A History of Britain, Volume II: The Wars of the British 1603-1776 |
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A History of Britain, Volume II: The Wars of the British 1603-1776
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by Simon Schama
Sales Rank: 74788
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$7.64
At Amazon
on 6-21-2008.
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Features
Cover Type: Hard Cover with 416 pages
Published by: Miramax October 17, 2001
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 0786867523
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0786867523
Book Dimensions:
10 x 7.7 x 1.6 inches
Weighs: 4 pounds
Product Review
The beginning of the 17th century promised that England's golden age would long outlast its Elizabethan namesake. Within a few years, that promise would end in civil war, political unrest, and international conflict, a period of strife that would last for two centuries, but produce the modern British nation. In this swiftly moving narrative, the second installment in a three- volume companion to the BBC/History Channel television series, Simon Schama looks at key events that would utterly change British life: the collapse of monarchy and republic, the establishment of the beginnings of empire, and the ever-wider division between court and country. The wars that accompanied these turns of fortune were, Schama writes, "eminently unpredictable, improbable, and avoidable." With them came the Glorious Revolution, the bloody suppression of religious dissent, the conquest of neighboring kingdoms, and the wide-scale movement of large populations from one place to another--including the deliberate introduction of nearly 100,000 Scots, Welsh, and English settlers in Ireland, which, Schama writes, "utterly dwarfed the related 'planting' on the Atlantic seaboard of North America." Along the way, Schama considers actors major and minor in this tumultuous play, from the unlucky king Charles I to Oliver Cromwell (who "lacked the one essential characteristic for true dictatorship: a hunger to accumulate power purely for its own sake"), from the writer Daniel Defoe to the pragmatic politician Sir Robert Walpole, from William Pitt to the African slaves who peopled Britain's American colonies.
Though understandably rushed and sometimes unfocused, Schama's narrative ably captures Britain's transformation from island outpost to global power. -- Gregory McNamee
From Publishers Weekly
This second in a series of three volumes, following the great A History of England: At the Edge of the World 3500 B.C.-1603 A.D., is an elegantly written, consistently engaging account of a seminal period in British history, penned by one of today's finest historians. Schama begins with the Stuart dynasty, which unified the crowns of Scotland and England in 1603 and as a result met its downfall. Schama contends that the concept of Great Britain caused constant upheaval for England: "The trouble was Calvinist Scotland and Catholic Ireland, and their deep religious incompatibility with Stuart England." When Charles I attempted to impose a unified religious establishment on Scotland, a firestorm ensued. In 1638, Scottish Calvinists signed a "National Covenant" and claimed that, by interfering with Scottish religion, Charles I had broken his contract, and Scotland claimed the right to overthrow him. A furious Charles called Parliament to raise military funds, but it denied his request. Instead, it began making demands for political, legal and religious rights. Charles's stubborn refusal to compromise triggered a civil war that resulted in his beheading. Parliament finally achieved its power-sharing demands in 1688-1689, when the Stuarts were toppled and an arrangement was reached with King William and Queen Mary. The year 1776, Schama points out, brought the ultimate irony: the American colonists demanded the same hard-earned liberties for which their British forefathers had fought the Stuarts. George III would prove every bit as obstreperous as Charles I. Columbia University historian Schama (The Embarrassment of Riches, etc.) is to be congratulated for this magisterial, delightfully accessible and important book. 150 color photos, ten color maps not seen by PW. (Oct.)Forecast: As with the first volume, this book is issued simultaneously with the airing of a History Channel companion series. Schama's great reputation plus the book's rich illustrations make it a good gift book that should sell steadily through its 50,000 first printing.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Reader Reviews
The second volume of Schama's book tie-in to the BBC and History Channel TV series takes Britain from the death of Elizabeth I (and the ascendancy of James I) to the end of the American Revolution and the settling of a British regime in the Indian subcontinent. It gives more space to the tumultuous middle of the 17th century (350 of the 524 pages) -- with its see-sawing Catholic and Protestant regimes, the civil wars, and Restoration -- than the 18th century. Perhaps what strikes one most about the entire period is how bloody gruesome the English ruling classes and armies once treated their own people as well as the Scots and Irish -- as badly as any 21st century religious dictatorship in Africa or Asia. Thousands were massacred after battles as well as during them; several of the Guy Fawkes gunpowder plotters had their hearts cut out while still alive. Two years after his death and embalming, Cromwell's body was exhumed and publicly hanged. And not just humans suffered: When yet another wave of the plague struck London in 1665, and dog and cats were believed to be the cause, 40,000 dogs and perhaps 200,000 cats were slaughtered. The slave trade and the brutal labor conditions on a West Indian sugar plantation are vividly depicted. (Bracing though all of this may be, it's encouraging to realize that such atrocities have ceased to occur within the UK in the past century and a half, just as it seems unlikely the Germans and French will ever again be at each other's throats, so maybe the species is making slow but inexorable progress toward the light. And what great movies all this history would make, and in some cases HAS made!) Though the life of common folk gets somewhat short shrift, Schama does note significant developments along the way: the arrival of condoms, the growth of print news media, English society as seen through the eyes of a slave named Olaudah Equiano. It is helpful to be reminded that while we Yanks tend to think of the "French and Indian War" as a quaint prelude to our Revolution (whose launching is stirringly related by Schama, who though a born Brit, spent a few years in Boston and now teaches at Columbia), the Seven Years War was actually a sort of "world war" between England and France for future dominance of the globe: battles took place in the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, even West Africa and India, while Major George Washington was dashing about New England under Braddock's command. Volume 2 regrettably has fewer maps than Volume 1 -- I would have appreciated a little more topographical help with the mid 17th century civil wars and Scottish campaigns -- and it also shows a few signs of having been rushed to print (e.g., "perpeptuated" on p. 99). But Schama's smooth and engaging narrative style makes a fine introduction to English history for the less knowledgeable general reader. (For example, he wishes Jane Austen had been around to chronicle the vicious personal politics of India's administrators, and drily notes the repeated automatic lies that filled British propaganda about its enemies, decade after decade: "impaled babies, eviscerated pregnant mothers, roughed-up grandpas -- the usual thing....") I look forward with eagerness to the next volume in the series.
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A History of Britain, Volume II: The Wars of the British 1603-1776
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Price: $7.64
Updated on 6-21-2008.
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