Speaking for Myself
My Life from Liverpool to Downing Street
Chapter One
The Beginning
The story starts in the early 1950s, when two young actors meet on tour in the
provinces. As happens in such stories, they fall in love and are soon in the
family way. When a daughter is born, they are overjoyed and overwhelmed at the
same time. Sadly, the strain of living in shabby digs, short of money and work,
and with a small baby in tow, proves too much. Thus, when their baby is six
weeks old, they leave her in the care of the father's parents in Liverpool and
go off to the big city to seek their fortune. The year was 1954, the baby was
me, and I never grew tired of hearing how my parents met, of their respective
childhoods, and, of course, of how I got my unusual name.
My father, Tony Booth, fell into acting largely by accident. While doing his
national service, he conducted a prolonged flirtation with a colonel's wife. As
she was heavily into amateur dramatics, he decided that this was the way in. And
so the stage was set for the rest of his life. Although he regularly complained
that the theat ... read full excerpt from: Speaking for Myself ebook
