A SOCIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND

by Asa Briggs ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1984

In the 40 years since G. M. Trevelyan's English Social History, writes his preeminent successor, the subject has both broadened and deepened--to include politics and culture, new findings and new approaches. ""The social history of any period must be comprehensive as well as sensitive."" The resulting volume--prehistory to the present in 300 pages, nearly half devoted to illustrations--calls for close, considered reading. Insofar as there is a theme, it can almost be said to be particularity, variety, multiplicity, complexity. And Briggs does not suffer foolishness gladly: ""Lewis Mumford, historian of cities, generalized scathingly about Roman towns as 'forum, vomitarium and bath,' but he left out the amphitheatre and temple and could not have been so scathing had he brought water supply into the reckoning."" Much later: ""Like old towns, industrial towns had different profiles and were not, as Mumford was to claim, the same place, Coketown, with different aliases."" From the mystery of Stonehenge to the myths of the Norman conquest through the radical-republican Diggers and Levellers to ""the mass appeal of spectator sports,"" readers will find Briggs unhackneyed, acute, and precise. As one approaches the present, moreover, there is less compression: roughly a third of the book deals with the 19th and 20th centuries. And here Briggs, the historian of industrial development and Victorian society, discourses to happy effect on ""the social implications of trade unions,"" the sylvan pleasures of canals (or civil vs. mechanical engineering), mid-Victorian ideals and late-Victorian criticism of those ideals. Throughout, the illustrations amplify and leaven the text. The death warrant of Charles I, showing Cromwell's signature ""third on the list,"" is accompanied by (among other things) Milton's defense of the execution; a page of Victorian photographs, trade-catalogues, and ads illustrates ""Keeping Clean."" There are periodic color insets--beginning with Celtic and Roman remains; there is a map of the North Sea oil fields, as of 1983. The book is not a pulsing dramatic synthesis--it is a vividly detailed, carefully shaded relief map.

Pub Date: April 1, 1984

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1984

Categories: NONFICTION