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David Cecil
Biography & Memoir
James Mustich
Jul 31, 2018
David Cecil’s biography of the British statesman William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, is reputed to have been John F. Kennedy’s favorite book. If that’s true, the thirty-fifth president had extremely good taste. Melbourne’s role as mentor to Queen Victoria upon her ascension to the throne at the age of eighteen is of considerable historical interest, but his life has a compelling narrative beyond his role as prime minister and early counselor to the young woman who became such an enduring monarch. In fact, Melbourne’s life fell rather neatly into two parts, as reflected in the two halves of Cecil’s work—The Young Melbourne and the Story of His Marriage with Caroline Lamb, published in 1939, and Lord M, or the Later Life of Lord Melbourne, which appeared in 1954. Each half is galvanized by a woman whose presence enriches with drama and character the events of Melbourne’s political career. Cecil’s sensitivity to Melbourne’s singular progress shapes a book that provides the reading pleasure of the great English novels, for it boasts not only the illuminating alertness of Austen but the expansive intelligence of George Eliot as well.
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James Romano
Apr 22, 2020
If you like biographies pick this one up.
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