My History

by Antonia Fraser

The childhood and early life memoir of Antonia Fraser, one of our finest narrative historians. Antonia Fraser's magical memoir describes growing up in the 1930s and '40s, but its real concern is with her growing love of history. A fascination that began with reading Our Island Story and her evacuation to an Elizabethan manor house at the beginning of the Second World War soon developed into an enduring passion, becoming, in her own words, 'an essential part of the enjoyment of life'. My History follows Antonia's relationship with her family: she was the eldest of eight children. Her parents Frank and Elizabeth Pakenham, later Lord and Lady Longford, were both Labour politicians. Then there are her adventures as a self-made debutante before Oxford University and a fortunate coincidence that leads to her working in publishing. It closes with the publication of her first major historical work, Mary Queen of Scots - a book that became a worldwide bestseller. Told with inimitable humour and style, this is an unforgettable account of one person's journey towards becoming a writer - and a historian.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Memoir, Autobiography, Biography Memoir, History, British Literature

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 8, 2015

About the author

Antonia Fraser is the author of many widely acclaimed historical works, including the biographies Mary, Queen of Scots (a 40th anniversary edition was published in May 2009), Cromwell: Our Chief of Men, King Charles II and The Gunpowder Plot (CWA Non-Fiction Gold Dagger; St Louis Literary Award). She has written five highly praised books which focus on women in history, The Weaker Vessel: Women's Lot in Seventeenth Century Britain (Wolfson Award for History, 1984), The Warrior Queens: Boadecia's Chariot, The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Marie Antoinette: The Journey (Franco-British Literary Prize 2001), which was made into a film by Sofia Coppola in 2006 and most recently Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King. She was awarded the Norton Medlicott Medal by the Historical Association in 2000. Antonia Fraser was made DBE in 2011 for her services to literature. Her most recent book is Must You Go?, celebrating her life with Harold Pinter, who died on Christmas Eve 2008. She lives in London.

Reviews

[Caroline · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a memoir about Antonia Fraser's childhood and early adulthood. I found it a pleasant read, but a little flat. She has a wonderful stash of anecdotes, but I found the telling of them a bit understated.

She was born into an eccentric family. Both her parents were Labour Party candidates, and her father went on to sit in the House of Lords as a Labour peer. They converted to Catholicism, and they took their religion seriously - in the sense of trying to do good in the world. At times their earnestness could be amusing...

"(My mother's) efforts at being a good Catholic mother had all her characteristic energy and resource. She encountered, for example, a particular problem with Guy Fawkes Day* on the fifth of November. How could we, a nice Catholic family, burn the effigy of a Catholic conspirator with his pipe, in his black slouch hat and his ancient fit-for-the-bonfire trousers? Yet we must not be deprived of the national celebration. The solution: we burnt the effigy of the Communist Foreign Minister of Romania, one Ana Pauker, a Cold War hate figure....who oddly enough wore a black slouch hat and ancient trousers and smoked a pipe."

"(My father) was made Minister in Charge of Germany, under Ernest Bevin as Foreign Secretary, and paid his first visit in this same icy spring of 1947; in the next two years he would make twenty-five more visits. Conditions for the civilians there were appalling. But conditions had been of course appalling for millions of others, innocent people, throughout the war, to say nothing of the atrocities committed. It was a war which had ended less than two years earlier. Nevertheless I was deeply shocked when (he) was execrated in the Beaverbrook press for announcing: "I shall pray for the Germans night and morning."....From (my father), it was an utterly natural comment... And as a matter of fact the other feature of his arrival in Germany - his rash jump from the aeroplane, unaware that steps were on their way, leading to a heavily bleeding forehead in all the photographs - was equally in character."

When young, Antonia and her seven siblings were home schooled by her mother. Right from the beginning, she was a passionate reader, learning to read at the age of four.

"Somehow...she taught me to read at a phenomenally rapid rate. Later I would win cash prizes from trusting grown-ups who didn't believe I could possibly master a chapter of, say, Sir Walter Scott at such speed. Later still, less agreeably, as a teenager I would incur sneers from the passenger sitting opposite me in a train: 'You don't imagine you are actually reading that do you?'"

If reading was almost an immediate passion, then so was history - the genre that would take up much of Antonia's time as an author.

"To quote my favourite lines of Keats:

'Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn'

In my case the magic casements opened on to the perilous seas and faery lands of History."

