Gimson's Heroes

I've really enjoyed reading this book of fifty well written short biographies. They vary appropriately in length and in the type of person chosen. From politicians like Ernest Bevin to poets like John Betjeman; from the famous, such as Nelson and Churchill to the lesser known, such as Burke and Shaftesbury, to some I was unaware of - such as Stan Hollis and Michael Wharton. There are ten women (Boudica, Bess of Hardwick, Elizabeth I, Mary Wollstonecraft, Jane Austen, Elizabeth Fry, Grace Daring, Florence Nightingale, Octavia Hill and Noor Inayat Khan) by design or happenstance. They are all British except the last, Nelson Mandela. The approach is fairly amoral and so one or two sneak through who I would not be keen on. When I was a boy my mother expected me to know about people like Alfred, Raleigh, Drake, Nelson, Livingstone and probably Shackleton. That way of thinking is less popular today but people likeGimson are still writing on thos elines and it is interesting to note.