Oliver Franks: Founding Father

by Alex Danchev

Lord Franks was an exceedingly deliberate man who, paradoxically, embarked upon his various careers--as don, mandarin, diplomat, banker, provost, pillar of state--almost by accident. A moral philosopher by training and inclination, Franks had a hand in the making of both war and peace in the middle decades of the twentieth century. He secured Marshal Aid for Europe's post-war recovery program. He had a major role in negotiating the North Atlantic Treaty. Later, he was responsible for several unusually influential offical reports, including that on Oxford University in the 1960s, and most recently and controversially, on the British Government's handling of the Falklands crisis. An extensively researched and thoroughly readable study, this book looks at the life of a man who succeeded in combining great intellect and public service to a rare degree. Oliver Franks, though personally self-effacing was an immensely influential figure at the center of public life for many years.

234 pages, Hardcover

First published July 1, 1993

About the author

Alex Danchev was Professor of International Relations at the University of Nottingham, and a long-standing friend of the Tate in London, where he has been a member of the Acquisition Committee of the Patrons of New Art.

His interests wandered across the borders of art, politics, and military history although his focus is chiefly biographical.

His biography of the philosopher-statesman Oliver Franks (Oxford University Press, 1993) was on the Observer's 'Books of the Year' and his biography of the military writer Basil Liddell Hart (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998) was listed for the Whitbread Prize for Biography and the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction.

His unexpurgated edition of the Alanbrooke Diaries (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2001) was listed for the W.H. Smith Prize for Biography. In 2009 he published On Art and War and Terror, a collection of essays on the most difficult issues of our age and, in particular, the nature of humanity in times of conflict.