Social Figure, Wife of Ambassador
In 1924, Duff Cooper gained election to Parliament, while his wife continued as a society celebrity. Her reputation became even more celebrated in France as the centerpoint of immediate post second world war French literary culture when her husband served from 1944 to 1948 as Britain's ambassador to France. During this period, Lady Diana's popularity as a hostess remained undimmed, even after allegations that the embassy guest list included "pederasts and collaborators".
Following Duff Cooper's retirement in 1947, they continued to live in France at Chantilly, until his death in 1954. He was created Viscount Norwich in 1952, for services to the nation, but Lady Diana refused to be called Viscountess Norwich, claiming that it sounded like "porridge". She made an official announcement in The Times to this effect, stating that she wished to be known as Lady Diana Cooper.
Read more about this topic: Lady Diana Cooper
Famous quotes containing the words social, wife and/or ambassador:
“... as women become free, economic, social factors, so becomes possible the full social combination of individuals in collective industry. With such freedom, such independence, such wider union, becomes possible also a union between man and woman such as the world has long dreamed of in vain.”
—Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935)
“...many men choose a wife amid the deft-fingered clerks in preference to the society misses. The woman clerk has studied the value of concentration, learned the lesson that incites to work when a burden bears heavily upon her strength. She knows the word of self- reliance, and the fine courage that springs from the consciousness that a good result has been accomplished by a well-directed effort.”
—Clara (Marquise)
“An Ambassador is an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.”
—Sir Henry Wotton (1568–1639)