"‘A profoundly moving meditation on love, loyalty, and, ultimately, forgiveness’ AMANDA FOREMAN
'Attempts to redress the balance and emphasises Simpson's intelligence, independence and unwillingness to ruin the life of the man she loved’ OBSERVER
The intimate biography of one of the most misunderstood women in British royal history. Now 40 years since her death and the 90 year anniversary of the abdication, there is no better time to look back on this brilliant woman's life.
Life has always been made difficult for those marrying into England’s royal family. In 1936, just months into his reign, King Edward VIII proposed to Wallis Simpson, a divorced American woman. Gossip ran wild, and that cacophony of speculation and distrust both hid the real Wallis, and forced Edward into abdicating so that he might marry the woman he adored.
In this intimate biography Anna Pasternak seeks to understand Wallis – and her relationship with Edward and The Crown. Using testimony from her closest friends, she shows the warm, loyal, intelligent woman who was written off and undermined by the powerful, often manipulative men of the Establishment. This is Wallis Simpson’s story as it has never been told before.
Previously published as Untitled."
"‘Riveting, tragic tale’ New Yorker
‘Anna Pasternak has produced an irresistible account of joy, suffering and passion’ Financial Times
The heartbreaking story of the passionate love affair between Boris Pasternak and Olga Ivinskaya – the tragic true story that inspired Doctor Zhivago.
Doctor Zhivago has sold in its millions yet the true love story that inspired it has never been fully explored. Pasternak would often say ‘Lara exists, go and meet her’, directing his visitors to the love of his life and literary muse, Olga Ivinskaya. They met in 1946 at the literary journal where she worked. Their relationship would last for the remainder of their lives.
Olga paid an enormous price for loving ‘her Boria’. She became a pawn in a highly political game and was imprisoned twice in Siberian labour camps because of her association with him and his controversial work. Her story is one of unimaginable courage, loyalty, suffering, tragedy, drama and loss.
Drawing on both archival and family sources, Anna Pasternak’s book reveals for the first time the critical role played by Olga in Boris’s life and argues that without Olga it is likely that Doctor Zhivago would never have been completed or published.
Anna Pasternak is a writer and member of the famous Pasternak family. She is the great-granddaughter of Leonid Pasternak, the impressionist painter and Nobel Prize winning novelist Boris Pasternak was her great-uncle. She is the author of three previous books."
"Their love was both passionate and full of hope, yet ultimately hopeless. This is the true story of the love between a man and a woman— a romance doomed from the start— besieged by media and public opinion on the world stage. The woman was Diana, the Princess of Wales; the man was Captain James Hewitt. Their love affair lasted for nearly five years and is a story of support, encouragement, and love— but alas, one that didn' t result in a fairy tale ending."
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