Edward Chancellor
All in Rancour, Envy And Tendentiousness
Divine Right: The Inglorious Survival of British Royalty
By Richard Tomlinson
Little, Brown 384pp £17.50 order from our bookshop
When the Independent was launched in 1986 one of its better ideas was to resist the temptation to cover its pages with articles and ‘exclusives’ about the lives and loves of members of the Royal Family. At the time this may have been due to a desire to differentiate itself from The Times, where, if I remember correctly, Princess Michael of Kent was appearing more frequently than Robert Maxwell was in the Daily Mirror. However, this admirable principle was eroded over the years and now an Independent journalist, Richard Tomlinson, has added to the seemingly endless pile of books on the Royal Family (as opposed to the Monarchy). The style of the book, in journalistic terms, might be characterised as the Daily Mail meets the Guardian: this is tittle-tattle with a social conscience.
From the subtitle of the book one might conclude that Tomlinson was attempting a history or analysis of the endurance of the monarchy. However, the author has eschewed such dull stuff and instead offers to the reader a catalogue of royal indiscretions from Edward VII to the annus horribilis. The
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Sign up to our newsletter! Get free articles, selections from the archive, subscription offers and competitions delivered straight to your inbox.
http://ow.ly/zZcW50JfgN5
'Within hours, the news spread. A grimy gang of desperadoes had been captured just in time to stop them setting out on an assassination plot of shocking audacity.'
@katheder on the Cato Street Conspiracy of 1820.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/butchers-knives-treason-and-plot
'It is the ... sketches of the local and the overlooked that lend this book its density and drive, and emphasise Britain’s mostly low-key riches – if only you can be bothered to buy an anorak and seek.'
Jonathan Meades on the beauty of brutalism.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/castles-of-concrete