THIS is the story of the relationship between Herbert Asquith, Prime Minister from 1908 to 1916, and Venetia Stanley. At the beginning of the First World War, when there were crucial decisions to be made, Asquith was writing letters to her in the middle of Cabinet meetings. More than this, he would drive to the hospital where she was working, and, with the curtains closed between them and the chauffeur, they would go for a Friday-afternoon drive to Henley or Maidenhead.
As if this was not extraordinary enough, he would read to her top-secret telegrams, and then crumple them up and throw them out of the car.
You couldn’t make it up. Nor did Robert Harris; for, although this is a novel, and the central character, Paul Deemer, a policeman trying to track down the source of these telegrams, is fictional, it was based on the nearly 600 love letters of 300,000 words which Asquith wrote to Stanley. It is one of those books that makes you sorry when it ends, and leaves you astounded.
Harris does not go into the psychology of Asquith, what led him into this madness, but the clue is, I think, in his earlier experiences. His father died when he was young, and he was sent away from his native Yorkshire to London, where “he was treated like an orphan” for the rest of his childhood. He had a happy first marriage, but his wife died young. He also had a happy second marriage to the formidable Margot, but she was told that another pregnancy would kill her; so they had to forgo a sexual relationship.
The remarkable Stanley deliberately put an end to the affair by marrying Edward Montagu, even though she was not attracted to him, and had to convert to Judaism to do so. Her letters to Asquith were destroyed by him. Harris paints a vivid picture of that sickly rich epoch of vast estates, now in ruins, weekend house parties, and no serious religion.
The Rt Revd Lord Harries of Pentregarth is a former Bishop of Oxford, and an Hon. Professor of Theology at King’s College, London. His latest book is Wounded I Sing: From Advent to Christmas with George Herbert (SPCK, 2024) (Books, 25 October).
Precipice
Robert Harris
Cornerstone £22
(978-1-5291-5282-1)
Church Times Bookshop £19.80