⇒ Descargar Gratis Daughter of Empire My Life as a Mountbatten Pamela Hicks Books

Daughter of Empire My Life as a Mountbatten Pamela Hicks Books

Download As PDF : Daughter of Empire My Life as a Mountbatten Pamela Hicks Books

Daughter of Empire My Life as a Mountbatten Pamela Hicks Books

This is an engaging memoir of the early years of the life Pamela Mountbatten Hicks. The writing is engaging and moves quickly as the writer appears to be a plain spoken woman and she writes in that manner. Her family life as a young girl was conventionally unconventional. As the daughter of Lord Mountbatten and his beautiful and audacious wife Edwina, Pamela and her sister lived in a world of bold face names -- the British royal family, foreign royals, famous politicians etc. and when Hicks speaks of them it's never in a name dropping manner rather in the manner of someone who knew all of these people and interacted with them as part of normal everyday life. Her parents had an open marriage in which her mother's lovers became part of the "family" and from what Hicks says in the book were loved and loving in turn to her and her sister. Lord Mountbatten ultimately also had another partner and she too became part of the extended family. Hicks doesn't spend time on condemning or condoning the situation or whinging that this situation affected her or her sister adversely instead she appears to take it in stride as the "way it was" and just got on with her own life. It is quite obvious that she adored her father and he in turn adored her. Her affection for her mother appears to be less but at no point does she feel the need to bash her mother.
I thought that the most fascinating part of the book covered the time she spent in India when in effect she was her father's hostess while he was the Viceroy. She does a very good job of presenting the agonizing her father went through as he tried to decide whether or not to accept the appointment which meant he'd have to leave the Royal Navy to which he was devoted and also have the tremendous task of moving India to independence from Great Britain while balancing the needs and wants of the various factions in Indian politics. Once her father accepts the assignment as his duty and the family moves to India, Hicks does a very fine job of describing her life in that exotic country so far removed from the life she knew in England. It's a tribute to Hicks as a person that she went to India with an open mind and found that she loved the country and the people she met. There is an appreciation of India that comes through in her writing which is quite surprising in that one would expect that a young woman of her background would not have been enthralled by the country based on other accounts people have written of being posted to colonial India. Instead Hicks is quite broken up when her father's viceroyship ends and they return to Great Britain and he resumes his career in the Royal Navy. Some of her most touching writing involves her interactions with and observations of Nehru and Gandhi as well as the servants in the household to whom she became close. Nehru and Gandhi become people and not just historical figures as a result.
The book ends when she is in her thirties and is about to marry her husband, David Hicks. Hopefully Hicks will write the story of her marriage and the tragedy that struck the family when her father and one of her sons was killed by an IRA bomb planted on the family boat. On a happier note, I think the fact that she named her daughter India says volumes about her connection to and emotion for the country where she spent part of her youth.


Tags : Amazon.com: Daughter of Empire: My Life as a Mountbatten (9781476733821): Pamela Hicks: Books,Pamela Hicks,Daughter of Empire: My Life as a Mountbatten,Simon & Schuster,1476733821,Hicks, Pamela,Ladies-in-waiting - Great Britain,Ladies-in-waiting;Great Britain;Biography.,Upper class - Great Britain,Upper class women - Great Britain,Upper class women;Great Britain;Biography.,Upper class;Great Britain;Biography.,Autobiography: historical, political & military,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Historical,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Women,Biography,Biography & Autobiography,Biography & AutobiographyPersonal Memoirs,Biography & AutobiographyWomen,Biography Autobiography,Biography And Autobiography,BiographyAutobiography,Great Britain,Historical - General,Ladies-in-waiting,Monarchy And Aristocracy,Personal Memoirs,Upper class,Upper class women,Viceroy's House; Mountbatten; Louis Mountbatten; Lord Mountbatten; Lady Mountbatten; Edwina Mountbatten; India; Viceroy of India; Gandhi; Nehru; Partition of India; Indian Independence; Princess Elizabeth; Queen Elizabeth; Prince Phillip; Sir Winston Churchill; Noel Coward; Douglas Fairbanks; Duchess of Windsor; Wallace Simpson; Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt; David Hicks; India Hicks,Women,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Historical,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Women,Biography & AutobiographyPersonal Memoirs,Biography & AutobiographyWomen,Historical - General,Personal Memoirs,Women,Biography Autobiography,Biography,Great Britain,Ladies-in-waiting,Upper class,Upper class women,Biography And Autobiography,Monarchy And Aristocracy,Biography & Autobiography,BiographyAutobiography,Autobiography: historical, political & military

