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Full Description
1946. Having taken one of the first post-War passenger flights across the Atlantic, England is a far cry from the glamorous world six-year-old Frederica has left behind - vibrant New York - where her French mother and English father, novelist and playwright Nigel Dennis, befriended the likes of WH Auden, Peggy Guggenheim, Saul Bellow. Now, with just her mother and sister, in a thatched cottage - no electricity, no running water - deep in the woods of Hertfordshire, she awaits her father's arrival, asking 'Why are we here?'
But change is on Frederica's horizon: summers spent on the Ile de Ré; reassurance found in a Quaker boarding school; a second taste of glamour savoured at theatrical parties; the benevolence of her great-uncle, Ernan Forbes Dennis, former British Vice-Consul and MI6 agent, and his novelist wife, Phyllis Bottome...
Readers will delight as Frederica narrates her unconventional upbringing with a blend of warmth and nostalgia for both the ordinary and extraordinary characters that populated her childhood, from nuns to Vogue debutantes, writers, artists, activists... and not least, Dolly, with her cake on Friday.
Contents
Chapter 1 - ARRIVING IN POST-WAR ENGLAND FROM NEW YORK (1946) -11
Chapter 2 - NEW YORK (1940-1946) - 12
Chapter 3 - NIGEL'S SCOTTISH AND ENGLISH FAMILY BBC Radio 3 interviews (1980s) - 19
Chapter 4 - NINI'S FRENCH FAMILY - 31
Chapter 5 - SETTLING DOWN IN POST-WAR ENGLAND - 37
Chapter 6 - THE ILE DE RE, CHARENTE-MARITIME, FRANCE - 44
Chapter 7 - FORMOSA SCHOOL, ESSENDON, HERTFORDSHIRE Elisabeth Wilson - 54
Chapter 8 - THE THATCHED COTTAGE IN THE WOODS before NIGEL - 58
Chapter 9 - THE THATCHED COTTAGE IN THE WOODS with NIGEL - 61
Chapter 10 - ST MARY'S CONVENT, BISHOP'S STORTFORD Nini's Houses - Christmases. Aunt Eve and Uncle David Henley-Welch - 75
Chapter 11 - GREAT-UNCLE ERNAN FORBES DENNIS AND HIS NOVELIST WIFE, PHYLLIS BOTTOME The Tennerhof in Kitzbuhel - St Ives - London - Phyllis's death - Freda Levson - 87
Chapter 12 - CASA FORBES ON LAKE ORTA, ITALY - 113
Chapter 13 - NIGEL'S BOOKS, PLAYS. THE ROYAL COURT THEATRE Parties! - Nigel's epilepsy - Move to Malta - Death - 118
Chapter 14 - PAX HILL FINISHING SCHOOL and FARNHAM ART SCHOOL - 132
Chapter 15 - ST GODRIC'S SECRETARIAL COLLEGE, HAMPSTEAD Thessaloniki and Athens, Greece - 134
Chapter 16 - PARIS: THE BRITISH INSTITUTE. THE SORBONNE Taranto, Italy - 138
Chapter 17 - FIRST JOB: VOGUE MAGAZINE - 145
Afterword - A HAPPIER FAMILY - 151
