Keep the flag flying

The insightful and entertaining account of a lively British diplomatic career in the post-colonial period. Keep the Flag Flying is intended to convey something of the flavor - and the frivolities - of escapades and encounters which Sir Alan and his wife experienced in the course of thirty-five years in diplomacy in the Middle East, Africa and South America, and at home too. The narrative ranges from the 1991 Gulf War, the Iranian Revolution and the running sore of Palestine through a gallery of African despots and of royal moments to the furor over the arrival of Ronald Biggs in Brazil. All this is set against a half-century of post-imperial adjustment in Britain's foreign policy, in which withdrawal from a global role is offset by an overriding concern, shared with western partners, to counter the extension, political and economic as well as military, of Soviet Marxist influence across a fractious world. The account brings out the human side, as well as the value, of a profession in which "life's rich tapestry" plays an uncommonly prominent part.