Brivati and Lycett on Ann and Hugh
Lazenby880
LondonPosts: 525MI6 Agent
In my spare time I enjoy reading political biographies of figures from the 1950s and 60s. Biographies of major British political leaders—such as Kenneth Young’s Sir Alec Douglas-Home (1970) or David Dutton’s Anthony Eden: a life and reputation (1997)—can provide a fascinating insight into the society of the time and the remarkable men (it was almost exclusively men at this time) who operated at the top of the political tree. I have just finished reading Brian Brivati’s informative biography of Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell, imaginatively titled Hugh Gaitskell (1996). It was no surprise to read about Gaitskell’s famous affair with Ann Fleming: it was a surprise to see him giving Andrew Lycett’s perspective on the affair—in Lycett’s biography with the similarly imaginative title Ian Fleming (1995)—a thorough roasting.
Brivati begins with some background on Ann Fleming and some interesting observations on Ian:
Brivati then quotes from Andrew Lycett’s biography of Fleming, in which Lycett postulates a theory about the role of Ann Fleming in Gaitskell’s world . Here is the fuller extract with which Brivati takes issue:
I have read most of Lycett’s biography of Ian Fleming. I generally found it an engaging and wonderfully-researched piece of work. However, even the first time I read this I thought it ludicrously exaggerated Ann Fleming’s role and was based on a fundamental misreading of Hugh Gaitskell as a political personality and the Labour party of the 1950s. It was a surprise, while reading Brivati’s biography of Gaitskell, to read Brivati taking Lycett’s thesis to task:
Of course, both views are subjective. However, as regards Ann Fleming’s influence on Labour party politics I think Brivati’s view is the more convincing. To suggest the Gaitskell was pulled into High Tory circles, abandoning his principles and his class, is to misjudge the man. The two may have discussed politics, but for Gaitskell I would agree that Ann Fleming was a socially useful, not politically useful, endeavour.
The other point arising from Brivati’s examination of the Gaitskell/Fleming courtship is the sympathetic treatment afforded to Ann and the overwhelmingly disapproving treatment afforded to Ian. As noted, Ian Fleming was apparently “unpleasant, misogynistic and sado-masochistic.” Consider, too, this:
Ian, Brivati argues, “enjoyed humiliating people, was incapable of loyalty and had serious emotional problems derived from his complex and destructive relationship with his mother; and he had a feeling of inferiority towards his brother which seems to have crippled him.” Brivati continues: “Such problems led to a marked tendency in Fleming towards sadism and general unpleasantness in his personal relationships. The contrast with Hugh could not have been more profound” (1996: 245-6).
This is again subjective, and based on conjecture. Brivati did not know Ian or Ann Fleming personally. He also did not know Hugh Gaitskell. Brivati’s biography is based on interviews with those who did know him and on archive film footage (Brivati 1996: xi). Regardless of his evident loathing of the Bond novels, and of Ian Fleming, Brivati does nevertheless put Ann Fleming’s role during her relationship with Gaitskell firmly in context, and this contrasts sharply with Lycett’s opinion.
Ann Fleming then: a social pleasure, a political inconsequence.
[line]
Sources: Brivati, B. (1996) Hugh Gaitskell London: Richard Cohen
Lycett, A. (1995) Ian Fleming London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson
Brivati begins with some background on Ann Fleming and some interesting observations on Ian:
“Ann Fleming had been married to the newspaper magnate, Lord Rothermere, and through him developed an interest in the worlds of newspapers and politics. She tinkered with the Daily Mail for a while during this marriage. But she soon tired of Rothermere and after a long and complex courtship married Ian Fleming—at that point on the verge of unleashing the thoroughly unpleasant, rather sadistic, misogynist James Bond upon the world. Bond, immensely popular from the outset, was a fictional creation who had characteristics in common with his creator. Ian Fleming was an equally unpleasant, misogynistic and sado-masochistic Old Etonian. Ann was a bright and interesting Tory hostess, who escaped from her husband’s relentless by pursuing a vigorous social life of her own…
Her parties were a fixture of the social scene in London from about the mid-1940s. She was an accomplished and attractive hostess. Gaitskell’s rise in the Labour Party attracted her attention and the invitation was issued. Gaitskell and Fleming also shared a connection through their mutual friend, Maurice Bowra.
