Always the Naked Girl Athwart the Chair

Christine Keeler and Chair

She always caught your eye. There have been things of far less value that have brought down governments. m/r

The Girl in the Swimming Pool
Christine Keeler, 1942-2017

by Mark Steyn - Ave atque vale - December 5, 2017

Christine Keeler died just before midnight on Monday. She was a teenager when she emerged naked from Lord Astor's swimming pool, and set in motion events that brought down the Government of the United Kingdom. Splashed across the front pages in 1963, her name resonated in Britain until the very end - even though, unlike her chum Mandy Rice-Davies, she was never able to parlay her notoriety into a lucrative second act. When I met her, as I recount below, she was delicate and damaged, beautiful and broke. Here's what I had to say about that turbulent summer in my obituary of her besotted lover, John Profumo - whose foolishness and decency also has a topical relevance, in the autumn of Weinstein, Lauer, Rose et al.
With Miss Keeler's death, all the principals of the tale are gone - the older men and the far younger women. We get a lot of requests for this essay, which in fact is anthologized in my book Mark Steyn's Passing Parade. Rest in peace, Christine:
It began like a movie: July 8th 1961. An unusually warm evening at a grand country estate. A girl in the swimming pool. She pulls herself up out of the water. She's beautiful, and naked. A larky lad in the water has tossed her bathing costume into the bushes. And among the blasé weekend guests dressed for dinner and taking a stroll on the terrace one man reacts with more than nonchalant amusement as the girl hastily wraps a towel around her. She leaves with someone else the next day. But not before the man on the terrace has enquired after her name.

It was Christine Keeler. The house was Cliveden, country home of Lord Astor. ...

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