Summary

"Although as King he became the epitome of a nation united in the Second World War, George VI spent the first forty years of his life in the shadow of his elder brother, the dashing Prince of Wales, later Edward VIII.

"Although as King he became the epitome of a nation united in the Second World War, George VI spent the first forty years of his life in the shadow of his elder brother, the dashing Prince of Wales, later Edward VIII. Born while Queen Victoria still ruled, George became, like his father, a naval officer. He fought at Jutland, learned to fly and in the twenties, as Duke of York, took the first keen royal interest in industrial conditions. Yet he was shy, naturally retiring and suffered from a debilitating stammer; until the Abdication forced him into the exalted positions he had dreaded, he was known to the public chiefly for the promise of succession held out by his family. Inheriting a throne shaken by his brother's abdication, King George schooled himself rigorously to the duties of kingship and quickly resorted to the prestige of the monarchy. He faced two great questions: how, in spite of the deep social division of the thirties, he could inspire his country in the war with Germany; and, more difficult, how to adjust the ideal and practice of monarchy to the demands of the more open society after 1945. In this sympathetic portrait George VI appears in private life as head of a royal family far less austere than in his father's time, and, as King, endowed with great courage, humility and commonsense. he was perhaps more genuinely loved by his people—because better understood—than any of his predecessors."-Publisher.