One of my favorite movies from the past few years was The King's Speech. The film tells the story of the unlikely friendship between King George VI and his speech therapist Lionel Logue. On the recommendation of a friend, I picked up the book of the same name written by Logue's grandson and professional writer Peter Conradi. Unlike the movie, which just focuses on the period between shortly before the succession crisis, up through the one of the first main speeches given by the new king, the book was far more expansive. It basically chronicles the lives of both men, with emphasis on the relationship they would go on to develop.
I want to emphasize that this is not a knock on the absolutely superb film starring Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush as George the VI and Logue respectively. Different mediums have different strengths. The movie better showed us the young king's struggles, and his burgeoning relationship with his therapist and later friend; while the book showed us the depth of that friendship via excerpts from diaries, letters, and so on. Also, the movie took some liberties with history, compressing the time frame, changing certain aspects of the characters roles, and made the older brother, the brief-King Edward, much more villainous than in real life. The admiration for Hitler was far more widespread than one would like to think, though Edward and his mistress (and future wife) Wallis Sampson did maintain it longer than most, including his younger brother/future king and Winston Churchill. Despite this, the movie was a pretty good portrayal of the friendship of this king and his therapist. The book was simply more historically correct and expansive in details.
What perhaps made the book all the more riveting to me is how the author did not try to sugar-coat or make some aspects of the life in Britain in certain period look better. There was a deplorable "system" for raising children among the British upper classes in the late 19th/early 20th centuries, and a very significant class consciousness was drilled into the people of the time. I have heard some allege that there is still some class consciousness in the U. K. today, and I have no clue for sure if that is true. If it is true, it was, according to the author, even more so at the time.
If anything, this made the events of the book even more poignant. Logue and King George had a friendship that would be unusual for folks from such differing backgrounds even now, and at the time was something to behold. In a way, that friendship was the foundation of the king's success. In Logue, the king had many things rolled into one: therapist, voluntary speech editor, moral support, representative of the commoners, and most importantly, friend.
Of course, the wives of these two men were indispensable. It is not for naught that it was noted that the king spoke better with his wife's support and attention. And for Logue, his wife Myrtle played a key role as well. He had a support in her that lasted for nearly forty years. After her death, he lived a life of some sadness during the rest of his time on this mortal coil.
At the end, the two men, king and commoner, friends, died within months of each other. After the immediate headlines faded away, they were not thought of much, outside of historical references, until the Academy Award-winning film, The King's Speech, came out in theaters. Yet the impact on history of this incredibly unlikely friendship can not be underestimated. Next to Churchill, the speeches during World War II of George the VI kept the morale of the Empire, and many other countries, afloat. The king gave enormous credit to his friend, Lionel Logue, for this success, and those of us alive today owe them both a deep debt.
This semi-biography, semi-history is one of the finest non-fiction books I have read in a long time, and I can't recommend it enough.
Highly Recommended.
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Top reviews from other countries
John Malcolm
Expands nicely on the film
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 24, 2023
フレデリック
An excellent book for those who are interested in this part of history.
Reviewed in Japan on December 17, 2022Elgin
After watching the movie I was intrigued by the story
Reviewed in Germany on February 11, 2013