She discusses those perilous seas a bit, as when mulling over the complexity of Winston Churchill. "Later, when I came to study the actual life story of my hero, I learnt a valuable lesson about the great men of history. This was not only the statesman who won the war for us with his courage, his oratory, and as we saw it his belief in us as a nation. He was also the politician whom my grandmother held responsible for the disaster of Gallipoli. As to subsequent decades, even reading Churchill's view about India and the Indians made this faint-hearted liberal shudder. Yet amateur study of the Second World War has only confirmed me in my admiration for Churchill the war leader."

Antonia did well at school, going on to study at Lady Margaret hall in Oxford. She then went to work for George Weidenfeld, at the publishers Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Her descriptions of him as a lovable but shameless flirt sit rather uncomfortably with 21st century views, or at least I found it so.

She mentions briefly her marriage to the Conservative Unionist MP Hugh Fraser, but doesn't discuss her second marriage to Harold Pinter.

The book ends with her description of writing her first book, 'Mary Queen of Scots', and having it published. This brought to mind something she had said earlier about the pleasures of writing.

"I had not yet discovered that truth so perfectly expressed in a line of verse by Hugh's old friend, the poet-diplomat Sir Charles Johnston: "Having fun is such hard work." In time I would discover the truth of the exact opposite, that working hard on what you really wanted to do could be the greatest fun in the world."



*Guy Fawkes, was a member of a group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605, when they planned to blow up the Houses of Parliament. The foiling of this is celebrated annually in the UK on 5th November, by putting Guy Fawkes figures onto bonfires and letting off fireworks.

[Bettie · Rating 2 out of 5]

BOTW

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06rx463

Description: The early life of historian Lady Antonia Fraser. Her memoir describes growing up in the 1930s and 1940s but its real concern is with her growing love of History. The fascination began as a child - and developed into an enduring passion. She writes, 'for me, the study of History has always been an essential part of the enjoyment of life'.

Born Antonia Pakenham, the eldest of the eight children of the future Lord and Lady Longford, her childhood was spent in Oxford where her father was a don at Christ Church. Evacuation at the beginning of the war to a romantic Elizabethan manor house near Oxford was an inspiration for historical imaginings. There were adventures in Anglo-Ireland at Dunsany Castle and Pakenham Hall, each offering her treasured links to the past, which became private obsessions.

North Oxford wartime life included four years as one of the few girls then admitted to the Dragon School for Boys, followed by time at a convent school after her family's conversion to Catholicism. Antonia's father joined the Labour Government in 1945 as a Minister, which provided an odd background for exploits such as working in a Bond Street hat shop and a season as a self-made debutante. A job in publishing, by a fortunate coincidence, followed Oxford University and then the dramatic leap forward with the publishing of Mary Queen of Scots, which became a worldwide bestseller to general amazement - including that of the author.

The first episode of My History begins with the 4-year-old Antonia Pakenham being given Our Island Story by her godmother, a book whose impact reverberated through her life and inspired her to write history.

2/5: the teenage Antonia immerses herself in the world of Georgette Heyer and sees the world very much through romantic eyes, but she still enters the school history prize competition.

3/5: Antonia has converted to Catholicism as is pressured to become a nun. But she wants to be a journalist in the tabloid press and become a Deb - choices that come under critical gaze from the nuns who teach her and the Socialist mother who regards Court as frivolous.

4/5: the author falls in love with a young man, as her love of history matures and deepens at university. However, work struggles to compete for the attention of a young woman living and working in London with a new found appreciation for nightclubs.

5/5: Antonia Pakenham - now Fraser after her marriage to MP Hugh Fraser - writes her first serious book, a biography of Mary Queen of Scots, transforming her life.

[Nancy Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Antonia Fraser, Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, has had the kind of life we Americans imagine most British people to have had -- born into an aristocratic and titled family, attended to by servants, hobnobbing with the likes of John Betjeman, and being presented in court to the Queen. It's Masterpiece Theater come to life!

Unlike many American memoirs, Dame Antonia Fraser's book isn't about the scandals of her life (divorcing her husband Sir Hugh Fraser to marry the playwright Harold Pinter). It's about her awakenings. She talks about her family's political involvements and how they formed her politics, the books she read and how they shaped her imagination, her dual heritage in both England and Ireland and how it formed her character, her education and how it lead to her life's work as an adult. Of course, as she is a writer of historical nonfiction, the subject of history is a mainstay of the book. "As my childish enthusiasm for History developed into something more substantial, I began to feel possessive about it," she writes.

