Faith, Fiction, Friends: History of England

Showing posts with label History of England. Show all posts

Monday, August 1, 2022

"Innovation" by Peter Ackroyd

For England and Britain, it was a century that began with Victoria on the throne – the second longest reigning monarch – and ended with Elizabeth, now the longest reigning monarch. In between were two world wars, the rise of the Labour Party, the Great Depression, the decline of the old, landed aristocracy, the vote for women, the first woman prime minister, and social change on a scale previously unimaginable. Telling the story of England in the 20^th century is British author Peter Ackroyd, finishing his grand historical series with Innovation: The History of England Volume VI.

The sheer breadth of this series is rather astonishing. Like he’s done with its predecessors, Innovation is written in a lively, comprehensive style, focusing on the political history of England while paying at least some attention to social and cultural. In other words, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones get sufficient attention, but don’t expect much detail. (Ackroyd also emphasizes that this is a history of England, not Britain; he includes information on Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland / Ireland only when they might be important to English history.)

Ackroyd’s England is familiar and yet it’s not. He fills in well-known stories with unexpected details, even as he paints with a broad brush. Winston Churchill is portrayed, failures and all (and he had his share of failures). He provides an account of each parliamentary election and keeps the story fast-paced enough so that it doesn’t become repetitious. Margaret Thatcher is treated with more balance that I expected; she was never popular with the literary and artistic elites in Britain and remains an object of ire. But Ackroyd gives her what she’s due; she revolutionized Britain and many have never forgiven her.

Peter Ackroyd

The highlights of the work are the events leading up to World War II; how an entire generation became disillusioned after the first world war; how the music of the 1960s developed and became known worldwide; and how Thatcher faced down Argentina’s military junta in the Falklands.

The author is one of Britain’s most prolific popular historians. In addition to his history of England series, he’s also written biographies of Charles Dickens and the artist J.M.W. Turner, among several others; a history of London (and a history of London beneath the streets); and many other works.

Innovation and the first five volumes in the series are what historians would call “popular history,” but they provide a solid overview of the history of England from prehistoric to contemporary times. His broad grasp of so much history is rather astonishing, and he shares it all. (And I keep wondering what his office must have looked like to accommodate all of the research.)

My review of Revolution by Peter Ackroyd.

My review of Rebellion by Peter Ackroyd.

My review of Peter Ackroyd’s Tudors.

My review of Peter Ackroyd’s Foundation.

Reading Peter Ackroyd.

A Revolt over a Prayer Book.

Monday, February 25, 2019

"Dominion" by Peter Ackroyd

You might want to call this “everything you wanted to know about British parliamentary history in the 19^thcentury, and then some.”

British author Peter Ackroyd is beginning to approach the end of his multi-volume history of England. Each of the first four volumes has a one-word title (followed by a long subtitle): Foundation, Tudors, Rebellion, and Revolution. The single words of the titles serve as both descriptions of the content and summary themes.

The fifth and most recent is Dominion: The History of England from the Battle of Waterloo to Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. It covers most of 19^thcentury British history. If there is a primary focus to the volume, it is the push and pull and British politics and parliamentary changes that occurred during the century.

We follow, in detail, the rise and fall and occasional resurrection of all of the prime ministers and the governments. We see the considerable amount of political activism that occurred during the period, like the Chartist movement that sought, among other things, universal male suffrage. We read about the political protests, often fueled by the industrial and technological changes, that sometimes ended in bloodshed. Dominionalso includes succinct accounts of the significant wars Britain experienced during the Victorian period – the Crimean War, the rebellion in India, and the Boer War.

Ackroyd writes with a comprehensive view and a rather sparkling (and witty) style. A history like this one and its cohorts is not an easy thing to write; in a sense, the author has to hold together all of the information being covered even as he’s writing about a specific event or month or year.

But Dominion is different from its predecessors. The difference is both significant and surprising, and it lies in what is not included. The previous volumes have covered literary and cultural history, in addition to political, technological, and military events. Dominion has a few scattered quotes from Charles Dickens, William Makepeace Thackery, George Eliot, and a few other literary figures, but that’s all that’s included. To get two-and-a-half pages on a music hall performer and essentially ignore what Victorian England produced in literature is not a minor omission. The previous volumes included literary history.

Peter Ackroyd

So what you will not find in Dominion, except for the occasional quotation, is Dickens, Thackeray, Tennyson, Thomas Hardy, George Eliot, the Brontes, and others. Dickens fares slightly better than the rest, but only slightly. Even popular culture is shorted, with a single reference to Gilbert and Sullivan and none at all to Arthur Conan Doyle and his Sherlock Holmes stories.

Dominion stands as an in-depth and lively summary of 19^thBritish political history. In that regard, it is comprehensive and well-written. But it is disappointing that Ackroyd didn’t turn his keen eye to the literature of the period as well.