Aug - St Teath Village Website

A GOOD READ
Elizabeth: Her Life, Our Times. A Diamond Jubilee Celebration.
By Alan Titchmarsh.
16
He’s a bit of a National Treasure himself, so who better than Alan Titchmarsh to go digging deep into the
Royal archives for this cheerful tribute to the Queen?
And he’s done a grand job of it. He looks at her as a monarch, as a mum and a grandmother and as a
brave and remarkable woman in her own right.
His personal encounters with the Queen and other members of the Royal family help him to tell the story
of her reign without any feeling of a dry history lesson – he paints characters sympathetically and with
plenty of interesting asides about their quirks and foibles.
There’s a treasure trove of detail about all the key events, the coronation, the world tours, all those royal
weddings we watched so avidly and the Silver and Golden Jubilees.
And he doesn’t shy away from the bad times. He takes us back to the dreadful “annus horribilis “ of 1992
when the marriages of her three eldest children ended and Windsor Castle caught fire, and the terrible
year of 1997 when Princess Diana died and for a while the mood of the country seemed to have turned
against the Queen.
It all sets the the Queen’s dignity, sense of duty and sheer hard work into context. In marked contrast to
many other members of her family, no matter how grim things were at home, no matter how gruelling her
routine of engagements, she has never stopped doing her best. Like the nation’s favourite tea-towel slogan,
our monarch always keeps calm and carries on.
Alan has amassed enough meticulous research to keep a pub quizmaster in business for months and
this book has been beautifully illustrated with the pick of the best royal photos from the past 60 years.
There are also endless illustrations of memorabilia which will fascinate anyone interested in British society
and how it has changed over the past 60 years. We may not be so politely reverent nowadays –
some modern memorabilia is downright saucy - but there is no mistaking our national affection for a
Monarch who has served us so well for 60 years.
For many of us this has been a year to remember because of the Jubilee parties and events we helped
organise or the celebrations that we enjoyed. This book is a perfect companion for the souvenirs and
photos we will be storing away to remind ourselves of a Diamond year.
SUDUKO