Funny Farm

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Xandra Bingley

A lyrical, evocative and wonderfully original wartime memoir about life on a farm in the Cotswolds, seen through the eyes of a child. Bertie, May & Mrs Fish is Xandra Bingley's account of her childhood on a Cotswold farm, set against the backdrop of the Second World War and its aftermath. Bingley's mother is left to farm the land while her husband is away at war. With its eccentric cast of characters, this book captures both the essence of a country childhood and the remarkable courage and resilience displayed by ordinary people during the war. The beauty and sensitivity of Bingley's observation is artfully balanced by the harshness and grit of her reality. Bingley tells her tale in a startling voice which captures the universe of a child, the unforgiving landscape and the complicated adult world surrounding her. Her acute observation and her emotional, sensual descriptive gift for place, people, sound and touch make this a brilliantly authentic and evocative portrait.

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Miranda Seymour

A biography of Ottoline Morrell, patron of an early 20th century British salon that included Viginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, D.H. Lawrence, Siegfriend Sassoon, Augustus John, and Bertrand Russell.

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[by] C. V. Wedgwood

The life of the well-known English poet and educator set against the social life and historic events of the seventeenth century.

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Michael Bloch

An empty account of an empty life, buoyed largely by speculation that Bessie Wallis Warfield Spencer Simpson, the duchess of Windsor, although thrice married, was a virgin when she died. Drawing on the correspondence between the duke and duchess and many of the sources that supported his earlier works about the Windsors, the author (*The Secret File of the Duke of Windsor*, 1969, etc.) tries to define the woman who moved the king of England to give up his throne. Beginning at the beginning, Bloch speculates that Wallis Warfield's birth to a socially prominent family was not registered because of «gender confusion» resulting from genital flaws. As she grew up, according to the author, she developed «a decidedly masculine appearance» and «a bossy personality.» Be that as it may, she made her Baltimore debut with a thoroughly feminine demeanor and married a thoroughly domineering, heavy-drinking male, E. Winfield Spencer Jr. The marriage lasted five years, after which she traveled in Europe and China, where she was rumored to have picked up sexual «arts.» In London with her second husband, Ernest Simpson, she launched a social climb that led to her romance with the man who would become King Edward VIII. She, willing to be mistress or morganatic wife, protested mightily when the king planned to abdicate in order to marry her. She predicted rightly that she would be the target of England's disappointment. Spending the rest of her life successfully insuring that the former monarch would never regret his decision, her households, her wardrobe, her parties, and her persona were never less than perfect. Is the throne of England worth a lifetime with a woman renowned for her perfect grooming? Did her alleged masculinity appeal to the duke's rumored homosexual leanings? This book—in prose as flat as the duchess's chest—doesn't begin to probe those questions or convince the reader of her vaunted charm and wit. ([*Kirkus Reviews*][1]) [1]: