Download PDF The Last of the Duchess: The Strange and Sinister Story of the Final Years of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, by Caroline Blackwood
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The Last of the Duchess: The Strange and Sinister Story of the Final Years of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, by Caroline Blackwood
Download PDF The Last of the Duchess: The Strange and Sinister Story of the Final Years of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, by Caroline Blackwood
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Review
“A sharply observed (and sometimes very funny) portrait of the frivolous world of wealth and luxury inhabited by the Windsors.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “Beguiling. . . . Blackwood is witty, understated and perceptive.” —The Washington Post “The central character in The Last of the Duchess never appears at all but, like Godot in Beckett’s play, becomes more powerful by her absence. . . . Brilliant—and brilliantly entertaining—journalism.” —Chicago Tribune “A fierce, scintillatingly funny report on a dying social circle.” —The Independent (London)
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About the Author
Caroline Blackwood, who began her writing career as a journalist, is the author of nine books, which include novels, collections of short stories, and a cookbook. She was awarded the David Higham Fiction Prize for her first novel, The Stepdaughter, and her novel Great Granny Webster was recommended for the Booker Prize for Fiction shortlist in 1977. She died in 1996.
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Product details
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Vintage (October 2, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0345802632
ISBN-13: 978-0345802637
Product Dimensions:
5.3 x 0.6 x 8 inches
Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
3.0 out of 5 stars
90 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#999,747 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
This is a bore with the author doing a hatchet job on the Duchess' cranky protective attorney. The author never saw the Duchess but speculates with no real substantiation her beliefs about her health and environment. The author admits to waiting until the attorney's death to publish this overblown tome the better not to be sued, but lacking in courage. Other parts rehash the Duchess' life in an uninspired manner. Stuffy and overblown.
This has to be the most entertaining book I've read in a long time. Caroline Blackwood's acid wit shines through in her depiction of Suzanne Blum, the Duchess's relentless guard dog in her final years. It is not so much a book about the Duchess as it is a book about how Maître Blum's blind adulation created a living-dead legend of Wallis, the Duchess if Windsor. It is a cautionary tale of making sure that in old age one does not end up in the clutches of a guardian who, while claiming to have your best interests at heart, condemns you to a living hell.
One would expect the brash Duchess to go out with a bang not a whimper, but that was not to be. The anti-climax of the Duchess' last years is really appalling. However, this sprightly reminiscence of author Blackwood's attempts to visit the Duchess but kept at the door by Wallis' rottweiler-lawyer, Suzanne Blum, is often hilarious. But there is pathos involved, too. The Duchess is actually up-staged by Madam Blum but Wallis does not go away- she's hovering like the spirit of Rebecca in "Rebecca" but she's not calling the shots.Blum had absolute control not only over the Duchess' estate and power of attorney but over her nursing care. To author Blackwood who interviews her for the substance of this book ,she spins a series of ridiculous lies, such as that both the Windsors were highly cultured and read many books and NEVER set foot in nightclubs. Blum crooningly rhapsodizes about Wallis' beautiful skin "so soft." and that the bed-ridden old lady is still beautiful. Blum seems to be in love with her client and gives you the creeps. Wallis was never beautiful, with a flat figure and big "utilitarian"hands and feet which have fascinated people for decades and we all come back to the old mantra -what did Wallis have to inspire David to give up his throne? Delightful as "The Last of the Duchess" is you will still be left wondering.You laugh at Diane Moseley's description of Wallis as "the poor little creature." Trying to morph Wallis into a poor little creature even if she is flat on a bed with a feeding tube stuck up her nose is virtually impossible for the average reader. Lady Mosely was, of course a well-known Fascist, her husband being head of the Fascist community in England. She offers up some disturbing information that Hitler played buddy-buddy with the Duke when the Windsors foolishly visited him, threw his arm around David's shoulder and disappeared with him after having the doors firmly shut in the Duchess' face. But the fact that the ex king of England was a Nazi aficianado boggles the mind.Maitre Blum had not only tried like Pygmalion to mold the Duchess in her own image, she had taken over the Duchess' life and persona. Since it was impossible for author Blackwood to see Wallis, she attempted to interview the few friends of Wallis who were not dead.Freda Dudley Ward, one of the Prince's early and most lasting lovers, after half a century and a marriage to a Marquis, was still bitter that Wallis had replaced her. She was filled with sneering laughter that "one horrible old lady was imprisoned by another horrible old lady."Other old friends of the Windsors were more charitable. Lady Diana Cooper talks about the love affair between Wallis and the sadistic, homosexual heir to the Woolworth fortune, Jimmy Donahue, who was some twenty years younger than the Duchess. She supposes Wallis was trying to escape from the besotted, smothering attentions of the Duke. David was frequently in anguished tears over some episode concerning his wife, he was abject, and if there was anything Wallis would despise, it was abjectness.When asked by author Blackwood if the Duchess was ever in love with the Duke, Lady Monckton replied "you can always tell when people are in love" implying that Wallis was not in love with her husband."Did the Duchess simply want to be Queen?" queries the author. "Yes, I suppose she did" answered Lady Monckton.There will never really be a "last of the Duchess." Deceased, she has not gone away. Blackwood's observations and reviews are often surprisingly touching. Wallis had been pushed and trained since birth to believe that an aristocratic girl's purpose and destiny in life were to snare a rich husband. It took her two tries and then she hit the jackpot. The horror of her story is that she ended up alone, wired up to a bunch of tubes and under the control of her lawyer, a spider controlling the fragile web of her remaining life.
If you are looking for a good biography of the Duchess of Windsor, this is not it. It is mostly about her lawyer and how she kept the Duchess locked up with no visitors! There is a little biography toward the end of the book, not very much. There were a lot of French phrases throughout the book, only one that I recall being translated to English. If you don't know French, you will miss out as I did. I read the whole book to find out what if anything was really wrong with her, not answered at all. There is an epilogue at the end with she and her lawyers dates of death but not much else. I would not recommend this book to anyone!
The Duchess of Windsor herself appears as an almost dead figure, although she is not allowed to die. She rests in a bed in a dark mansion on the outskirts of Paris. Battling fiercely for her (or against her?) is the fear-inducing lawyer Maitre Blum. Does Maitre Blum really have the Duchess's best interests at heart? Caroline Blackwood started out wanting to interview the Duchess and the lawyer on assignment for a British magazine. What follows is a multi-year attempt to find the facts - why did Edward VI renounce the crown? what were Wally Simpson's real intentions? how did the Windsors live after their exile? what do their surviving friends have to say about the couple? I waited for the grand reveal, it never came.
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