Must You Go?

forbidding and combustible on the outside, gentle and tender at home' -- James Preston EVENING STANDARD 'Pinter's first diagnosis with cancer of the oesophagus came on 13 December 2001, soon after that public "Fall" of 11 September. Fraser traces the "steps downwards" through the eight ensuing years of sporadic anguish and relief with exemplary clarity and courage...Fraser keeps her gaze steady and her heart open' -- Boyd Tonkin THE INDEPENDENT 'It is written with palpable love, warmth, affection and a huge sense of loss for a man regarded by many as Britain's greatest living playwright before his death on Christmas Eve 2008...Must You Go? is essentially a heart-warming love story' -- Charles Spencer DAILY TELEGRAPH 'As superior gossip about literary, theatrical and political stars it is entertaining and often very funny. As a testament to a long, loving marriage it is simply touching' -- Anne Chisholm SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'Finally this book works, just as it appears their lives worked, as the most touching and enduring of love stories...The ending, brutal and unsentimentally presented yet filled with a Tolstoyan directness of feeling, is almost unbearably moving. The whole of this lovely book fills you with gratitude that happenstance can, once in while, not screw up and find the right girl for the right boy' -- Dominic Dromgoole FINANCIAL TIMES 'This engaging memoir succeeds on two fronts. First it brings to light the private world of Harold Pinter, one of our greatest playwrights, but rather more importantly, it tells the remarkable love story between the writer and his wife Antonia Fraser...In the coming years there will be many biographies and assessments of this writer's life but none, I believe, will match the gentle intimacy of Antonia Fraser's memoir' -- Graham Ball SUNDAY EXPRESS 'Few people have the emotional capacity for a grand passion, or the talent for expressing it, as she does. Lady Antonia is a narrative historian and she has spent the year since Pinter died writing out their love story' -- Victoria Glendinning DAILY MAIL ' "No flowers on my grave," he hissed after seeing dead cornflowers on Larkin's. His wishes have been honoured in this book, which is less flowery than most elegies have a right to be, one year on. He had already approved the diary entries he'd read as "a great record of - us". -- Blake Morrison GUARDIAN 'Fraser often writes beautifully, in carefully weighted sentences charged with a mischievous wit and, finally, a heart-snagging tenderness' -- Clare Allfree METRO 'a poignant, touching and romantic tale that will illuminate a little-understood side of Pinter' NEWS OF THE WORLD 'Following several high-profile extracts, Antonia Fraser's memoir of her life with Nobel Prize-winning playwright Harold Pinter stormed the review pages this week' THE BOOKSELLER 'This book is a love story and a very moving one...There is a good test of a biography of memoir. Does it leave you thinking, I would like to have known this person? I would very much like to have known Harold Pinter - and that's not something I had thought before reading this book' -- Allan Massie LITERARY REVIEW 'A rollicking read' -- Richard Fitzpatrick IRISH EXAMINER 'For anyone interested in Harold Pinter, this is required reading' -- Melanie McDonagh THE TABLET 'The final section of Must You Go? is the strongest and most affecting, an account of Pinter's ill health, his 75th-birthday celebratins in Dublin, his Nobel Prize, his struggle to make his political voice heard and Fraser's gradual realisation that her time with Pinter is running out. This is a moving account of carefully crafted and cherished love, a theme that is, in itself, unusual' -- Hilary Fannin IRISH TIMES 'Must You Go? is wholeheartedly recommended to anybody who loves or hates Harold Pinter, has an interest in theatre or just can't resist a good old-fashioned love story' -- Philip Fisher BRITISH THEATRE GUIDE WEBSITE 'This is one of the most 'un-put-downable' books I have read in ages' -- Ruth Rees CATHOLIC TIMES 'Those who woul have liked to explore the bewitching love story that their union surely holds have to be content with occasinal details, such as Pinter's meltingly sweet focus on Fraser as he asks her, during that final ambulance ride to his death, "What are your plans - generally?". -- Terri Apter TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT 'As ever, Fraser writes beautifully. Her book is an uplifting, warm and moving tribute to her life with Harold, a man who often described himself as 'the luckiest man in the world', and a companion who is sorely missed' GOOD BOOK GUIDE 'Never sentimental, she enlivens every page of this affectionate memoir with humour, wit and minute observation' -- Maria Perry-Robinson CATHOLIC HERALD 'She provides considerable insight into the magnetic intellectual attraction she and Pinter exerted on each other, their respective creative processes, and the colourful characters they mixed with in London high society' -- Paul Nolan HOT PRESS (Ireland) 'Harold Pinter was one of Hackney's literary illuminati and this honest account of his big mouth and kind heart from his widow dispels some of the myths about him and allows us to consider his legacy without being deafened by his angry voice' -- The Hit List by Pages of Hackney THE INDEPENDENT 'As superior gossip about literary, theatrical and political stars, it is entertaining and often very funny. As a testament to a long, loving marriage it is simply touching' -- Anne Chisholm LADY MARGARET HALL - THE BROWN BOOK 'Her final chapters are searingly honest and often heart wrenching to read' -- Lucy Popescu TRIBUNE 'This book, then, is at once a highly readable account of a love story between two celebrities that, incidentally, 'drops' enough famous names to satisfy any gourmet gossip and a valuable source for understanding the work of one of the giants of twentieth century literature' CONTEMPORARY REVIEW 'it reads like an extended eulogy to a lost lover' -- Michael Quinn THE STAGE 'Lady Antonia's memoir, based on the diary she has kept since 1968, is an addictive and affecting account of her 33-year love affair with the playwright who defined his age' COUNTRY LIFE 'Great figures from recent (literary) history flit through its pages, but what really engages is the sense of life and love intertwining' -- Ian Rankin THE GUARDIAN 'The mutual fascination of Harold and Antonia never wavered; this luscious, name-dropping book celebrates the strange compatibility that lasted until Pinter's death in 2008' -- Kate Saunders THE TIMES