Daughter of Empire My Life as a Mountbatten Pamela Hicks Books Reviews

Greatly enjoyed this sensitively written book. The authors parents were both intriguing individuals with a very unconventional marriage. Yet they worked tirelessly for others and seemed to be excellent partners in their work together and their compassion for the downtrodden. Related to most of the British European and Russian royalty the author has many interesting vignettes to relate
An easy read with lots of gossip about her parents, their friends, and the part they played in the end of the Raj. Reading this spurred me on to buy “Indian Summer” which is also easy to read and goes into more detail about the politics and all the politicians active in the twilight of British domination of India. Speaking with contemporary East Indians that I have the privilege of meeting, they are thankful for the outstanding railroad system the Brits left behind. Learning the English language probably gave them a leg up too as we now see them exceeding our country in economic growth. There is a much bigger, more comprehensive book titled, “the Raj” that is not an easy read but something worth plugging through for any scholar or serious student of India. The subject book is an easy place to start getting motivated
If you read a lot of English history.add this to your list. If not, you are likely to be bored. Pamela Hicks provides an interesting view of India during the time of partition. Her father, Lord Mountbatten was the last of the
British viceroys, She was a teenager at the time. Her recollections reflect her age, that is she focuses on the people, Nehru, Ghandi.without displaying an understanding of the political chaos in which she was living.
Hicks was made a lady-in-waiting to the then Princess Elizabeth and was on the fateful Commonwealth Tour when the King died. She was one of the four people staying at Treetops in Kenya when the word finally got through. Her recollections of that time are poignant. She was later to join the remainder of the Commonwealth Tour after the Coronation.
She observes the greater demands as a lady-in-waiting to the Queen,
.
.
The book is ok. The story is really all over the place though. I bought this looking for more about Pamela Hicks life as it dealt with court and other English aristocrats. This book, however, devotes most of its page count to rehashing information one could get from her other book India Remembered.

There isn't really enough additional detail added to any point in her life to warrant this book, unless you haven't also already read India Remembered.
I found out about this book when the New York Times published the obituary of Lady Pamela's sister this spring. Highly recommend it for anyone interested in British and Indian history of the early to mid 20th century. Wish the book had kept going past the 1950s. It is a memoir that captured my interest.
Extremely interesting memoir from a member of the Mountbatten (Battenburg) royal family of Britain, chosen by the book club I belong to. We all loved the book for different reasons. Here are mine

Before reading the book, I had cynical views regarding the intelligence and usefulness of members of the British royal family. I didn't think that they were bright, wise, deep or particularly literate, or that they acted with good social purpose.

Reading this book blew those preconceptions out of the water... and to me, any book that changes my opinion with facts is a worthwhile book. In addition this book is a delightful and engaging read.

Lady Pamela Hicks writes colourfully and beautifully about her life in England and in diplomatic service outside the UK - with incisive depth and humour, and surprising modesty and lack of class snobbery. My favourite part of the book deals with her diplomatic work in India in the late 1940s, at the time of partition and the creation of Pakistan.

Read this book!
This is an engaging memoir of the early years of the life Pamela Mountbatten Hicks. The writing is engaging and moves quickly as the writer appears to be a plain spoken woman and she writes in that manner. Her family life as a young girl was conventionally unconventional. As the daughter of Lord Mountbatten and his beautiful and audacious wife Edwina, Pamela and her sister lived in a world of bold face names -- the British royal family, foreign royals, famous politicians etc. and when Hicks speaks of them it's never in a name dropping manner rather in the manner of someone who knew all of these people and interacted with them as part of normal everyday life. Her parents had an open marriage in which her mother's lovers became part of the "family" and from what Hicks says in the book were loved and loving in turn to her and her sister. Lord Mountbatten ultimately also had another partner and she too became part of the extended family. Hicks doesn't spend time on condemning or condoning the situation or whinging that this situation affected her or her sister adversely instead she appears to take it in stride as the "way it was" and just got on with her own life. It is quite obvious that she adored her father and he in turn adored her. Her affection for her mother appears to be less but at no point does she feel the need to bash her mother.
I thought that the most fascinating part of the book covered the time she spent in India when in effect she was her father's hostess while he was the Viceroy. She does a very good job of presenting the agonizing her father went through as he tried to decide whether or not to accept the appointment which meant he'd have to leave the Royal Navy to which he was devoted and also have the tremendous task of moving India to independence from Great Britain while balancing the needs and wants of the various factions in Indian politics. Once her father accepts the assignment as his duty and the family moves to India, Hicks does a very fine job of describing her life in that exotic country so far removed from the life she knew in England. It's a tribute to Hicks as a person that she went to India with an open mind and found that she loved the country and the people she met. There is an appreciation of India that comes through in her writing which is quite surprising in that one would expect that a young woman of her background would not have been enthralled by the country based on other accounts people have written of being posted to colonial India. Instead Hicks is quite broken up when her father's viceroyship ends and they return to Great Britain and he resumes his career in the Royal Navy. Some of her most touching writing involves her interactions with and observations of Nehru and Gandhi as well as the servants in the household to whom she became close. Nehru and Gandhi become people and not just historical figures as a result.
The book ends when she is in her thirties and is about to marry her husband, David Hicks. Hopefully Hicks will write the story of her marriage and the tragedy that struck the family when her father and one of her sons was killed by an IRA bomb planted on the family boat. On a happier note, I think the fact that she named her daughter India says volumes about her connection to and emotion for the country where she spent part of her youth.