Abse, Leo 1917-2008

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born April 22, 1917, in Wales; died August 19, 2008, in London, England. Politician, lawyer, and author. Abse was a colorful, vocal, and tenacious advocate for social justice. He served as a Labour member of the British Parliament from his native Wales for nearly thirty years until his retirement in 1987, but Abse was not primarily a champion of Welsh issues. A veteran of a forty-year marriage himself, and a parent as well, Abse was a champion of those whose life-paths took them in a different direction. For decades he campaigned in Parliament for the legalization of homosexual behavior between consenting adults, no-fault divorce legislation, the reform of existing laws regarding adoption and children in foster care, and issues related to in vitro fertilization. He introduced many controversial reform bills as a "private member," that is, a member of Parliament who is not also a government minister. Some of Abse's campaigns lasted for years, during which he cajoled, compromised, and employed strategies that approached outright trickery, but eventually, in most cases, he triumphed. Abse's career in Parliament provided ample opportunity for him to observe some of the world's prominent political figures at close range for extended periods of time, and his leisure-time interest in psychology prompted him to try his hand at psychohistory, or more specifically, psychobiography. He spent his retirement years as an author. Abse's studies of popular figures combined amateur psychoanalysis with provocative subject matter and startling titles. This would propel them to the bestseller lists, and each new study, reportedly more audacious than the last, generated the kind of public and critical outrage that could not help but increase sales. Outside the public eye Abse pursued a more circumspect lifestyle. He was a longtime solicitor with the Welsh law firm of Leo Abse and Cohen. Abse was the author of Margaret, Daughter of Beatrice: A Psychobiography of Margaret Thatcher (1989), Wotan, My Enemy: Can Britain Live with the Germans in the European Union? (1994), The Man behind the Smile: Tony Blair and the Politics of Perversion (1996), later revised as Tony Blair: The Man Who Lost His Smile (2003), and Fellatio, Masochism, Politics, and Love (2000), an exploration of the sexual dalliance of Bill Clinton and the political alliances of Tony Blair. His last book represented a departure from the current affairs category, but not from the lurid subject matter for which he was known: The Bi-sexuality of Daniel Defoe: A Psychoanalytic Survey of the Man and His Works (2006).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

BOOKS

Abse, Leo, Private Member, Macdonald (London, England), 1973.

PERIODICALS

New York Times, August 25, 2008, p. A17.

Times (London, England), August 21, 2008, p. 55.