It was the ‘Bowra side’ of Gaitskell that was attracted to this world of conversation, wit and upper-class frivolity. It was not so much that Fleming showed him a world on which he had turned his back—the upper middle class of his own family were as distant from Ann Fleming’s set as were the Durham miners—but that she offered him an escape from the endless cycle and frequent drudgery of Labour politics. She was exciting, sophisticated and amusing. His initial attraction for her was partly his social and political position: having had the idea of gaining access to power through the Daily Mail while married to Rothermere, now she liked the idea of gaining access to a central political leader” (Brivati 1996: 242-3).
Her parties were a fixture of the social scene in London from about the mid-1940s. She was an accomplished and attractive hostess. Gaitskell’s rise in the Labour Party attracted her attention and the invitation was issued. Gaitskell and Fleming also shared a connection through their mutual friend, Maurice Bowra.
It was the ‘Bowra side’ of Gaitskell that was attracted to this world of conversation, wit and upper-class frivolity. It was not so much that Fleming showed him a world on which he had turned his back—the upper middle class of his own family were as distant from Ann Fleming’s set as were the Durham miners—but that she offered him an escape from the endless cycle and frequent drudgery of Labour politics. She was exciting, sophisticated and amusing. His initial attraction for her was partly his social and political position: having had the idea of gaining access to power through the Daily Mail while married to Rothermere, now she liked the idea of gaining access to a central political leader” (Brivati 1996: 242-3).
Brivati then quotes from Andrew Lycett’s biography of Fleming, in which Lycett postulates a theory about the role of Ann Fleming in Gaitskell’s world . Here is the fuller extract with which Brivati takes issue:
“[Ann Fleming] struck up an immediate rapport with the Labour leader. He saw her as a spirited and amusing antidote to his dour professional life; she liked his brains and political clout, and considered it a challenge to wan him from his puritanical socialist principles to an enjoyment of the more overt pleasures in life.
Within a short time, he had helped Ann forget any marital tensions and encouraged her to live out the latter-day Souls existence—part cerebral, part social—which suited her. By early July Gaitskell and Ann had discovered a mutual delight in dancing. A Fred Astaire on his toes, he used to love twirling her around the Café Royal dance floor. Their relationship did not end there: the couple used to meet for trysts at the house of Anthony Crosland, a rising Labour politician, and Ann used to joke that when she went to bed with Gaitskell, she liked to imagine she was with the more debonair Crosland. Much as she enjoyed her unexpected romance, she could only cope with it by being slightly disparaging. As she told Breaverbrook, prior to one of her dancing dates, ‘I suppose I shall have to go dancing next Friday with Hugh Gaitskell to explode his pathetic belief in equality, but it will be a great sacrifice to my country’… On one level, she promoted Gaitskell with Beaverbrook and ensured that his policies received favourable Express group newspaper coverage in any internal Labour Party dispute with his left wing. On another, she subverted the Labour leader’s pretensions to seriousness. Ann Fleming, the political hostess who split the Labour Party and kept the Labour right wing in business: it is an interesting and not implausible thesis” (Lycett 1995: 295-6).
Within a short time, he had helped Ann forget any marital tensions and encouraged her to live out the latter-day Souls existence—part cerebral, part social—which suited her. By early July Gaitskell and Ann had discovered a mutual delight in dancing. A Fred Astaire on his toes, he used to love twirling her around the Café Royal dance floor. Their relationship did not end there: the couple used to meet for trysts at the house of Anthony Crosland, a rising Labour politician, and Ann used to joke that when she went to bed with Gaitskell, she liked to imagine she was with the more debonair Crosland. Much as she enjoyed her unexpected romance, she could only cope with it by being slightly disparaging. As she told Breaverbrook, prior to one of her dancing dates, ‘I suppose I shall have to go dancing next Friday with Hugh Gaitskell to explode his pathetic belief in equality, but it will be a great sacrifice to my country’… On one level, she promoted Gaitskell with Beaverbrook and ensured that his policies received favourable Express group newspaper coverage in any internal Labour Party dispute with his left wing. On another, she subverted the Labour leader’s pretensions to seriousness. Ann Fleming, the political hostess who split the Labour Party and kept the Labour right wing in business: it is an interesting and not implausible thesis” (Lycett 1995: 295-6).
