Culture, Thought and Belief in British Political Life since 1800: Essays in Honour of Jonathan Parry

Brings together agenda-setting essays that illuminate the complex relationship between ideas and political activity in modern British history. Ideas matter in modern British political life: culture, thought and belief are integral to the fabric of politics, high and low, foreign and domestic. They are woven into the day-to-day business of debate, policy and decision-making. This book shows how and why they have mattered so much. Inspired by the work of Jonathan Parry, it explores the cultural and intellectual influences on politics both formal and informal since the turn of the nineteenth century. Featuring original interventions by some of the world's leading historians, the essays in the volume are organised around themes of central relevance to the understanding of modern British political history. They explore a wide range of subjects across political life and its intellectual and cultural hinterlands, including constitutionalism and international political thought, anticolonial activism, race and imperial commemoration, female political thinkers, parliament, monarchy and the law, the politics of religion, and patriotism and national identity. This is an agenda-setting text that will be essential reading for anyone wishing to understand the complex relationship between ideas and political activity in modern British history. Paul Readman is Professor of Modern British History at King's College London. Dr Geraint Thomas is Fellow and Director of Studies in History at Peterhouse, University of Cambridge. Contributors: Michael Bentley, John Bew, Paul Bew, David Cannadine, Matthew Cragoe, Tom Crewe, Ben Griffin, Boyd Hilton, Michael Ledger-Lomas, Joanna Lewis, Helen McCarthy, Alex Middleton, Susan D. Pennybacker, Kathryn Rix, James Thompson, Philip Williamson

Table of Contents:
Introduction Paul Readman and Geraint Thomas Part I: Writing Modern British History Chapter 1. Parry Passu: Jonathan Parry in European Echo Michael Bentley Chapter 2. G.M. Trevelyan, Landscape and the Writing of History in England, c.1870-c.1950 Paul Readman Part II: Nation Chapter 3. The Image of the Country House in Victorian Political Culture James Thompson Chapter 4. Hugh de Sélincourt, The Cricket Match, and Englishness between the Wars Matthew Cragoe Chapter 5. Nation and Union in the Career of David Lloyd George Geraint Thomas Part III: Ideas Over Time: Narratives of Change Chapter 6. Politics, Rhetoric, and the Serial Fluctuations of 'Small State' Ideology in the Long Nineteenth Century and After Boyd Hilton Chapter 7. The Socialist Lives of Beatrice Webb and Margaret Cole Helen McCarthy Chapter 8. 'Great Contemporaries' but Guarded Friends: Winston Churchill and G.M. Trevelyan Revisited David Cannadine Chapter 9. What Happened to Political Nonconformity? Philip Williamson Part IV: Institutions Chapter 10. Liberalism, the Law and Parliament in Modern British Politics Ben Griffin Chapter 11. The Backbenchers of the Nineteenth-century Commons: Activity and Accountability in the Age of Reform Kathryn Rix Chapter 12. Lord Salisbury as Modern Political Man, c.1880-1902 Tom Crewe Chapter 13. Edward the Caresser: Monarchy and Religion in the Reign of Edward VII Michael Ledger-Lomas Part V: Britain in the World Chapter 14. Irish Realities and British Liberal Self-deception: The Reaches and Limits of British Liberal Constitutionalism John Bew and Paul Bew Chapter 15. Latin America and British International Thought, 1880-1920 Alex Middleton Chapter 16. Cambridge Beginnings, Oxford Departures: 'Liberal Education' and Imperial Legacies, 1945-70 Susan D. Pennybacker Chapter 17. The Curious Case of Wales's Statue to Henry Morton Stanley Joanna Lewis Jonathan Parry: List of Publications Index Tabula Gratulatoria

About the Author :
Paul Readman is Professor of Modern British History at King's College London. Geraint Thomas is Fellow and Director of Studies in History at Peterhouse, University of Cambridge. John Bew is Professor of History and Foreign Policy at the Department of War Studies, King's College London. Sir David Cannadine is Dodge Professor Emeritus of History at Princeton University, a Visiting Professor of History at the University of Oxford, and the General Editor of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Michael Ledger-Lomas is a Visiting Research Fellow at King's College London and the author of Queen Victoria: This Thorny Crown (Oxford, 2022). Joanna Lewis is Professor in the Department of International History at the London School of Economics, where she is also Director of the Centre for Women, Peace and Security. Helen McCarthy is Professor of Modern and Contemporary British History at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of St John's College. Alex Middleton is Fellow in Modern British History at St Hugh's College, Oxford. Susan D. Pennybacker is the Chalmers W. Poston Distinguished Professor of European History at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Kathryn Rix is the Assistant Editor of the House of Commons, 1832-1945 project at the History of Parliament. James Thompson is Professor of Modern British History at the University of Bristol PHILIP WILLIAMSON is Emeritus Professor of modern history at Durham University. Ben Griffin is Associate Professor in Modern British History at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Girton College.