Such is the enormous charm of the Love duology that it has powered an entire industry of fascination with the Mitfords — the charm of those novels, and the political extremes of the world in which they were produced. Si hay algo que me ha resultado conmovedor es su manera de pasar de puntillas sobre los momentos más dolorosos para ella. Y es en esa falta de detalles y de explicaciones donde el lector puede percibir hasta qué punto sufrió la autora a lo largo de su vida, como las ausencias que tuvo que soportar a lo largo de su vida dejaron en ella una huella profunda. Puede explayarse en tratar como le afecto la separación de su hermana favorita, Unity Valkirie (nombre profético donde los haya, pero conocida familiarmente como Gorgo) cuando esta abrazó sin ambages la doctrina del nazismo y se convirtió en miembro del circulo más intimo de Hitler, Intentando suicidarse cuando Alemania en Inglaterra se declararon la guerra. Pero, en cambio, pasa rápidamente por el episodio de la muerte de su primera hija. Y trata de forma abrupta y rápida las últimas páginas de su biografía, donde habla de la despedida a con su esposo cuando este se marcha a luchar al frente, centrándose más en una suerte de estudio antropológico social para explicar la naturaleza de las acciones de ambos a lo largo de su relación. Tampoco lo dice abiertamente, pero nunca deja dudas al lector sobre lo profundo que fue el vínculo con Esmond y lo mucho que se querían. Hay en todo esto un practismo moral increíblemente fuerte que tiene algo de supervivencia mental. El desenlace del libro es áridamente abrupto, pero que de alguna manera encaja porque tiene sentido. En las últimas páginas hay una sensación de fatalidad que lo envuelve todo totalmente, aunque hay que reconocer que eso en eso tiene mucho que ver el hecho de que se esté contando ya una situación que se conoce de antemano, que ya se sabe cómo va acabar. Y el párrafo final, aunque al igual que el resto de la obra es simple y conciso, tiene una gran carga emotiva que es imposible que pase desapercibida para nadie, y que hace que sea impactante por ese mismo motivo. De esa forma brillante y simple la autora expresa mucho más que lo que dice en sus palabras.

Hons and Rebels by Jessica Mitford | Waterstones

Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2013-05-16 14:05:26 Bookplateleaf 0002 Boxid IA1161806 City London Donor I fell in love with her right then and there. I felt the same way. Jesus, racism, and conservative politics made me nauseated, as they did my eldest sister. When war comes it destroys everything, but Linda maintains no regrets. “Don’t pity me,” she tells her best friend and cousin, Fanny. “I’ve had eleven months of perfect and unalloyed happiness, very few people can say that, in the course of long long lives, I imagine.”

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The audiobook I listened to is narrated by Jenny Agutter. It is based on the book’s 1989 edition which restores that which had been removed from the original 1960 edition. The narration is excellent. I adored the different inflections used for Americans and Brits.

Hons and Rebels | Slightly Foxed literary Jessica Mitford | Hons and Rebels | Slightly Foxed literary

It was a schoolroom joke that Unity was a Nazi, and Jessica (Decca) a Communist - they had competing posters of Hitler and Lenin on their walls - but the joke went very sour once they left the schoolroom. Unity insisted on being 'finished' in Munich instead of in Paris like her sisters, and hung around the Osteria Bavaria until she caught Hitler's eye. So instead of centering their drawing room conversations on historical irrelevancies, as they might have assumed would be their duty as minor society figures of no particular wealth or status, they were centering those conversations on the figures who would shape European and American politics throughout the wars and beyond. They were in the middle of a deadly serious conflict that would kill millions, including their own loved ones, and, ultimately, tear the family into pieces. Yet even in the midst of the reality of the war, the sisters’ letters and Jessica’s memoirs and Nancy’s novels continue to sparkle, to shine, to charm.Unity invented a tragic story involving a Pekingese puppy. ‘The telephone bell rang,’ it went. ‘Grandpa got up from his seat and went to answer it. “Lill ill!” he cried . . .’ Lill was on her deathbed, a victim of consumption. Her dying request was that Grandpa should care for her poor little Pekingese. However, in all the excitement of the funeral, the Peke was forgotten, and was found several days later beside his mistress’s grave, dead of starvation and a broken heart. the story of Jessica Mitford’s struggles makes tumultous and rewarding reading, and I recommend it heartily.”