I have read most of Lycett’s biography of Ian Fleming. I generally found it an engaging and wonderfully-researched piece of work. However, even the first time I read this I thought it ludicrously exaggerated Ann Fleming’s role and was based on a fundamental misreading of Hugh Gaitskell as a political personality and the Labour party of the 1950s. It was a surprise, while reading Brivati’s biography of Gaitskell, to read Brivati taking Lycett’s thesis to task:
“Unfortunately, the thesis is implausible in just about every respect. Gaitskell was not a ‘rather dry’ socialist who needed weaning from Puritanism, but a person with an immense appetite for life and commitment to socialist politics who was not open to such ‘weaning’. The frequent references to food in his diary and his tastes at Oxford testify to the fact that he needed no introduction to how to live. The Express group was largely irrelevant to the internal Labour battles of the 1950s and 1960s and its support or otherwise for the Labour leader made no difference whatever to the outcome of the battles. Beaverbrook continued his relationship with the ex-Bevanites and Gaitskell kept his distance until the Common Market gave them common cause. Finally, the idea that this ‘political hostess’ kept the Labour right in business is simply ludicrous. In fact, Gaitskell’s attachment to Ann and to the ‘Café’ society she represented did him harm with his party rather than any good; even Tony Corsland was worried about it. Politically Ann meant nothing” (Brivati 1996: 243-4).
Of course, both views are subjective. However, as regards Ann Fleming’s influence on Labour party politics I think Brivati’s view is the more convincing. To suggest the Gaitskell was pulled into High Tory circles, abandoning his principles and his class, is to misjudge the man. The two may have discussed politics, but for Gaitskell I would agree that Ann Fleming was a socially useful, not politically useful, endeavour.
The other point arising from Brivati’s examination of the Gaitskell/Fleming courtship is the sympathetic treatment afforded to Ann and the overwhelmingly disapproving treatment afforded to Ian. As noted, Ian Fleming was apparently “unpleasant, misogynistic and sado-masochistic.” Consider, too, this:
“The other side of the question is why Ann Fleming fell for Gaitskell. Here it is only possible to speculate because her letters on the subject, and the stories she told, were generally defensive and derogatory of Hugh and of herself and of her feelings. Typically upper-class English, she tried to cover the disatnce between her self-image and her feelings with sarcasm. But in the difference between Gaitskell and Ian Fleming perhaps we can see the attraction” (Brivati 1996: 245).
Ian, Brivati argues, “enjoyed humiliating people, was incapable of loyalty and had serious emotional problems derived from his complex and destructive relationship with his mother; and he had a feeling of inferiority towards his brother which seems to have crippled him.” Brivati continues: “Such problems led to a marked tendency in Fleming towards sadism and general unpleasantness in his personal relationships. The contrast with Hugh could not have been more profound” (1996: 245-6).
This is again subjective, and based on conjecture. Brivati did not know Ian or Ann Fleming personally. He also did not know Hugh Gaitskell. Brivati’s biography is based on interviews with those who did know him and on archive film footage (Brivati 1996: xi). Regardless of his evident loathing of the Bond novels, and of Ian Fleming, Brivati does nevertheless put Ann Fleming’s role during her relationship with Gaitskell firmly in context, and this contrasts sharply with Lycett’s opinion.
Ann Fleming then: a social pleasure, a political inconsequence.
[line]
Sources: Brivati, B. (1996) Hugh Gaitskell London: Richard Cohen
Lycett, A. (1995) Ian Fleming London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson
Comments