“Not a day passes when Winston Churchill, who proved indispensable WHEN LIBERTY HUNG IN THE BALANCE is not accused of something dreadful, from misogyny to warmongering. My book, Winston Churchill: Myth and Reality, confronts this busy industry.” —RML
Old Victory’s Pride (Extended Review): “Churchill & Son” by Josh Ireland

Old Victory’s Pride (Extended Review): “Churchill & Son” by Josh Ireland

"Randolph, Hope and Glory": Writing his father's biography was his chance at redemption, “to create a lasting record of his love and devotion to the man he had loved more than any other person he had ever known. In the process of telling the story of his father’s life, he belatedly gave meaning to his own.”

Read More Read More

“Jaw to Jaw” Versus “Jaw-Jaw”: Supermac Still Owns the Latter

“Jaw to Jaw” Versus “Jaw-Jaw”: Supermac Still Owns the Latter

“Jaw-Jaw” be-jaws the dialogue (from 2008):

On 27 June 1954, Churchill was quot­ed as say­ing “jaw-jaw is always bet­ter than to war-war.” (William H. Lawrence, “Churchill urges Patience in Cop­ing with Red Dan­gers,” The New York Times, page 1; and Wal­ter Tro­han, “‘Vig­i­lance and Time’ Asked by Churchill,” Chica­go Dai­ly Tri­bune, page 1. Did Churchill say this? —M.D.

No. From my Defin­i­tive Wit of Win­ston Churchill, page 37:

“Meet­ing jaw to jaw is bet­ter than war.” —1954 Com­mon­ly mis­quot­ed as ‘Jaw-jaw is bet­ter than war-war,’ an expres­sion coined four years lat­er by Prime Min­is­ter Harold Macmil­lan, on a vis­it to Australia.…

Read More Read More

“The Packard”: Ne Plus Ultra of Automotive House Organs (1)

“The Packard”: Ne Plus Ultra of Automotive House Organs (1)

The Q&A column ended with a confessional: "After this severe mental strain the Query Editor is working on the higher mathematics and differential calculus as a mild form of relaxation." And that was the whole idea, wasn't it? The Packard was a celebration—of all that was best in a young, dynamic company.  The grand marque couldn't have had a better champion.

Read More Read More

Harold Begbie: “The Man Who Did God for the Westminster Gazette”

Harold Begbie: “The Man Who Did God for the Westminster Gazette”

“Harold Beg­bie” is excerpt­ed from an arti­cle for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. To view the orig­i­nal, click here. To SUBSCRIBE for fresh arti­cles week­ly from the Churchill Project, reach­ing 60,000 read­ers world­wide: Click here, scroll to bot­tom, enter your email address in the box enti­tled “Stay in touch with us.” Your email address is nev­er giv­en out and will remain a rid­dle wrapped in a mys­tery inside an enigma.

“The hand of destiny”

The Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project’s updat­ed bib­li­og­ra­phy of works about Churchill has pro­duced grat­i­fy­ing inter­est in ear­ly biogra­phies.…

Read More Read More

Foreword to a Review of “The Racial Consequences of Mr. Churchill”

Foreword to a Review of “The Racial Consequences of Mr. Churchill”

“The Racial Con­se­quences of Mr. Churchill”: A Review

The fol­low­ing is my fore­word only to an analy­sis of the recent Churchill Col­lege pan­el, by Zewdi­tu Gebrey­ohanes and Andrew Roberts. They fol­lowed a max­im of Ran­dolph Churchill in the offi­cial biog­ra­phy: “I am inter­est­ed only in the truth.” Every Churchill schol­ar is in their debt.

Foreword

Eighty-eight years ago Hitler became Chan­cel­lor of Ger­many and the Oxford Union passed a res­o­lu­tion: “That this House refus­es in any cir­cum­stances to fight for King and Coun­try.” A week lat­er Win­ston Churchill said: “We have all seen with a sense of nau­sea the abject, squalid, shame­less avow­al made in the Oxford Union.…

Read More Read More

A “Paintatous” Masterpiece: Paul Rafferty on Churchill’s Riviera Art

A “Paintatous” Masterpiece: Paul Rafferty on Churchill’s Riviera Art

Paul Raf­fer­ty, Win­ston Churchill: Paint­ing on the French Riv­iera. Lon­don: Uni­corn Pub­lish­ing, 2020, 208 pages. $50. Excerpt­ed from a review for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. To view the orig­i­nal, with more illus­tra­tions, please click here.

