Margaret Thatcher: The Autobiography

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Margaret was born in 1925, and her father’s shop was in Grantham, a market town twenty miles east of Nottingham. Her childhood, she later said, was an “idyllic blur.” British policy in Northern Ireland had been a standing source of conflict for every Prime Minister since 1969, but Margaret Thatcher aroused the IRA's special hatred for her refusal to meet their political demands, notably during the 1980-81 prison hunger strikes. She became increasingly skeptical about the EC as time went on, though. The more powers that were delegated to Brussels, the more she worried that the EC was eroding democracy in member states. Instead, we get a few concluding insights into Thatcher as a person. They are all sharp, and often make her seem more sympathetic. Perhaps the best of all is this: “Mrs Thatcher combined an immense assurance about following her own way with a permanent uneasiness in life.” She created an uneasy country for the rest of us to live in. The second half of Thatcher’s tenure was marked by an inextinguishable controversy over Britain’s relationship with the European Community (EC). In 1984 she succeeded, amid fierce opposition, in drastically reducing Britain’s contribution to the EC budget. After her third electoral victory in 1987, she adopted a steadily more hostile attitude toward European integration. She resisted “federalist” continental trends toward both a single currency and a deeper political union. Her traditionally pro-European party became divided, and a string of senior ministers left the Cabinet over the issue.

Having established a presence on the islands before 1833, it believes that the Falklands – las Malvinas in Spanish – belong to Argentina, even if its inhabitants see themselves as British. Published in a single volume for the first time, Margaret Thatcher is the story of her remarkable life told in her own words--the definitive account of an extraordinary woman and consummate politician, bringing together her bestselling memoirs The Downing Street Years and The Path to Power. Moore illuminates Thatcher’s youth–her relationship with her parents and early romantic attachments, including her courtship and marriage to Denis Thatcher–moving forward to the determination and boldness that marked even the very beginning of her political career. His account of her political relationship with Ronald Reagan is riveting. Throughout Moore explores in compelling detail the obstacles and indignities that Thatcher encountered as a woman in what was still overwhelmingly a man’s world. A growing number of Conservative MPs wanted rid of Margaret Thatcher. The bone of contention was an issue which causes divisions within the party to this day: Europe.

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It was in Dartford too that she met her husband, Denis Thatcher, a local businessman who ran his family's firm before becoming an executive in the oil industry. They married in 1951. Twins — Mark and Carol —were born to the couple in 1953. Absolutely fantastic. I second Michael Barone's review that this is one of the best political biographies ever written. The num So, in March, 1984, Thatcher’s government announced that it was reducing Britain’s annual coal output by four million tons. According to the National Union of Mineworkers, that would mean the closure of at least twenty collieries or “pits,” and the loss of over 20,000 jobs.

For my review, I am copying from a message I sent to my Aunt. "Ironically, I've been completing this first of 3 volumes of Margaret Thatcher's official biography while watching the new "The Crown" season involving Mrs Thatcher. I am on Episode 6 of the TV series, but, although the series gets some things right, I think it ultimately doesn't do justice to the incredible accomplishments and humanity of this amazing leader, the first female leader of a major Western nation in Europe (of course, we haven't had a female President yet). I haven't seen the last 4 episodes, and the first volume of the biography only goes until victory in the Falklands War in 1982 - but there is no doubt that, if it wasn't for Mrs Thatcher, the UK wouldn't have risen out of the socialist doldrums of the 1960/1970's to again be a relevant power in the world and help defeat the Soviet Union in the Cold War as well. It is one of the beneficial coincidences of history that she and Reagan served during much of the same time and shared a world view fostering democratic capitalism and fighting socialism and communism to win the Cold War. The Crown is a TV show and it's popular nowadays, as so many did in the 1980's, to portray Mrs Thatcher as cold and inhuman, when, in fact, her steadfastness in economic reform literally saved the country. How inhuman is that?" The second cause was rising business costs. Trade unions enforced high wages and the state crowded out private investors by running large parts of the economy itself. Britain’s trade unions toppled Margaret Thatcher’s predecessor, Edward Heath. When he tried to impose limits on wage rises in 1973, they went on strike and brought the country to a standstill. The Falkland Islands are an archipelago in the South Atlantic around 300 miles east of the Argentinian coast. Several of the larger islands are inhabited; hundreds of the smaller islands aren’t.Similarly, during the late 80s, Thatcher became steadily more convinced that European integration was a project Britain should resist, almost regardless of how that resistance affected relations with our closest neighbours. Her foreign secretary Geoffrey Howe – once an ally, now increasingly alienated – disagreed. The two senior ministers began to plot against her, more aggressively, Moore suggests, than they were prepared to admit in their memoirs. Meanwhile, the Tory hierarchy and parliamentary party, which had never completely accepted that they should be led by a radical woman, watched closely for any sign that Thatcher’s performance or popularity was deteriorating. Thatcher had eighteen months to write the book covering her premiership. She hired a previous director of the Conservative Research Department, Robin Harris, to do most of the writing, the Oxford academic Christopher Collins to do the research and O'Sullivan to help polish the drafts. Just like with her speeches, Thatcher would "edit, criticise and exhaustively rewrite the drafts" until she was happy. [10] Margaret Thatcher's home and early life in Grantham played a large part in forming her political convictions. Her parents, Alfred and Beatrice Roberts, were Methodists. The social life of the family was lived largely within the close community of the local congregation, bounded by strong traditions of self-help, charitable work, and personal truthfulness. In the process, Margaret Thatcher became one of the founders, with Ronald Reagan, of a school of conservative conviction politics, which has had a powerful and enduring impact on politics in Britain and the United States and earned her a higher international profile than any British politician since Winston Churchill.