“Flaws and all, he is still a hero, whose wisdom still inspires free peoples. CHURCHILL STOOD FOR SOMETHING. He stood for certain critical human possibilities that are always worth bringing to the attention of thoughtful people.” —RML
“No Cutlet Uncooked”: Andrew Roberts’s Superb Churchill Biography
Andrew Roberts, Churchill: Walking with Destiny. New York, Viking, 2018, 1152 pages, $40, Amazon $25.47, Kindle $17.99. Also published by the Hillsdale College Churchill Project. For Hillsdale reviews of Churchill works since 2014, click here. For a list of and notes on books about Churchill from 1905 currently through 1995, visit Hillsdale’s annotated bibliography.
“No Cutlet Uncooked”
He lies at Bladon in English earth, “which in his finest hour he held inviolate.” He would enjoy the controversy he still stirs today, in media he never dreamed of. And he would revel in the assaults of his detractors, the ripostes of his defenders.…
Biography update: The warm reactions received to this post prompted me to add the cartoon at the end. Thanks for the kind words. I am so pleased and proud to be associated with my Hillsdale colleagues in this grand enterprise. RML
“Give us the Tools….
Every student of Winston Churchill knows of Hillsdale College’s Churchill Project and the “official biography.” (The term is misleading, because nothing was ever censored.) Read more on this effort on the Project website
Sir Martin Gilbert completed the eighth and final biographic volume in 1988. But the accompanying volumes of documents (aka “Companion Volumes”) ceased in the 1990s.…
We are bowled over by the sheer volume of color, beauty and depth of photographs in the latest and greatest edition of Triumph Cars: The Complete Story. Largely this was the effort of my co-author Graham Robson, but I never expected such a high quality treatment by the publishers. A big, square format, 10×10 inches, it’s chock-a-block with lavish illustrations from the first spindly Triumph 10/20 of 1923 to the last, badge-engineered Triumph Acclaim of 1984. There are even appendices on Triumph-derived cars like the Bond Equipe, Amphicar, Peerless and Swallow Doretti.…
My brother Andrew Roberts, author of the new and vital Churchill: Walking with Destiny, passes along a reader snipe which nails rickety new planks on the creepy ship Churchill Snipes. Incredible as it may seem, the writer manages to create a few we’ve never heard before. They will be added to my “Assault on Churchill: A Reader’s Guide.” As will another farrago by a loopy astronaut, about which you’ve probably already heard.
Snipe synopsis
Snipe 1) “Why doesn’t Andrew Roberts spell out Churchill’s mistakes? They were not all that innocent.”
Whole seminars could be devoted to whether Churchill’s mistakes—in fact exhaustively catalogued by Roberts—were innocent and well intended, or maliciously calculated.…
Apropos, of course, no current events in particular, I pass along a recommendation. It’s from a friend and fellow political junkie. “The entire United States Senate should be required to sit through an endless looped showing of Advise and Consent.” The 1962 film is based on Allen Drury’s Pulitzer-prize winning 1959 novel. In the unlikely event you do not remember the film, click here.”
I agree utterly. I must watch it again. It is not a lighthearted flick….
The Plot (excerpt from Wikipedia)
The President of the United States nominates Robert A. Leffingwell as Secretary of State.…
…added significantly to our knowledge with No More Champagne (2015), his study of Churchill’s finances. Now he fills another gap in the saga with this comprehensive collection of Churchill’s exchanges with his mother Jennie, Lady Randolph Churchill.…
Last Call: almost sold out
Fewer than 60 cabins remain on the Churchill cruise of a lifetime. Many of our old Churchillian friends are coming, and this truly will be an event you will never forget. CLICK HERE for complete descriptions of the voyage (June 1-31) plus optional pre- and post-cruise Churchill events (May 31-June 1, June 13-16). I cannot answer questions about bookings, cabins and availability. Please contact Global Tracks, who I know from experience are very professional: (877) 242-6397, email hillsdalecollegecruise.com.
A cruise to remember
The Hillsdale College Cruise in June 2019 is a spectacular journey around Britain.…
A great joy of reading The Churchill Documents is their trove of historical sidelights. Volume 22 (August 1945—September 1951, due late 2018) covers the early Cold War: the “Iron Curtain,” the Marshall Plan, Berlin Airlift and Korean War. It reminds us of the political battles swirling around the Anglo-American “special relationship.”…
Q: I have just been given a copy of Churchill: The End of Glory, A Political Biography by John Charmley (1993) and am obliged to say that it has the most confused index I have ever come across. It may be idle scholarship on my part but when I open a book that is new to me the first thing that I do is look through the index to see if it contains matters that I consider it should and the next thing I check is the bibliography. I looked for Singapore and its British commander, Lieutenant-General Arthur Ernest Percival but could not find any mentions. …
Much of my labor in the Churchill Vineyard involves researching quotations “AZ.” My 650-page books and ebooks, Churchill by Himself and Churchill in His Own Words, are the largest sources of Churchill’s philosophy, maxims, reflections and ripostes accompanied by a valid source for each entry. There are 4,150 entries, but a new, expanded and revised edition is coming. It will include a much larger appendix of “Red Herrings”—oft-repeated passages he never said but constantly ascribed to him.
