Книги, похожие на «Alexandra Richie, Faust’s Metropolis: A History of Berlin»

The story of the unsung heroines who flew the newest, fastest, aeroplanes in World War II – mostly in southern England where the RAF was desperately short of pilots.Why would the well-bred daughter of a New England factory-owner brave the U-boat blockades of the North Atlantic in the bitter winter of 1941? What made a South African diamond heiress give up her life of house parties and London balls to spend the war in a freezing barracks on the Solent? And why did young Margaret Frost start lying to her father during the Battle of Britain?They – and scores of other women – weren't allowed to fly in combat, but what they did was nearly as dangerous. Unarmed and without instruments or radios, they delivered planes for the Air Transport Auxiliary to the RAF bases from which male pilots flew into battle. At the mercy of the weather and any long-range enemy aircraft that pounced on them, dozens of these women died, among them Amy Johnson, Britain's most famous flyer. But the survivors shared four unrepeatable years of life, adrenaline and love.The story of this 'tough bunch of babes' (in the words of one of them) has never been told properly before. The author has interviewed all the surviving women pilots, who came not just from the shires of England, but also from the U.S.A, Chile, Australia, Poland and Argentina. Paid £ 6.00 a week, they flew – in skirts – up to 16 hours a day in 140 different types of aircraft, though most of them liked spitfires best.

In one of the most explosive and hotly debated books of the past year, Sir Peregrine Worsthorne presents a reactionary and playful look at the origins, evolution and demise of the aristocracy and what we can expect to replace them.Every country has the aristocracy it deserves; so what does it say about Britain that it is in the process of removing the last vestiges of political power from one of the most ancient hereditary aristocracies in the world, and one, moreover, whose record of public service has been impeccable?The word aristocracy has many connotations, some good, some bad, and Britain's aristocracy has in the past earned most of them in some degree or another. But Sir Peregrine Worsthorne, one of our most influential and respected political commentators, argues that not only does the good far outweigh the bad, but that our aristocracy has contributed mightily to our stability and prosperity, and that without it we would have neither.In this passionately argued and highly original essay Worsthorne forcefully demonstrates the shallowness of those who would celebrate the abolishment of hereditary peers in the House of Lords. For though many now forget it, Britain once had an upper class which was the envy of the world, and which, crucially, 'had enough in-built authority – honed over three centuries – and enough ancestral wisdom – acquired over three centuries – to dare to defy the arrogance of intellectuals from above and the emotions of the masses from below; to dare to resist the entrepreneurial imperative; to dare to try to raise the level of public conversation; to dare to put the public interest before private interests; and to dare to shape the nation's will and curb its appetites.’