I Never Promised You A Rose GardenAuthor :
Hardback
Published : Wednesday 21 October 2020
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by
Hardback
21 Oct 2020
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€24.10
Extended stock - Dispatch 5-7 days
Description
The story of the struggles of an adolescent boy wrestling with his demons amidst the political and personal conflicts of the 1980s and testimony to his startling discovery that wherever you go, you find yourself.
Aged fifteen and armed with a credit card stolen from his father, Jonny Oates ran away from home and boarded a plane to Addis Ababa. His plan? To single-handedly save the Ethiopian people from the devastating 1985 famine. Discovering on arrival that the demand for the assistance of unskilled fifteen-year-old English boys was limited, he learned the hard lesson that you can't change the world just by pure force of will. A rare political memoir from a figure whose life before politics is every bit as gripping as their time in the corridors of power, I Never Promised You a Rose Garden charts Oates's darkest moments as an idealistic but troubled schoolboy alone in Ethiopia, struggling with his sexuality and mental health; it traces his journey onwards - to Zimbabwe, where, aged eighteen, he becomes deputy headteacher of a rural secondary school; to South Africa in the final year of Nelson Mandela's presidency, where he works in the first post-apartheid parliament as the country seeks to shape a future from its bitterly divided past; and, ultimately, to the roller-coaster ride of Britain's first post-war coalition government, where, as Nick Clegg's chief of staff, he plays a key role in the struggle for his own country's future and learns important lessons about the difference between power and duty. Shot through with a captivating warmth and humour, this heart-stoppingly candid memoir reflects on the challenges of balancing idealism and pragmatism, reminding us that lasting change comes from working together rather than standing alone.
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