In a controversial account of a controversial man, Heffer goes some way towards rescuing Powell from demonisation--though there's no getting away from how hilariously curmudgeonly he often was. He seemed to spend his entire childhood being 81 years old; Heffer's account of the proud, spiky Classical scholar (Powell's precocity in this area was astonishing) poncing about like Socrates, his flirtation with morbid German Romanticism and his desire for war, and his success in the army despite his mannerisms and brusque, self- assured superiority do eventually make him a human, almost sympathetic character; but one is not always sure that Heffer is right to attribute irony to Powell's more drastic remarks rather than, say, arrogance or naivety.

What Heffer has done--remarkably swiftly, given that he only saw Powell's most personal papers after his death--is to provide an enormous, well-sourced and sympathetic biography of a towering yet flawed figure. It has wit and an attention to detail that would have pleased the pedantic Powell in his guise of scholar. The youngest ever British professor, promoted from private to brigadier during World War Two, and a much-loved politician for two parties, Powell also wrote tolerable romantic poetry (in the mould of A.E. Housman). One is left with a sense of sadness that such an intelligent and hard-working man was so coldly intellectual as never to appreciate the appalling consequences of his discussion of race and immigration. Whether or not Powell was a racist (and even his enemies seem to have doubted this) his ideas were received rapturously by those who were. But there was more to the man than that; and this is a surprisingly engaging portrait of a sometimes disagreeable genius. --Robert Potts

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The definitive, controversial, authroised biography of 1 of the defining political figures of postwar Britain. There have been many biographies of Enoch Powell - this will be the 7th or the 8th. They testify at least to the fascination we have for him, but none will be a patch on Simon Heffer's, the only 1 written with full access to all his personal and public papers, by 1 of Britain's leading conservative commentators and, with his acclaimed book on Carlyle published by Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1 of it's most promising biographers. The book will cover all aspects of Powell's life : his Midlands childhood, his teaching by A.E.Housman, his appointment at the age of 25 as professor of Greek at the University of Adelaide, his writing of poetry, his love for an aristocratic Irish woman, his resignation from Macmillans cabinet, the Rivers of Blood speech, and his spiritual Godfathering of Margaret Thatcher. It will also, effectively, be a history of postwar British politics from Powell's perspective, and should be 1 of the highlights of the Autumn 1998 season.

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