Dame Antonia has a delightfully dry sense of humor and an eye for the telling anecdote. My favorite part of the book is when she relates the challenges of trying to insert herself as a teen into the social scene of London when her family is marooned in Hampstead Garden Suburb (NW11), far from the center of the action. She turns to her aunt, who lives in Chester Gate, off Regent's Park (NW1, her dream postal district!). And her aunt's husband is Anthony Powell! Yes, THE Anthony Powell, author of "A Dance to the Music of Time." She overnights with them frequently to further her social capital, and at the same time soaks up the literary and historical aura of her hosts. (Her first love eventually turns out to be the son of a Scottish Earl!)

The book ends with the publication of her bestselling book, "Mary Queen of Scots," in 1969 and the reaction it got from the public, both critics and readers. It's fun to get the inside story of a book release. Dame Antonia's memoirs will be sure to appeal to lovers of both history and literature.

[Joan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fraser is a writer I admire. However, I found her autobiography slow going. This really was more of a 2.5 star title, than 3. Perhaps because she really doesn't seem to be aware what a privileged life she led, at least as a child. Perhaps also because there is such an emphasis on her conversion to Catholicism in this book. It is interesting in that I had not realized how many of her biographies were of Catholics. Otherwise, it was really far too much detail for me. She also is rather hard on herself in many instances. I don't think she would have been so tough on someone else she was writing about, and it was a bit unpleasant. She was entranced with history from a very young age and never really lost the desire to write history as a child or young woman. She considers it fortunate that her first biography was of Queen Mary of Scots since there is always interest in her. I was pleased that she attributed to two Americans the lesson that she needed to provide translations of French phrases in her books since that has often been a peeve of mine. Now of course, I will need to read her Mary Queen of Scots title!

[Doubleday Books · Rating 5 out of 5]

The acclaimed New York Times bestselling author shares vivid memories of her childhood and recalls the experiences that set her on the path to a writing life. My History is truly a remarkable work, a personal and heartfelt memoir that is also a love letter to a British way of life that has all but disappeared. Anglophiles, history lovers, and Downton Abbey fans are sure to be enthralled.
- Judy J., Doubleday Marketing Department

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

From BBC Radio 4 - Book at the Week:
The early life of historian Lady Antonia Fraser. Her memoir describes growing up in the 1930s and 1940s but its real concern is with her growing love of History. The fascination began as a child - and developed into an enduring passion. She writes, 'for me, the study of History has always been an essential part of the enjoyment of life'.

Born Antonia Pakenham, the eldest of the eight children of the future Lord and Lady Longford, her childhood was spent in Oxford where her father was a don at Christ Church. Evacuation at the beginning of the war to a romantic Elizabethan manor house near Oxford was an inspiration for historical imaginings. There were adventures in Anglo-Ireland at Dunsany Castle and Pakenham Hall, each offering her treasured links to the past, which became private obsessions.

North Oxford wartime life included four years as one of the few girls then admitted to the Dragon School for Boys, followed by time at a convent school after her family's conversion to Catholicism. Antonia's father joined the Labour Government in 1945 as a Minister, which provided an odd background for exploits such as working in a Bond Street hat shop and a season as a self-made debutante. A job in publishing, by a fortunate coincidence, followed Oxford University and then the dramatic leap forward with the publishing of Mary Queen of Scots, which became a worldwide bestseller to general amazement - including that of the author.

The first episode of My History begins with the 4-year-old Antonia Pakenham being given Our Island Story by her godmother, a book whose impact reverberated through her life and inspired her to write history.

2/5: the teenage Antonia immerses herself in the world of Georgette Heyer and sees the world very much through romantic eyes, but she still enters the school history prize competition.

3/5: Antonia has converted to Catholicism as is pressured to become a nun. But she wants to be a journalist in the tabloid press and become a Deb - choices that come under critical gaze from the nuns who teach her and the Socialist mother who regards Court as frivolous.

4/5: the author falls in love with a young man, as her love of history matures and deepens at university. However, work struggles to compete for the attention of a young woman living and working in London with a new found appreciation for nightclubs.

5/5: Antonia Pakenham - now Fraser after her marriage to MP Hugh Fraser - writes her first serious book, a biography of Mary Queen of Scots, transforming her life.

A Heavy Entertainment production for BBC Radio 4.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06rx463

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

My father loves Antonia Fraser’s books – I think he’s read all her histories and some of her detective fiction too. I’ve only read Mary, Queen of Scots (1969) and that was so long ago it predates keeping a reading journal and I can’t remember what I thought of it. Presumably not enough to have wanted to read the rest of my father’s collection.

