Philip Ziegler (Philip Sandeman Ziegler) Biography

British biographer, born in Ringwood, Hampshire, educated at New College, Oxford; he subsequently held diplomatic postings in Europe, Africa, and South America before entering publishing in 1967. His earlier works include The Black Death (1968), a historical study surveying the extent of the epidemic's social and cultural impact, and the biography William IV (1971). Among his further publications as a biographer are Melbourne (1976), Diana Cooper (1981), Mountbatten (1985), and Wilson (1993), the authorized biography of Harold Wilson. Ziegler also edited three volumes of Lord Mountbatten's diaries (1987–9). His most widely noted work to date is King Edward VIII (1990), a meticulously detailed biography in the preparation of which he was granted access to a wide range of hitherto secret documents. His other books include The Sixth Great Power (1988), a chronicle of the Baring family and their influence from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. London at War, 1939–1945 (1995) is a sociohistorical account of London during the Second World War.