Mark Pottle

Bonham Carter (1887-1969) was the eldest daughter of H.H. Asquith, the Liberal leader who became prime minister of England. This is the first of a planned trilogy covering her diaries and letters, edited by her eldest son, a publisher and politician, and Pottle, a research fellow at Wolfson College. The diary begins in 1904, when Violet was 17 years old and visiting Paris. She was presented at court in 1905 and "came of age" in 1908. Entries feature her travels to Italy, Egypt, and America (where she dined with Theodore Roosevelt) and dinner conversations with Winston Churchill; the diary ends the year before her marriage to Maurice Bonham Carter, her father's principal private secretary. Some entries speak in the voice of a debutante evaluating the menu and guests at a dinner party, while in others the voice of a young woman mature beyond her years offers great insight into the world of British politics, with rich details about Edwardian society.

Violet Bonham Carter, the only daughter of H.H. Asquith, kept a diary from the age of 18. She moved in privileged circles with the great figures of the day and wrote revealingly about what she saw. This book contains a selection of her diaries and letters, covering the years 1904-1914.

Inside British politics and upper class social life in the decade before the first world war-by the daughter of the Prime Minister and Liberal leader,H H Asquith. Hitherto and revealing unpublished letters and diaries of a Prime Minister's influential daughter.… (meer)