Kings and desperate menTransaction Publishers, 1.11.2009 - 323 sivua The goal of Kings and Desperate Men is to provide a picture of eighteenth-century England up to the French Revolution. Kronenberger's work lies much closer to a social chronicle than an orthodox history, and is more concerned with manners and tastes than with treaties and wars. Kings and Desperate Men reveals what life was like for both aristocrats and commoners: their family lives, experience of larger society, habits, diet, fashions, religion, and artistic tastes. In tracing these topics for both city and country dwellers, he artfully communicates the very real division between the vivacity of London and the regular, fixed, and monotonous character of country life. The division is vital to understanding the age and the transformations it would experience. Yet Kronenberger does not ignore the more traditional historical landmarks. Kroenberger treats the characters of the leading political actors: Walpole, Bolingbroke, Burke, Fox, and Pitt, while providing the reader with a sweeping account of the formation of political parties and constitutional shifts of power between the monarchy and parliament. Students of the period who despair at its political complexities will fi nd much to appreciate in Kronenberger's condensed and easy to understand formulations. As for philosophy, Kronenberger refers to thinkers and ideas as they influence English life; especially Locke and Hume. Their ideas and reputations are explained as part of the character of society. The same is true for economics. More attention is given to the social gains of middle-class shopkeepers and the eighteenth-century zeal for stock speculation than to formal schools of thought. Especially notable is Kronenberger's treatment of both the arts and the artists of the eighteenth century-theatre, opera, music, literature, architecture, and painting. |
Kirjan sisältä
Tulokset 1 - 5 kokonaismäärästä 30
... Anne's reign vaulted free of politics least of all: they were violently partisan, wrote on political subjects, lived by political alliances, and frequently held political office. Should they happen to write without bias, bias was ...
... Anne's reign. It had at least an oflicial character and definite, however disputed, aims. Far more devious and complex were the other plots and counterplots, with their slanders and self-seeking, that were hatched for other reasons ...
... Anne's, this "James III of England ” with his toy court in France, that the long drama that agitated the seventeenth century plays itself out. On the score of blood, the Pretender —- as the legitimate son of James II — should have ...
... Anne's reign. The Queen never forgot who she was; duty forbade her. It was almost a virtue in her father and uncle to have set so bad an example that Anne could not possibly follow it. The course that she must follow was plain. She must ...
... Anne's retinue since girlhood, and as the mistress rose in power, so did the servant. No favourite was ever granted a warmer friendship or a wider province. For Sarah, Anne tore off all her stately habiliments, and the two women talked ...
Sisältö
3 | |
16 | |
Two or Three Characters | 25 |
Walpole and the House of Hanover | 42 |
Arisocrats with a Portrait of One of Them | 60 |
Shopkeepers | 89 |
The Poor | 98 |
The Arts | 108 |
Bath | 183 |
The Wesleyan Movement | 189 |
Empire and Revolution | 203 |
Kings and Counsellors | 215 |
The Great World | 247 |
The World Below | 263 |
The World Within | 273 |
The Bully and the Fop | 309 |
The Artist | 131 |
Country Matters | 161 |
The Country Gentleman | 168 |
Oxford and Cambridge | 175 |
READING LIST | 321 |
INDEX | i |
Muita painoksia - Näytä kaikki
Kings and Desperate Men: Life in Eighteenth-century England Louis Kronenberger Rajoitettu esikatselu - 2017 |
Kings and Desperate Men: Life in Eighteenth-century England Louis Kronenberger Rajoitettu esikatselu - 2017 |