A Private Life of Michael Foot by Carl Rollyson Prof & Michelle Phillips

Author:Carl Rollyson Prof & Michelle Phillips [Prof, Carl Rollyson & Phillips, Michelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography & Memoir, Historical
ISBN: 9781841024080
Amazon: B011C6COTU
Barnesnoble: B011C6COTU
Goodreads: 25893751
Publisher: University of Plymouth Press
Published: 2015-06-27T00:00:00+00:00

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1 Michael had grown up with several dogs in Plymouth and Cornwall, including a St. Bernard that looked just like the Tory leader the Marquis of Salisbury. “My father called him Salisbury.”

2 Michael and Jill rented a large flat on Roslyn Hill Road in Hampstead in the early 1950s.

July 2001

68

On this visit there was much talk of my Gellhorn biography, which had just appeared and had received excellent reviews, with a few very negative ones, including a personal attack on me by one of Gellhorn’s friends, the journalist John Pilger. Michael wanted to know why. “Well, he said I wrote a salacious book,” I told Michael. Of course, it was nothing of the kind. Michael’s response was “Dirty sod. I tell you, I’ve got very strong feelings about him. The way he’s behaved over the breakup of Yugoslavia. It’s absolutely outrageous. Pilger bilge, I call it. But we have to be careful about it because Paul is a close friend of Pilger.” I said, “Paul may not have a good opinion of me anymore if he’s been talking to Pilger.” Michael dismissed the idea.

69

On this trip I was able to speak with one of Julie’s friends, Lizzie, who had lived for a time with Julie in the mid-1950s and had kept up with Julie and her family since then. Lizzie described visiting Jill during her last illness. It was typical of Jill to want to hear all about Lizzie’s life, rebuffing Lizzie’s efforts to learn more about her health. To Lizzie, Michael seemed fragile but as garrulous as ever. Jill said, “Michael do be quiet. I don’t want to hear you about Byron. I’ve heard it so many times. I want to know what Lizzie has been doing.” Lizzie had come with flowers and Jill whispered, “Lizzie would you put these in water because Michael doesn’t know about such things.”

Lizzie’s earlier memories were of a jokey Michael teasing her (he called her Dizzy Lizzie) and Julie when they were girls, “What are you two little chicks up to now? What fellow do we have calling at the door this week?” Lizzie added, “He never talked to me about politics because I didn’t know anything about politics. He always seemed to be in his head somewhere else. I absolutely adored him. He couldn’t do anything wrong for me.” Like Julie, Lizzie was repulsed by Michael’s eczema and asthma. “I had actors and film stars in my head and I could not understand Jill, obviously beautiful, being with this unattractive man. But later when I grew to know him and love him I could understand completely—his charm.” His humour, in particular, made him seem sexy—as did his pleasure in being teased.

70

Back in Hampstead, I quizzed Michael about a journal Jill had kept during their first trip to India, in particular Jill’s disenchantment with their traveling companion, Jennie Lee, who seemed full of herself. “A bit of that,” Michael commented dryly. I read him another part concerning Jill’s take on his

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