A work of art on Churchill’s art

This beau­ti­ful book com­bines Churchill’s favorite French paint­ing venues with fas­tid­i­ous research on their loca­tions. The hor­i­zon­tal for­mat blends qual­i­ty bind­ing with bril­liant col­or on thick, coat­ed paper, and the price is a bar­gain. Paul Raf­fer­ty, him­self an artist, brings Churchill’s oils alive as adjuncts to WSC’s per­son­al­i­ty. (N.B.: this writer played a minor part in ver­i­fy­ing quotations.)…

Read More Read More

“Churchill’s Britain”: Good Try, But More is Needed

“Churchill’s Britain”: Good Try, But More is Needed

Peter Clark, Churchill’s Britain: From the Antrim Coast to the Isle of Wight. Lon­don: Haus Pub­lish­ing, 2020, 240 pp., no illus­tra­tions, $29.95, Ama­zon $27.48, Kin­dle $22.49. Excerpt­ed from a review for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. To read the orig­i­nal, click here.

N.B. March 2021: The orig­i­nal post con­tains author Clark’s response, which is about the most cor­dial reply to a grumpy review I’ve ever read. He kind­ly takes heed of my crit­i­cisms and says he will attend to them in the paper­back in due course. RML

Churchill’s Britain abridged

I did want to like this book.…

Read More Read More

Iron Curtain 75 Years On: Churchill on the Fulton Flak

Iron Curtain 75 Years On: Churchill on the Fulton Flak

The 75th Anniver­sary of Win­ston Churchill’s “Iron Cur­tain” speech at Ful­ton, Mis­souri, was cel­e­brat­ed this week with due cer­e­mo­ny. One need look no fur­ther than his lead­ing recent biog­ra­ph­er Andrew Roberts for an emi­nent­ly read­able account of the speech and its after­math in the Dai­ly Express.

Read­ers inter­est­ed in fur­ther details may wish to watch or read three per­ti­nent pre­sen­ta­tions, the first being the speech itself, the oth­er two pro­vid­ed by the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project:

Sir Win­ston Churchill’s Ful­ton Speech, “The Sinews of Peace,” West­min­ster Col­lege, 5 March 1946 (audio; speech begins at minute 8:40) Sir Mar­tin Gilbert, “The Endur­ing Impor­tance of the ‘Iron Cur­tain’ Speech,” Hills­dale Col­lege, 22 Octo­ber 2004.…

Read More Read More

Grand Alliance: A Way Out of the Second World War?

Grand Alliance: A Way Out of the Second World War?

Question:

“Pro­fes­sor John Charm­ley says in a pod­cast that Neville Cham­ber­lain believed a pre­war grand alliance against Hitler was not fea­si­ble. He was refer­ring to alliance between the UK and France and the Unit­ed States and USSR. Do you agree?”

Answer:

As Mona Lisa Vito (Marisa Tomei) tells the Dis­trict Attor­ney (Lane Smith) in “My Cousin Vin­ny” (1992), “that’s a B.S. question.”

(To voir dire Miss Vito on “gen­er­al auto­mo­tive knowl­edge” the D.A. had demand­ed the igni­tion tim­ing of “a 1955 Chevro­let 327 V-8.” (Read­ers less mechan­i­cal­ly inclined than Miss Vito may enjoy her dev­as­tat­ing two-minute rebut­tal to this “trick question.”)…

Read More Read More

Paintatious – Paintaceous – Paintacious: What Was Churchill’s Word?

Paintatious – Paintaceous – Paintacious: What Was Churchill’s Word?

Paul Rafferty’s mag­nif­i­cent Win­ston Churchill: Paint­ing on the French Riv­iera is being trans­lat­ed for a French edi­tion by Dr. Antoine Capet. The author and trans­la­tor posed an inter­est­ing ques­tion. How did Win­ston Churchill spell “painta­tious”?

(Any read­er bored by pedan­tic, picayune, obscure mean­der­ings about noth­ing of impor­tance should stop read­ing now. For my review of Paul’s book see: “Book of the Year.”)

“Painta­tious” was artist Churchill’s word for a scene wor­thy of his brush. He found many such venues on the French Riv­iera, which Paul explores so well. But this is a tricky ques­tion because “painta­tioius” not a real word.…

Read More Read More

RML Books

Richard Langworth’s Most Popular Books & eBooks

Links on this page may earn commissions.