But still, I was interested to read this memoir. I like literary biographies because it’s fascinating to see how writers develop…

Lady Antonia Fraser DBE was born in 1932 into a family privileged by class and education, where she led a charmed life as the eldest of eight children. However, hers was not a life of ostentatious or shallow privilege. Her father, Frank Pakenham, (a.k.a. Frank Longford) was an Oxford don who came from an old aristocratic Anglo-Irish family but was a ‘second son’, and he became Lord of Longford only because his older brother and heir to the title, had no children. The circumstances, however, were unusual, to say the least…

To read the rest of my review please visit http://anzlitlovers.com/2015/09/03/my...

[Kasa Cotugno · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although not as gut wrenching as her memoir about her life with Harold Pinter, this is a fine explanation of why Antonia Fraser was besotted with history from an early age. I was reminded of an interview with Hilary Mantel in which she reminisced about her childhood and how history was brought alive for her, giving her a sense of immediacy which translates into her fiction. Fraser had a more romantic introduction to the subject, but being raised in Oxford, being provided with that atmosphere of history and romance, would seem to lead to such a passion. Her descriptions of what it meant to be a young girl during the years of World War II are vivid, and her family life well executed.

[Linda A]

Very difficult read.

[Elizabeth · Rating 1 out of 5]

First off, I must state that I was thrilled to receive this book as a Goodreads Giveaway - an uncorrected proof from Doubleday - and I offer my thanks to Goodreads and the publisher. That said, I am really sorry to have to write a negative review. I forced myself to read the first 150+ pages before I had to take a break & move on to another book. A few days later I went back to "My History" and forced myself to read to p. 220 (of the total 266 pages in the book) and finally gave up altogether. Aside from the very beginning and a mid-section dealing with Fraser's conversion to Catholicism, I found this autobiography - aside from flashes of an endearing sense of humour and self-deprecating wit - to be paralyzingly dull, confusing, and bogged down in irrelevant minutiae. Another disappointment was the lack of photographs; unless they have been included in the final published edition I feel this is a huge omission. I see from other opinions that I am in the minority in not liking this book but, as one of the expectations of the Giveaway program is the writing of a review, here it is - warts and all.

[Kelly Furniss · Rating 3 out of 5]

Radio 4 Book Of the Week-audio. An interesting memoir of growing up in the 1930's in a privileged family. The acclaimed author tells us how she was drawn in to history and recounts her experiences of growing up in Britain through the War. A humorous, interesting book just nothing astounding to warrant rating the book much higher however the bit that stood out to me most was at the beginning that she was gifted a book as a child that sparked her life love of history and eventually led to her successful career. Moments like this that you read make you realise how destiny can be shaped!.

[Sherry Mackay · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let me just say I have read her nonfiction and her Jemima shore books and enjoyed them all but this one was hard going. It was as though a rather dim old lady had got stuck into her bottle of gin and started speaking about her past without giving you any references or explanations as to people and places. She speaks of a time and place so long past and so unfamiliar to the average reader that it is almost incomprehensible. Boy did this book need a really good editor!! Really needed someone to whip it into shape and give it coherency. Sadly it just wandered all over the place.

[Katharine · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable memoir recounting the author's childhood to young adulthood and the beginnings of her lifelong devotion to history. As a fellow history nerd from an early age I could certainly relate to this. The most enjoyable parts of the book for me were her memories of her North Oxford childhood and her distinguished parents, the occasionally unworldly academic and Labour politician Frank Pakenham (later Lord Longford) and Elizabeth, latterly a very distinguished biographer, but always intelligent and interesting. The author's late teenage years and young adulthood were more a catalogue of who she met and socialised with though the anecdotes are always told in a self-deprecating manner. There are interesting moments during her career in publishing during the early years of Weidenfeld and Nicholson and the book ends with her marriage to Hugh Fraser, a Conservative MP. I felt the author's heart was more in writing about her childhood and that was the part that came alive for me but I did enjoy the book as a whole.

[Yenta Knows · Rating 3 out of 5]

You know, I want to like Antonia Fraser, but what am I to make of her asserting, on page 52, that Harold Pinter’s exile from Hackney to Cornwall was a distance of 600 miles?

I’m American, but that didn’t sound right to me, so I mapped it. My start point was Hackney, the neighborhood in East London, my end point was the middle of Cornwall. It is a little under 300 miles.

How could Fraser, a native Brit, an historian, and a publishing professional, be wrong by a factor of two? And why didn’t her editor notice this?

I read Fiona Hill’s book “There is nothing for you here” just before this one. Two clever British lasses, though born about 30 years apart. I am afraid that Antonia comes off as … well, privileged, entitled, and a bit of a snob. Hill scratched and scrambled for everything. Fraser took her time, secure in the knowledge that an Oxbridge education was hers when she decided she wanted it.