Hons and rebels : Jessica Mitford : Free Download, Borrow Hons and rebels : Jessica Mitford : Free Download, Borrow

Ocr_converted abbyy-to-hocr 1.1.20 Ocr_module_version 0.0.17 Openlibrary OL19641626M Openlibrary_edition At age 19, Jessica eloped with her second cousin, a nephew of Winston Churchill named Esmond Romilly. The couple ran away to Spain to aid the cause of anti-fascism in the Spanish Civil War but were deported after the horrified Mitford parents pulled strings to get Jessica out of the war zone. Briefly, they reported on the war from France for a British paper, the News Chronicle, before relocating to America, penniless, with Jessica no longer on speaking terms with either Unity or Diana. It was becoming rather apparent by this year of 1935 that not all of us were turning out quite according to plan,’ writes Jessica Mitford in this brilliantly funny and perceptive account of growing up as the fifth of the six notoriously headstrong Mitford sisters. And it was perhaps Jessica – always known as Decca – the lifelong hard-line socialist, who turned out least ‘according to plan’ of them all. Hons and Rebels, originally published in the United States under the title Daughters and Rebels, [1] is a 1960 autobiography by political activist Jessica Mitford, which describes her aristocratic childhood and the conflicts between her and her sisters Unity and Diana, who were ardent supporters of Nazism. Jessica was a supporter of Communism and eloped with her second cousin, Esmond Romilly, to fight with the Loyalists in the Spanish Civil War, [2] and Diana grew up to marry Sir Oswald Mosley, the leader of the British Union of Fascists. Unity befriended Nazi leader Hitler, [3] who praised her as an ideal of Aryan beauty. Wigs on the Green is still a satire of Nancy’s social set, but since that social set had come to include avowed Nazis and avowed communists, so does the novel: It skewers Diana’s courtship with the fascist Mosley, and Unity’s budding fascism. (Diana eventually forgave Nancy for the book, but Unity never did.) By the time she released Pigeon Pie in 1940, Nancy was writing light social satire about the war. The heroine of Pigeon Pie is an English aristocrat who transforms herself into a Beautiful Female Spy to fight the fascists.There’s something about the Mitford family — that famous family of Nazis and communists, satirists and journalists who became the fascination of English society in the mid-20th century — that feels perfect for this moment. It's quite surprising that I hadn't read this book before - as I have become a little addicted to reading about the mad bad Mitfords. This is a really well written, funny memoir from one of those infamous sisters. If anyone asked me who my favourite Mitford was it would be Nancy every time, the most fascinating was Diana, but the one I would have most likely liked in real life - would have been Jessica. Her warmth and likability come across strongly in this book, and she was able to poke gentle fun at herself, at the same time. Unfortunately the book stops too soon. It covers her privileged, aristocratic childhood, elopement with her second cousin Esmond Romilly, both only 19 years old and off to the Spanish Civil War. It concludes with the outbreak of the Second World War when Esmond leaves for Canada and Airforce Training Camp. She is pregnant for the second time. We are summarily told of Esmond’s tragic death which will soon follow in 1941. The memoir is chopped short at this point, when her husband leaves for Canada to enlist, having ensconced his pregnant wife in the home of some wealthy Americans (on whom she also looks down) who don't quite realise she is being foisted on them for the duration. One wonders how long the marriage would have lasted if he had returned from the front. While all her elders were trooping off to Munich, Decca was languishing at home, but not for long. She heard that her cousin, Esmond Romilly, had run away from school to fight with the Communists in the Spanish Civil War and the next year, 1937, she eloped with him. She was 19, he 18, and the fact that he was Churchill's nephew made for gratifying headlines.

