The King's Speech: Based on the Recently Discovered Diaries of Lionel Logue: How one man saved the British monarchy - Softcover

Mark Logue; Peter Conradi

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0857381113 ISBN 13: 9780857381118

Publisher: Quercus, 2011

Synopsis

One man saved the British Royal Family in the first decades of the 20th century - amazingly he was an almost unknown, and certainly unqualified, speech therapist called Lionel Logue, whom one newspaper in the 1930s famously dubbed 'The Quack who saved a King'.

Logue wasn't a British aristocrat or even an Englishman - he was a commoner and an Australian to boot. Nevertheless it was the outgoing, amiable Logue who single-handedly turned the famously nervous, tongue-tied, Duke of York into the man who was capable of becoming King.

Had Logue not saved Bertie (as the man who was to become King George VI was always known) from his debilitating stammer, and pathological nervousness in front of a crowd or microphone, then it is almost certain that the House of Windsor would have collapsed. The King's Speech is the previously untold story of the extraordinary relationship between Logue and the haunted young man who became King George VI, drawn from Logue's unpublished personal diaries. They throw extraordinary light on the intimacy of the two men - and the vital role the King's wife, the late Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, played in bringing them together to save her husband's reputation and his career as King.

The King's Speech is an intimate portrait of the British monarchy at a time of its greatest crisis, seen through the eyes of an Australian commoner who was proud to serve, and save, his King.

About this title

Book Description

How an Australian commoner saved the British monarchy.

From the Back Cover

Lionel Logue was a self-taught and virtually unknown Australian speech therapist. Yet it was this outgoing, amiable man who almost single-handedly turned the nervous, tongue-tied Duke of York into one of Britain's greatest kings after his brother, Edward VIII, abdicated in 1936 over his love for Mrs Simpson.
The King's Speech: How One Man Saved the British Monarchy is the previously untold story of the remarkable relationship between Logue and the haunted future King George VI, written with Logue's grandson and drawing exclusively from his grandfather Lionel's diaries and archive.
This is an astonishing insight into the House of Windsor at the time of its greatest crisis. Never before has there been such a portrait of the British monarchy seen through the eyes of an Australian commoner who was proud to serve, and save, his King.

About this edition

• Publisher: Quercus
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0857381113
• ISBN 13: 9780857381118
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272