Search results for ""Author Shirley Williams""

The role of women in our society has changed out of all recognition. But it has changed least in the House of Commons. I want to describe those changes and the resistances to them through the magnifying glass of my own life, a life that coincides with our turbulent post-war history.'Shirley Williams was born to politics. As well as being influenced by her mother, Vera Brittian, her father George Caitlin, a leading political scientist, encouraged his daughter to have high ambitions for herself - including daring to climb the bookshelves in his library. Elected as MP for Hitchin in 1964, she was a member of the Wilson and Callaghan governments and was also the Secretary of State for Education. As one of the 'Gang of Four' Shirley Williams famously broke away from the Labour Party to found the SDP in 1981 and later supported its merger with the Liberal Party to form the Liberal Democrats. CLIMBING THE BOOKSHELVES is the voice of strong and passionate woman of luminous intelligence.

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'That politics was the most exciting of all the exciting things in the world I never doubted'Shirley Williams was born to politics. As well as being influenced by her mother, Vera Brittan, her father George Catlin, a leading political scientist, encouraged his daughter to have high ambitions for herself - including daring to climb the bookshelves in his library. Elected as MP for Hitchin in 1964, she was a member of the Wilson and Callaghan governments and was also the Secretary of State for Education. As one of the 'Gang of Four' Shirley Williams famously broke away from the Labour Party to found the SDP in 1981 and later supported its merger with the Liberal Party to form the Liberal Democrats. This is her story.Praise for Climbing the Bookshelves'Very few politicians are loved, but Shirley Williams was one' Independent'She speaks human, which is a surprisingly rare political talent' Guardian'Decent, sensible, honest and endearing, this book is Shirley Williams to a T' The Times

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NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE With an introduction by her biographer, Mark Bostridge'Remains one of the most powerful and widely read war memoirs of all time' GUARDIAN 'Vera Brittain's heart-rending account of the way her generation's lives changed is still as shocking and moving as ever' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'A heartbreaking account of the impact of the First World War on a stout-hearted, high-minded young woman' SUNDAY TIMES In 1914 Vera Brittain was twenty, and as war was declared she was preparing to study at Oxford. Four years later her life - and the lives of a whole generation - had changed in a way that was unimaginable in the tranquil pre-war era.Testament of Youth, one of the most famous autobiographies of the First World War, is Brittain's account of how she survived the period; how she lost the man she loved; how she nursed the wounded and how she emerged into an altered world. A passionate record of a lost generation, it made Vera Brittain one of the best-loved writers of her time.

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