The Viceroy's Daughters: The Lives of the Curzon Sisters

I have always wanted to read this book. I was so pleased to find it.

Unlike the Mitford girls, the Curzon sisters were essentially useless creatures, though one could base a really good revolution on their cosseted existence and horrid antics. Upper classes in every land produce people like them, but the English do it particularly well. I remember at lunch one day hearing a well-known older titled lady, refer to a deceased -and very grand- noblewoman, saying, "Yes, and _________ made the Curzon sisters look like nuns!" After reading "The Viceroy's Daughters" I now know that the 1920s and '30s were much more wild than I ever imagined... and I was a teenager in the 1960's! If you enjoy the perfectly dreadful, really meaningless, but drama-filled lives of some of society's sacred monsters, Anne de Courcy's superbly written and meticulously researched book is just the thing.

"The Viceroy's Daughters: The Lives of the Curzon Sisters" takes you into the homes-and the bedrooms-of some of Britain's most powerful figures in the period between the two World Wars. The Viceroy was Lord Curzon, a smart and ambitious aristocrat who married a beautiful American heiress. When she died, at the turn of the last century, she left him with a lot of money and three attractive, willful daughters. These three daughters-Irene, Cimmie and Baba-never did that much in their own rights (they were no Mitford sisters) but they did circulate in very interesting crowds. IN addition, their wealth gave them a tremendous sense of independence and ability to pursue their interests.Irene, the eldest, never married. Her life was filled with men, foxes, and drink (not necessarily in that order). Cimmie, the middle, married the British fascist Oswald Mosley. She was deeply devoted to him and his causes-campaigning in her furs for fascism, for socialism, for whatever cause captured him-despite his many infidelities. She, like her mother, died young while her husband was embroiled in an affair with the beautiful Diana Mitford Guinness. Her two surviving sisters took her death as an excuse to wage out all war against Diana Mitford and her family. (Mitford did eventually marry Mosley.) Irene basically raised Cimmie's children. And Baba, the youngest, well she took her place in Cimmie's bed with Mosley despite her own marriage to the Duke of Windsor's best friend. Much of the charm of the book lies in seeing certain historical figues-the Duke of Windsor, Wallis Simpson, Mosley-through the eyes of these sisters. These women certainly had interesting if not overly consequential lives.I would recommend this book to Anglophiles, to lovers of social history, and to fans of the interwar period (if you liked the movie Gosford Park, you'll love this book). If you're looking for a serious examination of the time and the history, well look elsewhere. But if you want an interesting read that will give you a "feel" for the times-then "The Viceroy's Daughters" is your book.

Anyone who is fond of the BBC-produced period dramas that make up the typical fare on public television's "Masterpiece Theater" will find this book a delicious treat. The lives of the three Curzon sisters are played out during the period Robert Graves called "The Long Weekend," -- Great Britain between the two world wars. All the usual suspects are here -- The Prince of Wales and Mrs. Simpson, Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Winston Churchill, Ramsey MacDonald, Sir Oswald Mosely, Nancy Astor, Fruity Metcalf, et. al. The Curzon sisters were intimates of Mosely and the Cliveden Set, yet we see them not as political actors but as party guests and hostesses of country house weekends where Neville Chamberlain cheats to beat out David Astor at musical chairs, or Oswald Mosely tries to juggle the convergence of multiple girlfriends at the same location simultaneously. And then there is the period itself -- The Curzon sisters were among those who sailed on the Normandie, danced the Charleston and the Black Bottom at the Kit Kat Club, ate at Quaglinos, weekended at Fort Belvedere and summered in Antibes. They lived the life the BBC costume dramas only faintly evoke for us today. And the life they lived had its share of pain and sorrow, unrequited love, early death, and alcohol abuse. Ms. De Courcy escorts us through these three lives elegantly and efficiently, never losing track of any one sister along the way. If you read the recently released book about the Mitford Sisters (as I did), you'll be struck by how much more effectively De Courcy's book transports you into the period and world of her subjects. Oddly, considering the notorious Mitford girls reputations, the Curzon sisters led much more interesting lives than the Mitfords, and quite frankly are much less annoying. One was elected to Parliament in 1928, when women politicians were a novelty. Another was at the center of the abdication crisis of 1936 and attended the wedding of the Duke of Windsor and Mrs. Simpson. And the third was a Baroness in her own right, an expert hunter and horsewoman, a philanthropist and an intimate of musicians like Artur Rubenstein and John MacCormack. Rather than the babytalking Mitford girls, the Curzon sisters taste, style, wit and intelligence should serve as the model of the age. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and hope to read Ms. De Courcy's other books as well. She is an excellent tour guide in time travel to a more elegant era.

Having read over and over again about the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, I was curious about who their peers were. Here is a book that presents a group of "wannabees" who clearly had the potential to do so much more with their lives but fell short. I found pity for the daughters who lost their loving mother. Living unfocused lives these sisters squandered themselves. This book deserves to be screened. Anyone interested in the lives of the British uppercrust will have a delicious treat.