Most politicians write autobiographies to 'set the record straight' and provide retrospective justification for their careers. That is not the case with this book. 'It occurred to me that to track down myself would enable me to discuss an issue that had begun to intrigue me, namely the relationship between politics and identity, the things that had shaped me and whether and how they had come to reflect my life and opinions. As I wrote, the question of identity moved from the wings to centre stage, and roiled politics and nations on both sides of the Atlantic.' 
'Who am I? Who are we?' Chris Patten's career has taken him from the outer London suburbs to the House of Commons, a seat in the Cabinet, last Governor of Hong Kong, Chairman of the BBC and Chancellor of Oxford University. About all of these he is enlightening and entertaining. He has unexpected and telling things to say about each of the three Prime Ministers for whom he worked - Edward Heath, Margaret Thatcher and John Major. But his political heroes - Baldwin, Macmillan, Butler - came from an earlier time: he is proud to be 'wet', and reckons all his paladins were pretty damp themselves. But more, Patten uses each phase of his life as a spur to reflect upon its contemporary situation - education, America, conservatism, Ireland, China, Europe and finally the question of links between violence and religion. Unlike one No.10 press secretary, Patten definitely 'does God'. 
At the end, the reader has an impression of someone who knows himself as well as any of us can, and who continues to think, passionately and intelligently, about the world around him. Wise, funny and opinionated, First Confession is a different sort of memoir, a meditation on personal and political identity which, in an age of simplification, reminds us of the complexities of both.

First Confession: A Sort of Memoir

PATTEN, Chris

Religion & Spirituality

Penguin

The Hong Kong Diaries

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

Chris Patten was a cradle Catholic (hence the title), became one of the most prominent Tory 'Wets' of the 1980s and 1990s, and went on to hold a series of prominent public offices - Chairman of the Conservative Party, the last Governor of Hong Kong, European Commissioner for External Affairs, Chancellor of Oxford University, Chairman of the BBC, advisor to the Pope - as he self-deprecatingly puts it 'a Grand Poo-bah, the Lord High Everything Else'. He writes with wry humor about his time in all these offices, taking us behind the scenes and showing us unexpected sides of many of the great figures of the day. In exploring his own identity he also examines the dangers of identity politics, which he encountered in several of his jobs, from Northern Ireland to Asia and the Middle East. No politician now writing is so purely enjoyable as Chris Patten

Leaders & Notable People

Allen Lane.

Review\nPatten's diaries over the next five years describe in detail his day-to-day battles with the Chinese ... a terrific tale, one that will appeal not just to Sinologists but to all historians, since it is effectively a record of the end days of an empire ... At times, the diaries read like a novel ... His chatty style makes the[m] an easy read--Simon Murray, Daily Telegraph 
wonderfully waspish, fascinating and rude in spades about all the people who deserve nothing less. --Stephen Vines, Literary Review 
Patten has now published his diaries of five tumultuous years in office, from 1992 to 1997, recording battles against the comrades, the tycoons, the doubters in the cabinet and mandarins everywhere. As you might expect, they are urbane, sardonic and quotable ... his plan was to extend the vote and to democratise local government. The magnates were aghast, the diplomats shuddered and the Chinese, who loathed such notions, ostracised the governor after one round of talks in Beijing ... Yet it was a brave and decent thing to try, an endeavour recorded for posterity in these pages.--Michael Sheriden, Sunday Times 
the diaries themselves, kept from the time of his appointment in April 1992 to the handover just over five years later, have not been seen before and make for consistently good reading ... Patten also has something powerful to say about Hong Kong today. This takes the form of a passionate polemical essay, written as a postscript to the diaries, about China's increasingly brutal sabotage of the Hong Kong deals. Patten brings terrific energy to his denunciation of Xi Jinping's crackdown on the territory. ... Twenty-five years on, with the global order turning more nationalist and inward, the diaries are a witness that despite his limited achievements, it was Patten who called the outcome more accurately and more honourably than they did.--Martin Kettle, The Guardian 
As an insider's account, The Hong Kong Diaries is filled with that daily sense of grappling with a multi-headed hydra ... There is an inescapable poignancy to reading this diary in 2022: it is a snapshot of a unique moment at the end of empire, and a now fading picture of an extraordinary society that flourished in its brief moment of freedom. --Isabel Hilton, Times Literary Supplement 
Lord Patten spent much of his time in Hong Kong struggling against British officials and members of the local elite who believed it was not worth trying to push China to accept more democracy in pre-handover Hong Kong-much less expanding it without China's approval. Some of the most riveting detail in this rich volume relates to these tensions. ... The author's entertaining language brings these diaries to life.--Economist 
In Patten's diaries we see everyone from Mother Teresa to Margaret Thatcher passing through the governor's living room ... Eschewing the feathered hat, the uniform and all the other flummery that goes with governing an outpost of the British empire, he plunges into a series of walkabouts, holds public meetings, looks for ways of redistributing some wealth and makes no secret of his sympathy for the democrats.--Chris Mullin, Spectator 
minutely observe[s] how China broke its promises - first insidiously and gradually and then openly and suddenly - and the impact on the lives of Hong Kongers ... Patten's diaries of his frustrating yet rewarding stint as governor cover the years from 1992 to the 1997 handover ... [he] is a genial and self-deprecating companion through the years leading up to the handover ... In the course of his diaries, Patten argues convincingly that for Britain or any other country to abandon liberal principles and yield to the Chinese Communist party's demands at every opportunity brings neither political nor commercial benefits. The trade and investment statistics he cites from the final decades of British rule do indeed suggest there is little correlation between grovelling and real rewards for business.--Victor Mallet, Financial Times

East and West

Business & Money

Economics

Macmillan Audio Books

Tory Case

Politics & Social Sciences

Politics & Government

Addison-Wesley Longman Ltd

What Next? tackles the big questions about our global condition and collective future with a verve and authority no other commentator could match. Energy, food, water, weapons proliferation, climate change, epidemic disease—the challenges themselves are proliferating. Chris Patten digests information from a vast number of sources and analyzes the issues using his experience at the highest levels of international politics. The capacity to act is the problem, he says, not the comprehension of what we should be doing—but for reasons he explains, we have good reason for hope

What Next?: Surviving The 21st Century

VIKING

A crisp clean first edition, not an ex-lib.

What Next : Surviving the Twenty-first Century

History

East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future

Asia

MCCLELLAND STEWART

Used book in good condition, due to its age it could contain normal signs of use

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