Author:Stuart Maconie,Stuart Maconie
Brought to you by Penguin.
In Hope and Glory Stuart goes in search of the places, people and events of the century we have just left behind that have shaped the look and character of modern Britain. From the death of Victoria to the demise of New Labour, he takes a single event from each decade of the 20th century that offers up a defining moment in our history and then goes in search of its legacy today. The death of a queen, a bloody war, a nation on strike, a first broadcast, a ship coming into land, reaching for the top of the world, an epic football match, a youth rebellion, a pop concert and an election - each event in turn has shaped our national culture and spirit to make us who we are. Some were glorious days, some tragic, even shameful, but each has played its part - from sport to music, politics to war, industrial relations to exploration - in making modern Britain.
1901 - the death of Victoria and the rise of British women; 1916 - the First World War in the national psyche; 1926 - the General Strike and industrial conflict; 1936 - how the British invented television; 1948 - the docking of the Empire Windrush and multi-cultural Britain; 1953 - Edmund Hillary's ascent of Everest and the tradition of British adventure; 1966 - how we won the World Cup and our continued obsession with the game we gave the world; 1977 - Royalists and Rebels, the Queen's Silver Jubilee and the rise of punk; 1985 - how Live Aid gave birth to celebrity culture; 1997 - the rise and fall of Blair's spin revolution.
The best single-volume work on the Victorian age yet written
—— Andrew Roberts , Evening StandardHuge, entertaining volume of popular history
—— Sunday TimesA wonderful book
—— Sunday TelegraphA masterpiece of popular history
—— Frank McLynn , IndependentWilson is incapable of writing a dull sentence... This is the history of a vanished world brought to vibrant life
—— Beryl Bainbridge , ObserverThe Victorians widens the focus of God's Funeral which was one of the best books of its year. This one, too, is to be devoured
—— Tom Stoppard , Sunday TelegraphReading A. N. Wilson's The Victorians provides ongoing pleasure in handsomely researched, beautifully written prose about an age which we have come to think disparagingly. We thought wrong
—— Clement Freud , Mail on SundayThe Victorians was one of the books that gave me greatest pleasure during the past year... A brilliant evocation of an age
—— Ian McIntyre , The TimesRarely have author and subject been found in such deep and contented harmony... Wilson's tour de force
—— Robert McCrum , ObserverWilson's panoramic survey is the best attempt so far to describe and explain what was happening in that fascinating time
—— Literary ReviewThe Victorians finds Wilson writing at the height of his powers
—— The IndependentI can't recall a history book furnishing so many laughs en route ... The Victorians is a work of scholarship, a labour of love, a persusasive polemic
—— John Sutherland , Mail on SundayIt's a gripping insight into the ex-PM's ten years of power . . . It will take a lot for many people to read his own take on the rise and fall of New Labour, but those that do might be reminded of the charm and vision that swept him to power
—— News of the WorldI have read many a prime ministerial memoir and none of the other authors has been as self-deprecating, as willing to admit mistakes and to tell jokes against themselves
—— Mary Ann Sieghart , The IndependentPaints a candid picture of his friend and rival, Gordon Brown, and of their relationship
—— Patrick Hennessy , The Sunday Telegraph
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