Here’s a key difference between Fraser and Hill: Hill writes understandable sentences, Fraser tells her stories in beautifully constructed prose (maybe there’s something to early study of Latin and Greek). But while Hill sees her experiences in the larger context of socioeconomic forces, Fraser’s stories are just — stories.

An example: Fraser was sometimes asked if working for the brilliant Jewish refugee, George Weidenfeld, was “difficult.” But instead of seeing this for the deep rooted anti-semitism that it is, Fraser just reports her clever reply. Fraser tells you what happened. Hill tells you why it happened and what it means.

I think my Fraser phase is coming to an end. I read her biography of Marie Antoinette. I am going to read her memoir of life with Harold Pinter. And then I’m on to other books.

[Nicola Pierce · Rating 4 out of 5]

I much preferred her book about her marriage to Harold Pinter but this is still an interesting read. This memoir involves her childhood up to her first marriage and bestseller, in that order. I would have liked so much more about the marriage and bestseller (which was written after producing five children in quick succession) and was not overly absorbed by the accounts of her religious interests or her parents' political activities. In any case, she led a charming life. The name-dropping is fascinating by itself, her parents and extended family seemed to only know the most important people, artists and politicians.

The book only truly grabbed me with her entrance to Oxford. I had hoped to read more about her development as a writer and, though, it was definitely mentioned, it felt very contained, like the marriage/motherhood/bestseller. I still enjoy reading her though.

[Katharine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not for everyone, I think. But if you have read her histories and the memoir about her time with Harold Pinter , Must You Go may enjoy it.
To say that she was born and lived in the highest realm of upper middle class privilege is putting it mildly. To read it and compare the parenting of today will make you wonder. She was the eldest of 6 and her parents were content to hand over most child care to nanny's, undoubtably poorly paid single women. Yet Antonia's love of history and her experiences are interesting and a look into a way of life pretty much unknown in the US.
She is writing as a historian, for the record,( she is 88) and she never ventures into the TMI of many current writers. Yet it would have made for a livelier read if she had shared more of her feelings and not just events and names.

[Jo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was rather disappointed by this disjointed memoir about a privileged young woman from an aristocratic background. The focus is firmly on Antonia Fraser's love of history and what history means to her. The book begins and ends with her passion for the story of Mary, Queen of Scots (Antonia Fraser finally had her own book about the unfortunate young queen published in May 1969). Fraser keeps the reader at a distance throughout the memoir while introducing us to a huge cast of influential characters from her childhood and teen years. There's nothing very personal about this snapshot of her early life and it's all rather factual and lacking in emotion.

[HelenA33 · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were bits of this book that I found interesting (such as the author's conversion to Catholicism) but on the whole I found this book dull, dull, dull. Lots of details of who's who in the Labour Party in the '50's and society people in general - I had hoped for more personal anecdotes rather than the formality of life at Oxford.

[Candia L · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of the author’s life until her first marriage: her clever, well connected and eccentric family, her interesting schooling and the development of her passion for history. My main criticism is her frequent mention of people unknown to most younger readers without sufficient explanation of who they are.

[Celia Crotteau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in self-deprecatory style that suggests she does not take herself too seriously, this eminent British historian recalls growing up in a celebrated family of social activists/intellectuals during and just after World War II.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

c2015 (11) FWFTB: 1930, Pakenham, Oxford, Dragon School, Catholicism. Such a fascinating memoir. Its funny, enlightening and evokes a wonderful atmosphere of the 1930s. I have enjoyed many of Ms Fraser's books and this one is no exception. Highly recommended to the normal crew.

[Dorothy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I envy her for knowing what she wanted to do with her life…. Write about historical figures. I received Mary Queen of Scots as a birthday gift from a boyfriend who knew I was enchanted by anything having to do with the UK.
Now I shall read her life with Harold Pintner.

[Olga Vannucci · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, I wish that I may see
The romance of history.

[Mary Montgomery · Rating 3 out of 5]

She was known as a biographer but in telling her story she reached the pinnacle of her genre, as least as far as all I've read that she wrote. It was also fun.

[Susanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and highly recommended. An exceptional writer.

[David]

3.5 stars
An engaging memoir from an accomplished biographer.

[Tracey- Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good interesting read .

[Capedaisy · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you love Antonia Fraser and her writing as I do, you will appreciate this lively, interesting memoir of her childhood and young adulthood. Highly recommended.

[Jane Gregg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read Antonia Fraser’s memoirs in the wrong sequence, but I think it has been a better way to do it. This one is great too.

[Joan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good story of growing up in the war years, post-war London and a budding writer