sailed to India during the Raj in
search of husbands. From the late 19th century, when the Raj was at
its height, many of Britain's best and brightest young men went out
to India to work as administrators, soldiers and businessmen. With
the advent of steam travel and the opening of the Suez Canal,
countless young women, suffering at the lack of eligible men in
Britain, followed in their wake. This amorphous band was composed
of daughters returning after their English education, girls invited
to stay with married sisters or friends, and yet others whose
declared or undeclared goal was simply to find a husband. They were
known as the Fishing Fleet, and this book is their story, hitherto
untold. For these young women, often away from home for the first
time, one thing they could be sure of was a rollicking good time.
By the early 20th century, a hectic social scene was in place, with
dances, parties, amateur theatricals, picnics, tennis tournaments,
cinemas and gymkhanas, with perhaps a tiger shoot and a glittering
dinner at a raja's palace thrown in. And, with men outnumbering
women by roughly four to one, romances were conducted at alarming
speed and marriages were frequent. But after the honeymoon, life
often changed dramatically: whisked off to a remote outpost with
few other Europeans for company, and where constant vigilance was
required to guard against disease, they found it a far cry from the
social whirlwind of their first arrival. Anne de Courcy's sparkling
narrative is enriched by a wealth of first-hand sources -
unpublished memoirs, letters and diaries rescued from attics -
which bring this forgotten era vividly to life.
From the author of the critically acclaimed THE VICEROY'S
DAUGHTERS, the story of a glittering aristocrat who was also at the
heart of political society in the interwar years. At the age of
twenty-one, Edith Chaplin married one of the most eligible
bachelors of the day, the eldest son of the sixth Marquess of
Londonderry. Her husband served in the Ulster cabinet and was Air
Minister in the National Government of 1934-5. Edith founded the
Women's Legion during the First World War and was also an early
campaigner for women's suffrage. She created the renowned Mount
Stewart Gardens in County Down that are now owned by the National
Trust. All her life, Edith remained at the heart of politics both
in Westminster and Ireland. She is perhaps best known for her role
as 'society's queen' - a hostess to the rich and famous. Her close
circle of friends included Winston Churchill, Lady Astor, Neville
Chamberlain and Harold Macmillan who congregated in her salon,
known as 'The Ark'. Other members included artists and writers such
as John Buchan, Sean O'Casey. Britain's first Labour prime
minister, Ramsey MacDonald, became romantically obsessed by her.
Diana Mosley was one of the most fascinating and controversial
figures of recent times. For some she was a cult; for many,
anathema. Born in 1910 Diana was the most beautiful and the
cleverest of the six Mitford sisters. She was eighteen when she
married Bryan Guinness, of the brewing dynasty, by whom she had two
sons. After four years, she left him for the fascist leader, Oswald
Mosley, and set herself up as Mosley's mistress - a course of
action that horrified her family and scandalised society. In 1933
she took her sister Unity to Germany; soon both had met the new
German leader, Adolf Hitler. Diana became so close to him that when
she and Mosley married in 1936 the ceremony took place in the
Goebbels drawing room and Hitler was guest of honour. She continued
to visit Hitler until a month before the outbreak of war; and
afterwards, for many, years, refused to believe in the reality of
the Holocaust. This gripping book is a portrait of both an
extraordinary individual and the strange, terrible world of
political extremism in the 1930s.
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