Hons and Rebels - Jessica Mitford - Google Books Hons and Rebels - Jessica Mitford - Google Books

What is truly remarkable about the Mitfords is how such a pinnacle of fame can be built on such a pea of achievement. Nancy deserves to be remembered as an excellent light novelist, Jessica (Decca) as a goodish journalist; Debo will no doubt loom large in future histories of Chatsworth. But we are not talking about the Brontës here, or even the Drabble-Byatts. Mary Lovell claims bizarrely: 'They have now become almost creatures of mythology.' Mitford] has a most unusual talent for recapturing the past....There is a feeling of immediacy, as if it were all being written on the spot, at the time, by the teen-ager it was happening to. It is a fascinating book. I am so glad that I finally read this book that's as old as I am, being published in 1960. (My copy isn't that old, it dates from 1962.) It's very instructive to be reminded that youth isn't necessarily wasted on the young. Odd pursuits, indeed, and little wonder that my mother’s continual refrain was, ‘You’re very silly children.’ Se nota mucho que la autora es periodista. Es una escritora increíblemente económica en cuanto a medios de expresarse, su estilo es claro, directo y conciso, no se permite nunca divagar o irse por las ramas. Al igual que con su hermana mayor encontramos una lectura sazonada de comentarios irónicos sobre el mundo en el que vivió y las personas que la rodeaban. Pero en el caso de Jessica la sátira es mucho más directa y concisa, menos elegante, no se anda con por las ramas a la hora de decir lo que piensa ni se esconde tras situaciones tan frívolas que pueden resultar absurdas o con personajes a los que es imposible tomar en serio, pero que esconden una carga histórica y social mucho más profunda de lo que puede parecer a simple vista. Como buena periodista hace una crónica nítida, detallada e inteligente de un mundo que está desapareciendo, de una sociedad cambiante por el contexto histórico y político, una acertada comparativa de dos sociedades; la estadounidense y la inglesa. Es sincera cuando la mayor parte del tiempo, y parcial el resto, en muchas ocasiones uno tiene la impresión de que lo que cuenta está ligeramente retocado para que parezca más interesante o lustroso. Pero incluso cuando camufla la verdad, está sigue visualizándose en el fondo de todo. Como puede verse en que muchos de sus comentarios y apreciaciones tienen un tinte frívolo y elitista, que demuestra que Jessica no pudo escapar del todo del tipo de vida y educación que había recibido en su casa. He incluso da la impresión de que ha llegado a un punto en su vida en que tampoco lo intenta.

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Obra de costumbrismo social de la época de entreguerras; biografía sobre una familia que rompió con todos los moldes de su época; ensayo sobre una guerra; crónica sobre un mundo convulso y en pleno cambio; historia iniciativa sobre una joven a la que vemos madurar a través de las páginas que ella misma narra… “Nobles y Rebeldes” es todo eso y más. Pero como señala la acertada introducción que podemos encontrar al principio del libro, lo que subyace en el fondo es una historia de amor breve pero intensa, con una pareja apasionadamente enamorada de ellos y de la vida, ejemplo de una juventud idealista que se enfrenta al odio, la guerra y la oposición social; dispuesta a luchar por sus convicciones políticas y vitales. Además la edición publicada por Libros del Asteroide viene con unas fotografías de los protagonistas de la obra y sus familiares en las páginas finales. Después de leer el libro es imposible no contemplarlas con un pequeño nudo en el estómago, siendo plenamente conscientes de las existencias azorosas y brillantes que todos ellos llevaron. Si hay algo que no se puede decir de Jessica, Esmond y el resto de las hermanas Mitford es que no se contentaron con lo que tenían, fueron estrellas que refulgieron hasta su extinción. By the time of her first London season in 1935, Decca was smouldering: she hated the world into which she had been born and now longed to leave. A committed socialist, her mind was firmly focused on running away, and an irresistible opportunity presented itself the following year with the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. The war profoundly divided the Mitfords, Unity and Diana passionately proFranco, while Decca immediately became a committed Loyalist, determined somehow to leave England and join the fight in Spain. ‘Fortress aspects of life at home now came to the forefront with a vengeance,’ she recalled. ‘I was in headlong opposition to everything the family stood for.’ urn:oclc:877131609 Republisher_date 20171223165528 Republisher_operator [email protected] Republisher_time 406 Scandate 20171223092046 Scanner ttscribe8.hongkong.archive.org Scanningcenter hongkong Top_six true Tts_version v1.57-initial-82-g2b8ab4d Worldcat (source edition)