There are some figures the reading public can never get enough of: Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill — and the Mitford Sisters.

The number of books by and about these daughters of privilege in the years between the two World Wars is a literary phenomenon that shows no sign of letting up. Today there are over 100,000 entries about them on the Internet, about the same number as for Jane Austen.

Last winter a collection of the letters of the sisters to and from each other was thoughtfully reviewed in these pages. “The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters” followed individual biographies of most of the sisters as well as autobiographies, memoirs, and earlier collections of letters they wrote to each other and to assorted acquaintances in the literary world of their day. Their scandals and their involvement with figures of note on the world stage provided endless material for the press and even for a successful musical.

What can explain the unending interest, if not fascination, with the Mitfords when so many glamorous celebrities shine for a moment and then fade away? Tall, beautiful, and unmistakably patrician, Nancy Mitford, the oldest of the sisters, drew on her eccentric family for the characters and plots of several amusing novels, her best known is “Love in a Cold Climate.” She wielded her rapier-like wit in correspondence with such friends as Evelyn Waugh.

Jessica Mitford, the second youngest, ran off to witness the Spanish civil war with a dashing cousin, became a Communist, and eventually moved to America, where she found fame as the author of the best-selling critique of the funeral business, “The American Way of Death.” Unity Mitford, the fourth sister, became a Hitler groupie, pursuing the Fuhrer, declaring her love for him and her hatred of Jews, and famously shot herself in an unsuccessful attempt to commit suicide when war between England and Germany was declared.

The matriarch of the clan, Lady Redesdale, found Hitler “very easy to be with … and such good manners.” The society beauty Diana Mitford, the third sister, left her husband, heir to the Guinness ale fortune, for Oswald Moseley, head of the British Union of Fascists, England’s blackshirts, and joined him in prison during the war years. She remained unrepentant about their beliefs until her death.

The remaining two sisters led quiet lives. Deborah, the youngest and the only sister still living, became the Duchess of Devonshire and Pamela, the second oldest Mitford sister, chose relative obscurity. Throughout their lives they all referred to each other by such nicknames as “Honks” and “Bobo,” and remained unruffled by each other’s various contretemps.

The one exception was Nancy’s denunciation of Diana as a danger to the country. The others never forgave her, although they did forgive Unity, Diana, and Jessica, whose values, like their manner, had remained those of the English upper classes.

Nancy’s veneer of brittle sophistication mirrored the arch snobbery of her class, satirized — although he shared some of its predilections — by Evelyn Waugh. To Waugh’s smart set, eccentricity was a virtue, a stand against bourgeois values. “The Bright Young Things,” perversely transgressive, made big things little and little things big; war was a nuisance but a dull party was a disaster. Style was what mattered. It was not to be found in tradesmen, businessmen — or Jews least of all. This attitude toward Jews, after a hiatus following the revelations of the Holocaust, has reappeared openly in mainstream English society and academia. A Parliamentary report released in 2006 declared: “Anti-Jewish themes and remarks are gaining acceptability in some quarters in public and private discourse in Britain.”

The designation “Israeli” has conveniently taken the place of “Jew,” but the tone of contempt is unmistakable and has a familiar ring. The Mitford voice and the Mitford values live on among England’s professors, politicians, and editorial writers.

The Guardian, the Independent, the New Statesman, and the BBC, while paying scant attention to assaults and threats against Jews, print editorials and cartoons repeating old calumnies about world-wide Jewish conspiracies and blame the Jewish state alone for the violence in the Middle East, portraying Israel as a cruel occupying power practicing apartheid. While synagogues and Jewish centers need to be heavily guarded against attack, the mayor of London and leftist Labour MPs vilify Jews with impunity.

Is anti-Semitism endemic to English culture? George Orwell thought so. In 1945 Orwell noted, “There is more antisemitism in England than we care to admit,” adding, “prejudice against Jews has always been pretty widespread in England.” Even as World War II was barely over he observed, “It is generally admitted that antisemitism is on the increase … and that humane and enlightened people are not immune to it.” He referred to “the antisemitic strain” in the works of such sophisticated and admired authors as Evelyn Waugh.

With anti-Semitism once again respectable in mainstream society, the report by Parliament describes “an atmosphere where Jews have become … more vulnerable to abuse and attack than at any other time for a generation or longer.”

The Mitfords would feel right at home.

Ms. Kramer is the author of “Maria Montessori: A Biography.”