Book description
Great-grandson of a crofter and son-in-law of a Duke, Harold
Macmillan (1894-1986) was both complex as a person and influential as
a politican. Marked by terrible experiences in the trenches in the
First World War and by his work as an MP during the Depression, he was
a Tory rebel - an outspoken backbencher, opposing the economic
policies of the 1930s and the appeasement policies of his own government.
Churchill gave him responsibility during the Second World War with
executive command as 'Viceroy of the Mediterranean'. After the War, in
opposition, Macmillan was one of the principal reformers of the
Conservatives, and after 1951, back in government, served in several
important posts before becoming Prime Minister after the Suez Crisis.
Supermac examines key events including the controversy over the
Cossacks repatriation, the Suez Crisis, You've Never Had It So Good,
the Winds of Change, the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Profumo Scandal.
The culmination of thirty-five years of research into this period by
one of our most respected historians, this book gives an unforgettable
portrait of a turbulent age.
Shortlisted for the Orwell Prize.
D. R. Thorpe's work on the constitutional history and politics of the
20th century has made him one of Britain's most respected historians. He
has written biographies of Alec Douglas-Home, Anthony Eden, Selwyn
Lloyd, Austen Chamberlain, Lord Curzon and Lord Butler. Thorpe is a
senior member of Brasenose College, Oxford, and has been a Fellow of
Churchill College, Cambridge, and of St Antony's College, Oxford.
