No-one can deny that Margaret Thatcher was a divisive figure. As so often, I’m somewhere in the middle. To me, Thatcher has qualities that one can admire, even if one isn’t supportive – to put it mildly – of everything she did. As an autobiography, it’s wholly unsurprising that it is her positive attributes that tend to shine through here.

Margaret Thatcher: The Autobiography (Hardback) - Waterstones

Let’s move on to Robin Harris’s book. I think he was Margaret Thatcher’s speech writer and helped her write her memoirs. But what does he add to this story that is not in the official biography? Charles Moore focuses very much on her private decision making processes, rather than discussing the broader social and political landscape. Does Harris do more of that?For example, Martin Gilbert’s life of Churchill in eight volumes is unutterably tedious. It’s the sort of thing I’d like to see used as an alternative to custody for young offenders. I’d make them read all eight volumes, rather than going to chokey—that would teach them a lesson they wouldn’t forget. But Charles’s book isn’t boring. If you’re not interested in certain questions, such as foreign policy, he does go on a bit about that. But he has to; she was an international figure. The last time I saw Denis would have been March or April 2003. He died that autumn. He was just about to go to hospital. I asked him what he’d like to drink. He said he’d have a gin and vermouth. I got a large tumbler and started filling it with gin and asked him to say ‘when’. It was quite near the top when he said ‘when’. Then I put the vermouth in. It went down amazingly rapidly. Critics and supporters alike recognise the Thatcher premiership as a period of fundamental importance in British history. Margaret Thatcher accumulated huge prestige over the course of the 1980s and often compelled the respect even of her bitterest critics. Indeed, her effect on the terms of political debate has been profound. Whether they were converted to 'Thatcherism', or merely forced by the electorate to pay it lip service, the Labour Party leadership was transformed by her period of office and the 'New Labour' politics of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown would not have existed without her. Her legacy remains the core of modern British politics: the world economic crisis since 2008 has revived many of the arguments of the 1980s, keeping her name at the centre of political debate in Britain. Robin is a very clever man. He’s a highly intelligent, highly educated man, who was ‘present at the creation.’ And then he followed the story through. That’s the advantage of his book—it’s based on immersion in the life of Mrs Thatcher. It’s a more spontaneous book. He also says things like, ‘You don’t tax a loss, you can only tax a profit, so we need rich people. We need to create money. If you are a Labour adherent and you want to welfare state, then you have to accept that that welfare state has to be paid for and, it’s only paid for by rich people and rich companies.’

The Downing Street Years - Wikipedia The Downing Street Years - Wikipedia

rapid rebuttal）跟Joseph Keith的软弱形成鲜明对比。”The Thatcher camp, which had retained discipline throughout, now suffered a lapse of taste.””It looked as though they were rubbing Heath’s nose in his defeat.” The importance of decisiveness in a leader (I.e., the then PM Heath quite indecisive in the timing of calling the general election). It seems that quite often a Prime Minister will resign when his party loses the majority in Parliament. “In later years, when asked why he had lost the leadership of his party, Heath used to say that it was simply because he had not handed out enough honors. There were other, bigger reasons, but he was not completely wrong.” Her response was characteristic: at the Conservative Party's annual conference in October 1986, her speech foreshadowed a mass of reforms for a third Thatcher Government.With the economy now very strong, prospects were good for an election and the government was returned with a Parliamentary majority of 101in June 1987. Margaret Hilda Roberts was born 13 October 1925 in Grantham, Lincolnshire. Her father owned a grocery store and was active in the local Methodist Church and Liberal politics. Margaret won a scholarship to the local Kesteven and Grantham Girls’ School, where she became head-girl. She applied to Somerville College, Oxford University, and was accepted to study chemistry in 1943. She graduated in 1947 with second-class honours. During her time at Oxford, she was elected President of the Oxford University Conservative Association in 1946.We ask experts to recommend the five best books in their subject and explain their selection in an interview. The economy continued to improve during the 1983-87 Parliament and the policy of economic liberalisation was extended. The government began to pursue a policy of selling state assets, which in total had amounted to more than 20 per cent of the economy when the Conservatives came to power in 1979. The British privatisations of the 1980s were the first of their kind and proved influential across the world.

Margaret Thatcher : The Autobiography - Google Books

In international terms, her effect on bringing down the Berlin Wall and her relationship with Gorbachev were very important. It’s just a shame that he’s been replaced with another form of tyrant, but at least it’s a tyrant who has, as yet, not moved too far beyond the boundaries of his own country. British policy in Northern Ireland had been a standing source of conflict for every Prime Minister since 1969, but Margaret Thatcher aroused the IRA's special hatred for her refusal to meet their political demands, notably during the 1980-81 prison hunger strikes. The Labour Government of 1974-79 was one of the most crisis-prone in British history, leading the country to a state of virtual bankruptcy in 1976 when a collapse in the value of the currency on the foreign exchanges forced the government to negotiate credit from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF imposed tight expenditure controls on the government as a condition of the loan, which, ironically, improved Labour's public standing. By summer 1978, it even looked possible that it might win re-election.

That, if you like, has been the argument between Remainers and Leavers ever since. You either believe in this country or you don’t. She did and he didn’t. I went to the Falkland Islands six or seven years ago and she is regarded as a god-like figure there because of what she did. They know they wouldn’t be living there in those circumstances if she hadn’t acted as she did. That was something that came up out of the blue, but she also understood that this country had become profoundly anti-democratic in that it was run largely by trade union leaders. I wonder whether he’ll do a second edition in a few years’ time. I think there were some cabinet papers he was unable to access under the 30-year rule. That’s the only thing that’s missing from the book, simply because when he was writing the first volumes not everything was out. Everything’s out now. It’s certainly one of those rare books that, if more information arises, it should be updated.