Eminent Georgians: The Lives of King George V, Elizabeth Bowen, St. John Philby, and Lady Astor ANNOTATION
The author of the bestselling The Life of Jane Austen illuminates the connections among four fascinating people and the age in which they lived--the second "Georgian" age, the period in England between the two world wars. Halperin considers the impact that these leading figures had on their era, as well as the extent to which they themselves were shaped by the age in which they lived.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
King George V, a monarch often deemed stodgy and reactionary; Elizabeth Bowen, a brilliant Anglo-Irish writer, exposed as a World War II English spy monitoring her native Ireland; St. John Philby, father of the notorious spy Kim Philby; and Nancy Astor, an American divorcee who became the first female member of Parliament, make up the quartet of personalities through which John Halperin explores a world of intrigue existing just below the glittering surface of Britain in the 1920s and 1930s. Describing the age as simultaneously conventional and progressive, Victorian and modern, Halperin considers the impact that these leading figures had on their era, as well as the extent to which they themselves were shaped by the age in which they lived.
FROM THE CRITICS
Library Journal
The Georgian age to which Halperin (Life of Jane Austen, LJ 9/15/84) refers is that of King George V-primarily the Britain of the 1920s and 1930s. His format, a bow to Lytton Strachey's 1918 Eminent Victorians, is a quartet of life stories of significant figures-a king (George V); a novelist (Bowen); a "tycoon" and civil servant, father to a famous spy (Philby); and the first woman member of Parliament (Astor). His theme is the interplay of Victorian tradition and developing modernism, the way an age shapes its actors and the actors shape the age. His style is engaging, chatty, and vigorously opinionated, particularly about Lady Astor. An entertaining book and a good choice for most biography collections.-Nancy C. Cridland, Indiana Univ. Libs., Bloomington
Booknews
Halperin considers how their world shaped these four personalities, and the impact they had on their era. Halperin writes that all four--a king; an author exposed as a World War II spy; the father of the notorious Kim Philby; and the American divorcee who became the first female member of Parliament--embody the simultaneous allegiance of many Georgians both to tradition and to change, to the status quo and to the future. "Their spiritual and historical ambivalence defines the age they lived in," he writes, "and the age they lived in, it may be, was defined in some small way by the lives they led." Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
Home
