Simply fascinating

A bird's eye / fly on the wall view of some of the most pivotal moments in the history of or country and Empire at the beginning of a tumultuous century. As revealed by Cups, who was at the very heart of the establishment. Best history lesson available today.

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Gripping but a difficult listen.

Chips Channon seemed to be an odious man. However this was a different time. Eugenics theory was common throughout Europe. The UK was not exempt and the class system was rigid and social mobility rare. Through these diaries I developed a better understanding of the times leading up to the second world war and the appeasement processes which the aristocracy clung onto in order to maintain their lifestyles at any cost. Bravo Editor who must have found these diaries equally as difficult to transcribe as I found to listen to.
The casual racism; anti semitism; sexism and classism which Channon used in his diaries is so offensive to my modern ears that I was deeply emotional at times. But like a scab which one cannot leave alone I could not stop listening. The performance of the narrator was excellent and managed to exude the sheer campness of Channon who to my mind was a complete cliche.

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Preferred no notes

This recording has no footnotes while the Kindle version, which I also have, has a lot. While the notes seemed helpful at first, I soon realised I was wasting a lot of time looking people up, and I listened to the audio alone.

Whatever one thinks of Channon, he was a great diarist, and he brings the period (as he saw it) to sparkling life.

I enjoyed the narration, especially the way he gradually lost the American accent except for a few different pronunciations or stresses.

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Poor pronunciation

This is another book that I’ve enjoyed very much but wish the reader had checked how to pronounce certain words. There were lots of gaffes, the last one I noticed was pronouncing columbine as columbean……

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Nasty man writes a diary

What a plonker Chips Channon was - along with his cast of royals , minor royals , a high percentage of the government and some very rich hangers on. Why the U.K. did not have a revolution in the 1920s or 30s is beyond me.

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Brideshead Wasn't Visited

Sir Henry (Chips) Channon was a USA born multi (as Nancy Mitford used to say) from Chicago. Anybody who was anybody went to his parties and just in case he was missing anything he went to "everybody" elses. That all, or most, of these parties were held in order to meet "someone" who "everybody" had met last week doesn't help. In some respects the most interesting material in this weighty tome are the footnotes - which sadly one does not get to hear. There are some great set pieces, state funerals, coronations (George VI, I think) and the whole abdication nonsense. Though to my surprise he very quickly goes off the boil about the Duke of Windsor - I'd have thought he would be a great fan, but he isn't. Quite caustic in fact, almost as unimpressed by him as Sir Alan Lascelles and that's pre abdication. He does like Wallis though. That he is supremely unconscious of his frantic scramble to make sure that King George VI and Queen Elizabeth don't freeze him out of high society is very funny. Creepy crawling round the Duke & Duchess of Kent is also very funny. He is very silly. Though also very well read, much more so than you would expect from wading through this vast compendium of pre war "Jennifer's Diaries". Mrs Betty Kenward was obviously influenced by him - his copy (like hers) is sometimes "I went to a delightful cocktail party for ......... at. Present were ........ Noel Coward nailed it with "I've been to a marvellous party, with Nu-Nu and Nada and Nell"

Some of the people he hero worships (Lord Curzon in particular) came across to me as utter arseholes, as Channon himself does at times. He was gay, or bi, and one assumes having a raging affair with Viscount Gage for a substantial chunk of this volume. This was illegal and if discovered he would have been socially ruined. That this same Viscount Gage was engaged in lukewarm pursuit of a certain Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon at around the same time does give pause for thought. The future Prince Regent of Yugoslavia was also a fly in the ointment - but he's not mentioned as obsessively as Viscount Gage. There is a huge amount of social - as in high society - history and gossip here but I'm not struck by Channon's writing style and excellent though the performance of the reader is it's a huge effort not to be sidetracked by the ironing. As a historical document what does surprise me is the extent to which High Society/The Court/The Season was still a place of serious politics - right up to the Second World War. My innocence.

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4 people found this helpful

Worth sticking with.

I'm glad I stuck with it. At first the narrator's voice was a little jarring but he grew on me! I think he became more English and sophisticated as Chips himself did. Very enjoyable.

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Chips on the shoulder...

Intriguing, maddening diaries. There’s no doubt Channon was a very good diarist - the entries buzz with anecdote, detail and opinion, much of the opinion wildly wrong headed; he’s a quite zealous appeaser and fan of both Hitler and Mussolini. He loathes socialism, presumably because it’s a threat to the way of life he has so assiduously wormed his way into. Very interesting insight into privilege and class and the workings of power ( even though Channon never as powerful as he he thinks he is) Tom Ward perfect narrator; captures the snobbish , ‘cultured’ tone, with the mid Atlantic accent reminding us that Chips is always a bit of an outsider looking in.

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2 people found this helpful

Missing footnotes a challenge for this listener

I was a little surprised by criticism of the narration; I found it excellent, with the strident, mid Atlantic, voice perfect for how I would imagine the diarist. It's well read with flavour and texture in the performance.

My struggle with the audio book is the absence of footnotes or additional contextual information. The editor's introduction talks of the importance of the footnotes but there is none in the audio. Consequently I was left with sentences of untranslated French which is far beyond my school boy knowledge, and rapid fire references to many different people who I was unclear of the context of. It is perhaps my ignorance, but only a handful of people were familiar to me and some required pausing and Google: something I can only occasionally do with an audio book.

I am still enjoying it a great deal, but I think I will get the second volume in print.

edit: I ended up buying the book, the audio book is just missing too much without the footnotes. However I've ended up still listening, albeit a little behind my reading.

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1 person found this helpful

Chipps Channon memoir

Overall I enjoyed this memoir - it set the scene of the time and was particularly interesting around the time of the Munich crisis. Be aware however that Channon held some objectionable views which are voiced here and to our modern Sensibilities are shocking. He comes across as a self obsessed socialite although his genuine love for his son is touching.

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