The controversial life of the Society darling Diana Mosley. Born June 10, 1910, was by general consent the most beautiful and the cleverest of the six Mitford sisters. But by marrying British Union of Fascists leader, Sir Oswald Mosley (in Goebbels' drawing room with Hitler as the guest of honour), she horrified her family and scandalized society. A well received biography.
Diana Mosley was one of the most fascinating and controversial figures of recent times. For some, she was a cult; for many, anathema. Born in 1910 Diana was the most beautiful and the cleverest of the six Mitford sisters. She was eighteen when she married Bryan Guinness, of the brewing dynasty, by whom she had two sons. After four years, she left him for the fascist leader, Oswald Mosley, and set herself up as Mosley's mistress - a course of action that horrified her family and scandalised society. In 1933 she took her sister Unity to Germany; soon both had met the new German leader, Adolf Hitler. Diana became so close to him that when she and Mosley married in 1936 the ceremony took place in the Goebbels drawing room and Hitler was guest of honour. She continued to visit Hitler until a month before the outbreak of war; and afterwards, for many, years, refused to believe in the reality of the Holocaust.
This gripping book is a portrait of both an extraordinary individual and the strange, terrible world of political extremism in the 1930s.
Anne De Courcy is a well-known biographer, journalist, interviewer and reviewer. She lives in London. Her book about the Curzon sisters, The Viceroy's Daughters, was a bestseller in Phoenix paperbacks.
