If voice makes
such a huge impression, the key question becomes, To what extent can someone
consciously alter their voice? Consider the case of Margaret Hilda Roberts, who
in 1959 was elected as a Conservative member of British Parliament for North
London. She had higher ambitions, but to those in her inner circle, her voice
was an issue.16 “She had a schoolmarmish, very slightly bossy, slightly
hectoring voice,” recalled Tim Bell, the mastermind of her party’s publicity
campaigns. Her own publicity adviser, Gordon Reese, was more graphic. Her high
notes, he said, were “dangerous to passing sparrows.” Proving that though her
politics were fixed, her voice was pliable, Margaret Hilda Roberts took her
confidants’ advice, lowered the pitch, and increased her social dominance.
There is no way to measure exactly how much difference the change made, but she
did pretty well for herself. After the Conservatives were defeated in 1974,
Margaret Thatcher—she had married the wealthy businessman Denis Thatcher in
1951—became the party’s leader and, eventually, prime minister.
