The dull title is ill-matched with Weidenfeld's literate, well-written text, but it does capture the generally warm tone of the noted British publisher's memoirs. Born in Vienna shortly after the end of WW I to an agnostic but culturally Jewish family, he fled Austria in the wake of the Nazi invasion and landed in England, where he worked as a translator of German broadcasts for the BBC. After the war, he founded and edited Contact magazine, which eventually led to the establishment with fellow editor Nigel Nicolson of the book publishing house Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Weidenfeld writes about his career and events in the larger world with acuity; his portraits of a diverse group of friends that includes Moshe Dayan, Antonia Fraser, Harold Wilson, and Marietta Tree (as well as others less famous) are affectionate but never fawning, with just enough sharp-tongued asides to keep things interesting.
