From Bevan to Blair, livre ebook

For more than half a century Geoffrey Goodman was one of Fleet Street's foremost political and industrial reporters. This book is his record of what it was like to work at the heart of British politics. Taking us through the years that followed the end of World War II up to the present day, he offers a compelling story of the characters and events that shaped British political history.
Goodman's portraits include many of the political giants of the twentieth century. As a close friend of the great socialist Aneurin Bevan, he is able to reveal the philosophy and drive of the man who. Goodman also offers a behind-the-scenes account of Labour Prime Ministers Harold Wilson and James Callaghan, and brings to light new reasons why Wilson suspected the security agencies of trying to destabilise his government.
Other portraits include Michael Foot, Harold Macmillan, Edward Heath, Willie Whitelaw, Margaret Thatcher, Rupert Murdoch and Hugh Cudlipp.
Acknowledgements

Preface

1. 1945: Footsteps in the dark

2. Early life: Buttonholes and cornerstones

3. The 1930s: The devil’s decade

4. The war years: My university of life

5. Postwar world: Civvy street, Fleet Street

6. Aneurin Bevan: From NHS to The Bomb

7. The 1960s: Postwar interregnum

8. Harold Wilson: White heat and The Sun

9. In place of courage: Journalism in decline?

10. The long march: Dropping in on China in the Cultural Revolution

11. Prepare for revolution: In Britain?

12. 1973-4: For all our tomorrows

13. Inside the Whale: A journalist in Whitehall

14. Jim Callaghan takes over: ‘Too late at 64’?

15. Return of the Native: Back to the Mirror

16. A nation in discontent: Nothing at the end of the rainbow

17. 1979: The curtain falls, enter Margaret Thatcher

18. Maxwelliana: Cap’n Bob and his slippery decks

19. Conclusion: A funny old world

References

Index