The fringes of power

By Colville, John Rupert Sir.

Subjects: Diaries, Diplomats, World War, 1939-1945, Private secretaries, Biography, Great britain, politics and government, 20th century, Foreign relations

Description: This is undeniably interesting but hopelessly long at nearly 700 pages of text. It covers about a 15 year period when the author was one of the secretaries to Winston Churchill, and for 4 or 5 years to Princess Elizabeth and then to Attlee, the British Prime Minster in the Labour Government of 1945-1951. The problem is that the writer was clearly immature at the start , when he was only about 24, and continued to be thoroughly dislikeable as an arrogant,unrepentant name-dropper, and an obvious a social climber. Whether he ever really matured is a moot point . I found myself reading down the middle of the page at a very early stage but did persevere to the end