the strange death of liberal england by george dangerfield

After a resounding electoral triumph in 1906, the Liberals formed the government of the most powerful nation on earth, yet within a few years the House of Lords lost its absolute veto over legislation, the Home Rule crisis brought Ireland to the brink of civil war and led to an army mutiny, the campaign for woman's suffrage created widespread civil disorder and discredited the legal and penal systems, and an unprecedented wave of strikes swept the land. 'When codes, when religions, when ideas cease to move forward, it is always in some shining illusion that an alarmed humanity attempts to take refuge.' -The Strange of Liberal England, 343 (Stanford University Press ed, 1997).Īt the beginning of the twentieth century England's emp.)Īt the beginning of the twentieth century England's empire spanned the globe, its economy was strong, and its political system seemed immune to the ills that inflicted so many other countries. History, which reconciles incompatibles, and balances probabilities, by its very nature eventually reaches the reality of fiction. 'If the novel can go to history, history can go to the novel, at least to the extent of bringing a creative imagination to bear upon its characters. He died of leukemia in Santa Barbara, California, where he had taught for a few years at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 1941 Dangerfield published a work on the early life of Edward VII, Victoria's Heir: The Education of a Prince.Ī Guggenheim Fellowship in 1970 allowed Dangerfield to return to Europe for research. Lieutenant remains one of the best accounts of the failure of the Liberals to deal effectively with increasingly vehement demands from Ulster Unionists, industrial workers, and suffragettes. In 1930 he moved to the United States, married Mary Lou Schott in 1941, and became an American citizen in 1943.ĭangerfield's The Strange of Liberal England was not given much attention by academic historians when it first appeared in 1935, but has gained admirers over the years because of its lively style and trenchant analysis. In 1927 he received his Bachelor of Arts from Hertford College, Oxford.

His first memory, he wrote in his thirties, was 'of being held up to a window and shown Halley's Comet' in 1910. (age 82) Newbury, Berkshire, United Kingdom

The strange death of liberal england by george dangerfield