Peter Washington
The Man and The Mask
ANYONE WHO SAW Carol Thatcher’s television interview with her father last year must have been impressed by the shrewdness Denis concealed under a bufferish exterior. His friend Bill Deedes has even suggested that he welcomed his portrayal as a silly ass in Private Eye because it distracted the press from probing his influence in Downing Street. Deedes’s suggestion came to mind while I was reading this new biography of P G Wodehouse.
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'Only in Britain, perhaps, could spy chiefs – conventionally viewed as masters of subterfuge – be so highly regarded as ethical guides.'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/the-spy-who-taught-me
In this month's Bookends, @AdamCSDouglas looks at the curious life of Henry Labouchere: a friend of Bram Stoker, 'loose cannon', and architect of the law that outlawed homosexual activity in Britain.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/a-gross-indecency
'We have all twenty-nine of her Barsetshire novels, and whenever a certain longing reaches critical mass we read all twenty-nine again, straight through.'
Patricia T O'Conner on her love for Angela Thirkell. (£)
https://literaryreview.co.uk/good-gad