Rugger, Robin Hood and Rupert of the Rhine: enthusiasms of the young Antonia Fraser

Despite it being a well known fact that Antonia Fraser had earthly parents, I had always imagined that she had somehow skipped infancy and emerged instead from a celestial cloud, surrounded by hordes of trumpet-wielding cherubim, a fully-formed Venus in pink and gold and white. Turreted castles, a constant shower of sovereigns, a title, a jewelry box whose contents might have made Liz Taylor wince: this was the milieu suggested by her tremendous beauty and mysterious half-smile. My History, a captivating memoir of her childhood and early youth, proves otherwise.

In fact Antonia’s father, Frank Pakenham, was a second son who married the very clever daughter of a Harley Street doctor. Neither of them was at all interested in the accoutrements of fairy tales, since both were deeply committed to the Labour party; it was only after bringing up her family that Antonia’s mother, Elizabeth Longford, began to write the histories for which she was to become renowned.