The Duchess of Windsor: The Uncommon Life of Wallis Simpson

Portada
Citadel Press, 2000 - 556 páginas
It was the love story of the century -- the king and the commoner. In December 1936, King Edward VIII renounced the throne to marry "the woman that I love", Wallis Warfield Simpson, a twice-divorced American. His love quickly became one of the twentieth century's most famous personalities. Until her death in 1986, she was a figure of intrigue and mystery, both admired and reviled.

For years interest in her story has remained constant, resulting in a small library of books. All of these biographies share one quality: a thinly veiled animosity toward the subject.

The Duchess of Windsor sifts the decades of rumor and accusation to reveal the woman behind the legend. The Duchess's hold over her husband, her alleged sexual secrets and experiences, the couple's bitter relationship with the British Royal Family, and their involvement with Hitler and the Third Reich are all fully examined.

From her birth in Pennsylvania in 1896, during the Gilded Age, to her death in Paris in 1986, Greg King takes the reader through a world of privilege, palaces, titles, high society, and love to an accompaniment of hatreds, feuds, conspiracies, and lies. The cast of characters is vast: Lady Diana Cooper; Harold Nicolson and Vita Sackville-West; Nancy Astor; Emerald Cunard; Noel Coward; Cecil Beaton; Lord and Lady Mountbatten; the Vanderbilts; Pamela Harriman; Adolf Hitler; Winston Churchill; and hundreds of others -- politicians and presidents, dictators and socialites.

Using previously untapped sources, the author presents a complete and, for the first time, sympathetic portrait of the Duchess. Wild speculations -- about her past affairs, her domination of the duke, and her tragic and lonely end --are answered.

Wrongly blamed for the abdication crisis, Wallis suffered years of hostility from the Royal Family and much of the world. The truth is infinitely more fascinating than the shallow, pathetic portrait previously painted.

Dentro del libro

Índice

Romeo and Juliet in Baltimore
3
Childhood
14
Youth
26
Win
38
Marriage
46
China
58
Ernest
68
The Prince of Wales
79
Exile in Paris
290
Two Houses
301
War
317
The Plot to Kidnap the Windsors
328
The Bahamas
341
The Visit to America
351
The Duchesss War Work
358
Shady Friendships Murder and Treachery
367

A Fateful Weekend
97
Wallis in Wonderland
106
The Relationship Deepens
116
The Passing of the King
131
The New Reign
139
The Kings Mistress
150
The Nahlin Cruise
164
The Divorce
173
Growing Troubles
181
A Pretty Kettle of Fish
193
The Morganatic Marriage Proposal
200
Flight to France
210
The Struggle for the Throne
219
Abdication
233
Rat Week
241
The Whole World Against Us and Our Love
251
At War With the Royal Family
258
The Wedding
264
The Visit to Germany
277
Postwar Wanderings
376
The Death of the King
386
The Last Two Houses
393
A Woman of Style
403
Life in Paris
413
41
421
American Adventures 393
424
The Windsors and the Royal Family
441
Declining Years
452
The Dukes Death
461
Wallis Alone
476
Last Years
487
Epilogue
495
Acknowledgments
507
Source Notes
511
Bibliography
537
Index
549
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