Benjamin Disraeli Letters: 1852-1856, Volume VI(Letters of Benjamin Disraeli)

Benjamin Disraeli, Queen Victoria's favourite prime minister, was, in the words of Robert Blake, 'the best letter-writer among English statesmen.' This, the latest volume in the critically acclaimed Letters of Benjamin Disraeli series, contains or describes 951 letters (784 previously unpublished) written by Disraeli between 1852 and 1856. These years cover his first cabinet post, as chancellor of the exchequer, his attempts as House leader to unify the Conservative party, and his opposition to the Crimean War, both in the House and in his newspaper, The Press. Included are significant runs of correspondence, such as 63 letters (34 previously unpublished) to the 14th Earl of Derby, and 75 letters (none previously published) to Lord Stanley, the future 15th Earl of Derby, as well as more personal ones, such as 59 letters to the eccentric Mrs Brydges Willyams, the 'female Croesus' who offered Disraeli a substantial legacy. These illuminate anew both his public and private life, and show the strength of his resolve to reshape party policies to suit the age of industrialism and free trade. New light is also thrown on other matters, such as the supposed plagiarism in his panegyric on the Duke of Wellington. Ten appendices include full cabinet lists, Disraeli's own reminiscences of the period, and Stanley's remarkable verbatim notes of intimate conversations with Disraeli at Hughenden Manor.

About the Author :
Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) was one of the most important figures in nineteenth-century Europe, spending three decades in British government and twice serving as prime minister, as well as being a well-known literary figure. A convert to Anglicanism, he was Britain's first and thus far only Prime Minister of Jewish heritage. Mary S. Millar is a co-editor with the Disraeli Project and an independent scholar in Kingston, Ontario. M.G. Wiebe is general editor emeritus of the Disraeli Project and was a professor of English at Queen's University. JOHN M. ROBSON was born educated in Toronto, graduating from the University of Toronto (B.A. 1951, M.A. 1953, PH.D. 1956). After lecturing at the University of British Columbia and the University of Alberta, he joined the staff as Victoria College, University of Toronto, where he is now Professor of English. He is Associate Editor of the Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, and he also edited Edmund Burke’s Appel from the New to the Old Whigs, J.S. Mill: A Selection, and Editing Nineteenth-Century Texts.

Review :
'If you have not read the first three volumes of the Disraeli letters, then you have a treat in store...Volume IV, like the others, is informatively introduced and meticulously edited...The detailed footnotes...are often as illuminating as the letters. The erudition never becomes heavy or obfuscating, but the accumulated information is a veritable who's who and where's where for London life in the 1840s.' - Ann P. Robson - Newsletter of the Victorian Studies Association 'The editing is splendid...As it continues, this important project will stimulate us to look at the familiar in new ways.' - Angus Hopkins - The Parliamentary History Yearbook