Where’s the Beef?
Posted by jonathanfryer on Monday, 9th April, 2007
After an almost entirely veggie Easter, I rather relished a traditional roast beef lunch at Simpson’s in The Strand today with my chum Michael Bloch, biographer of Joachim von Ribbentrop and editor of the posthumous James Lees-Milne diaries. I don’t suppose anyone writes such voluminous diaries these days, but maybe blogs are the contemporary equivalent, though probably more ephemeral. Michael has now embarked on a biography of James Lees-Milne, too. But the book the politicos are waiting for is his biography of Jeremy Thorpe, which he finished seven years ago. By a gentlemen’s agreement, this won’t be published until after Jeremy’s death. As all the books so far on Jeremy have essentialy been hatchet jobs — including Auberon Waugh’s The Last Word – it will be a relief to have an objective overview, which will provide the real beef.
For years, Jeremy has been blighted with Parkinson’s disease, yet despite his physical frailty, he still turns up occasionally at events at the National Liberal Club and his local amenity group, the Orme Square Garden Committee. For people who didn’t know him or know much of him before his downfall, it’s hard to imagine what a vigorous and charismatic politician he was. It was largely due to his zestful campaigning style that the old Liberal Party did so well in the February 1974 election — the first time I was able to vote.
On the files of the Oxford Mail there is a truly cringe-making photo of a student me welcoming him outside the Oxford Union, when he came to speak to the Oxford University Liberal Club (of which I was then Secretary), in about 1971 — which Liberator many years later cheekily put on its cover, when I reviewed Jeremy’s autobiography for that magazine. I look a total prat, whereas Jeremy, despite his trademark Edwardian suit, was positively brimming with vitality. It was Jo Grimond who personally rallied me to the Liberal cause, when he came to my school during the 1964 general election, but it was Jeremy who fired me with the enthusiasm to carry on.
Link: www.jamesleesmilne.com
