Michael Bloch
British author and historian (born 1953)
Michael Anthony Bloch (born 24 September 1953) is an author and historian.
Educated at Portadown College and St John's College, Cambridge, he was called to the bar by the Inner Temple in 1978 and in 1979 became an assistant to Maître Suzanne Blum, the Parisian lawyer of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
Bloch's books include several about the Duke and Duchess, an authorized biography of James Lees-Milne, a study of the Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe, and a biography of Frederick Matthias Alexander, founder of the Alexander Technique. Bloch was once the lover of Lees-Milne, writing in 2009: "I thought he was quite simply the most wonderful person I had ever met". In a review, it was noted that Bloch in his biography of Lees-Milne had a "laudable objectivity" about him, despite being one of his "most loyal and long-term late-in-life amours".
Books
The Duke of Windsor's War (Weidenfeld, 1982) ISBN 0-297-77947-8
Operation Willi (Weidenfeld, 1984)
Wallis and Edward: The Intimate Correspondence of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor (Weidenfeld, 1986) ISBN 0-671-61209-3
The Secret File of the Duke of Windsor (Bantam Press, 1988) ISBN 0-593-01667-X
The Reign and Abdication of Edward VIII (Bantam Press, 1990)
Ribbentrop (Bantam Press, 1992)
The Duchess of Windsor (Weidenfeld, 1996), ISBN 978-0297835905
FM: The Life of Frederick Matthias Alexander, Founder of the Alexander Technique (Little Brown, 2004)
James Lees-Milne: The Life (John Murray, 2009) ISBN 978-0719565502
Jeremy Thorpe (Little Brown, 2014)
Closet Queens: Some 20th Century British Politicians (Little Brown, 2015)
Bloch edited the later diaries of James Lees-Milne for publication by John Murray: Deep Romantic Chasm, 1979-81 (2000); Holy Dread, 1982-84 (2001); Beneath a Waning Moon, 1985-97 (2003); Ceaseless Turmoil, 1988-92 (2004); The Milk of Paradise, 1993-97 (2005). He also abridged the original 12-volume series in 3 volumes: Diaries, 1942-54 (2006); Diaries, 1971-83 (2007); Diaries, 1984-97 (2008).
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Michael Bloch” as british author and historian (born 1953). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as british author and historian (born 1953). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q50111701. VIAF identifies the subject as 274513019. The Library of Congress control number is n82140608. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1953, 1978, 1979 and 2009.
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This entry incorporates text from “Michael Bloch” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.