Volume 20, Number 1 · February 8, 1973
Nancy
By Noel Annan
Nancy: The Life of Lady Astor
by Christopher Sykes
Harper & Row, 543 pp., $10.00
Christopher Sykes is one of the best biographers in the business in England today, and in tackling Lady Astor he certainly needs to be, if only to justify his opening statement that in her day she was one of the five or six most famous women in the world. The contention is dubious if by famous is meant the number of inches of newsprint published about her doings and utterances: already by her time the movie stars and celebrities were pushing titled Americans off the front page. It is out of the question if by famous is meant the quality which makes a person's memory glow for generations to come. If history has a scrap album, she would certainly feature in one of the photos, but her achievements do not earn her a footnote in the text. Strength of personality is not itself sufficient to earn a mention unless it is concentrated remorselessly toward achieving some objective.
Review, 1808 words
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