“Precipice” is a
skilful and fascinating novel – Harris in top form. (Review by Margaret von
Klemperer, courtesy of The Witness)
In July 1914, as the world slid towards a war it did not expect, London’s gilded youth partied carelessly and led a life of luxury.
The British government of the day, led by the ageing H.H. Asquith, was preoccupied by Ireland and the rift between nationalists and unionists.
But Asquith himself
was more preoccupied by his feelings for one of the most gilded of them all –
Venetia Stanley, some forty-odd years his junior.
Their relationship has been well documented, and Robert Harris, who is a past master at turning real events into gripping fiction, has taken it as the basis for this excellent novel, Precipice. Asquith wrote to Venetia sometimes as often as three or four times a day, and his side of the correspondence survives, and is used in the book to jaw-dropping effect – it is hard to credit what he was writing but all the quoted letters from Asquith are genuine. Here was a man, leading his country at a time when Britain was facing a series of crises, spending his time working out when he could next see Venetia, sending her top-secret memos and letters, sometimes written during Cabinet meetings, and meeting her on long drives in his official car.
During those journeys, he showed her more secret documents, then, when they had discussed them, he would screw them up and toss them out of the window. That provides a useful plot device for Harris as some of the documents were found by passers- by and handed over to the police, and Harris creates a fictional member of the secret service, Sergeant Paul Deemer, who investigates the leaks, and finds out more and more about what is happening.
Plenty of other historical characters populate the novel – Margot Asquith and Winston Churchill among them. As the war grinds on, Churchill comes out of the story badly – his Gallipoli disaster laid bare. But the main focus is on Asquith and Venetia, and how obviously doomed their relationship had to be, even though one of the most extraordinary things that Harris makes clear is that in a pre-television and social media world, even the prime minister of Britain could go around London unrecognised by the vast majority of people. The need for secrecy was greater in their social circle than in the wider population.
Harris’s novel reads almost like a thriller, as the sense of impending doom, both in the relationship and in the political world, is built up. Despite Asquith’s astonishing behaviour, Harris creates in him a believable and even sympathetic character, and as events move towards their poignant climax, the reader cannot help feeling for both Asquith and Venetia, caught in a web of their own making. Precipice is a skilful and fascinating novel – Harris in top form. - Margaret von Klemperer
Precipice is published by Hutchinson Heinemann: ISBN 978-1-52-915283-8
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