Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
20th-Century Luminaries
Find the painting of the
Duchess of Windsor
(see photo) and the small statue of
Edward,
Duke of Windsor.
The Duchess' smug smile tells us she got her man.
Edward VIII (1894-1972), great-grandson of Queen Victoria, became king in 1936
as a bachelor dating a common-born (gasp), twice-divorced (double gasp) American (oh
no!) named Wallis Simpson (1896-1986). Rather than create a constitutional stink, Ed-
ward quietly abdicated, married Wallis, and the two moved to the Continent, living hap-
pily ever after. They hosted cocktail parties, played golf, and listened to servants call them
“Your Majesty”—though they were now just plain Duke and Duchess of Windsor. (His
brother “Bertie” took over as King George VI, and George VI's daughter became Queen
Elizabeth II. Elizabeth—and all the other royals—essentially snubbed their disgraced aunt
and uncle for the rest of their lives.)
George Bernard Shaw
(1856-1950)—playwright, critic, and political
thinker—brought socialist ideas into popular discussion with plays such as
Man and Su-
perman
and
Major Barbara.
Virginia Woolf
(1882-1941) wrote feminist essays (“A wo-
