Deborah Vivien Freeman-Mitford Cavendish Duchess of Devonshire Livres

Née en 1920, Deborah Devonshire est la cadette et la dernière représentante des six légendaires sœurs Mitford, qui défrayèrent la chronique en Grande-Bretagne. Devenue duchesse de Devonshire et châtelaine de Chatsworth, elle se chargea de restaurer ce Versailles anglais. Ses chroniques, qui ont enthousiasmé la presse française, distillent le must de l'humour Mitford. La duchesse douairière vous parle avec la même verve de son enfance excentrique, de ses poules bien vivantes ou en porcelaine, de son dieu Elvis Presley, des vêtements inusables qu'elle achète dans les foires agricoles, de son sac à main bourré de rations de survie ou encore de ces visiteurs de Chatsworth qui croient qu'elle porte un diadème du matin au soir.

This stunning volume provides an enchanting visit to one of the most storied and beautiful English country houses.No place embodies the spirit of the English country house better than Chatsworth. From best-selling books such as Duchess of Devonshireand The House by Deborah Mitford, the late Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, American audiences have long been transfixed by this remarkable place and its extraordinary collection of art and decorative objects.Today, Chatsworth’s facade is newly cleaned and its windows freshly gilded. The forward-looking current Duke of Devonshire, who likes to say that “everything was new once,” has redone the public and private rooms. This tour-de-force volume is his telling of the story of Chatsworth through seven historical periods accompanied by stunning photo-graphic portraits of the house, its collections, and the grounds.Chatsworth contains countless treasures from Nicolas Poussin’s Et in Arcadia Ego and Antonio Canova’s Endymion to seminal modern works by Lucian Freud and David Hockney. Though filled with works from different time periods, the collection represents the very best of the “new” from each artistic era.

A lively personal and horticultural tour of the magnificent 400-year-old gardens at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. The Duchess of Devonshire's text takes the reader on a stroll through a garden that includes parterres and vistas; water in all its forms, from formal cascades and fountains to natural streams and ponds; rockeries and trees; a working kitchen garden and statuary; and planted borders. The history of the garden is described, incorporating the creation, the changes and the restorations both the Duke and Duchess have made, in the spirit of the place.

A unique window on an extraordinary life lived with tremendous zest, discrimination, and intelligenceThe Duchess of Devonshire is the youngest of the Mitford siblings, the famous brood that includes the writers Nancy and Jessica. Like them, she has lived an unusually full and remarkable life, and like them she has an inimitable expressive gift. In Counting My Chickens, she has gathered extracts from her diaries and other writings to create a multifaceted portrait of her life at Chatsworth, the home of the Dukes of Devonshire, that is pithy, hilarious, wise, and always richly rewarding.Under the Duchess's inspired supervision, Chatsworth has become one of England's most frequently visited great houses, welcoming over 400,000 visitors a year. The Duchess reveals what it takes to keep such an establishment alive and prospering, tells of transporting a goat by train from the Scottish island of Mull to London, discusses having her portrait painted by Lucian Freud, and provides rich reminisces of growing up a Mitford--along with telling anecdotes about friends from Evelyn Waugh to John F. Kennedy. From Tom Stoppard's adoring Introduction to the author's meditation on the beauty of Elvis Presley's voice, COUNTING MY CHICKENS offers continuous surprise and delight.