Wait for Me!

January 24, 2011
In this sparkling memoir, the Duchess (The Pursuit of Laughter) writes about her famously eccentric family and the upper reaches of the British aristocracy with whom she has mingled during her long life (she'll turn 91 in March). She was related to Winston Churchill's wife, Clementine, and to Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. In 1938, she met her future husband, Andrew Cavendish, and socialized with the Kennedy's. As their guest, she attended JFK's inauguration, and then his funeral, and writes movingly of both events. When her husband inherited his title, she became the mistress of Chatsworth; the Devonshire family estate dated back to the time of Henry VIII and contained fabulous treasures, including original Rembrandt paintings, and Mitford helped manage a variety of enterprises connected with it. In the ‘60s, Andrew served as a Minister of State and the couple travelled widely. A staunch conservative herself, her family's politics tended to be more extreme. Her parents sympathized with Nazi Germany, her sister Unity, a close companion of Hitler, attempted suicide at the start of hostilities, and sister Diana, wife of British fascist Oswald Mosley, was jailed. Full of absorbing anecdotes, Mitford's wonderfully-written tale of a tumultuous era is fascinating. Norman Parkinson's iconic 1952 photo of the Duchess adorns the cover.

November 15, 2010

The author, whose full name is Deborah Vivien Freeman-Mitford Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire, now 90 years old, is the youngest and last surviving of the Mitford sisters, made famous in Nancy Mitford's thinly fictionalized comic novels, especially The Pursuit of Love. The six sisters included two who became fascists (Unity and Diana), a communist (Jessica), a duchess (Deborah), and two best-selling authors (Nancy and, again, Jessica). Deborah Mitford's affable memoir reads like the bonus voice-over DVD commentary--the "movie" here being Nancy's uproarious novels. To make proper sense of Wait for Me!, the uninitiated may first need to read The Pursuit of Love. But don't expect Nancy Mitford's ironic view of the British aristocracy; "I have always voted Conservative," writes Deborah Mitford, "and would never do otherwise." The usually genial author reserves harshest judgment for her writing sisters Jessica and Nancy while offering passes to Diana and Unity, great admirers of Hitler ("many other girls...were swept up in the movement"). VERDICT The book palls when the sisters grow up, and it ceases to serve as a gloss on Nancy Mitford's novels. Yet all acolytes of the Mitford sisters will want to read what will probably be the last firsthand account of their youth.--Stewart Desmond, New York

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.