Little Englanders: Britain in the Edwardian Era

(Hardback, Main)

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'The very best sort of panoramic portrait' David Kynaston

'The Edwardians have long been the lost decade of British history, yet they are that history at its climax. Alwyn Turner sets the record straight, bringing its characters, strains and stresses brilliantly to life' Simon Jenkins

'Britain's most electrifying contemporary social historian conjures the forgotten country of more than a century ago ... fiercely recommended' Alan Moore

When Queen Victoria died in 1901 it was the end of an era. Britain's dominance stretched across seven continents and its ruling classes were wealthier than ever before. Many later remembered the decade or so that followed as the long afternoon of an empire where the sun never set. Yet the Edwardians themselves were acutely aware that the country was in a state of flux; the seismic change that they felt would transform modern Britain forever.

In Little Englanders, Alwyn Turner reconsiders the Edwardian era as a time of profound social change, with the rise of women's suffrage and the labour movement, unrest in Ireland and the Boer republics, scandals in parliament and culture wars at home. He tells the story of the Edwardians through music halls and male beauty contests, the real Peaky Blinders and the 1908 Summer Olympics. In this colourful, detailed and hugely entertaining social history, Turner shows that, though the golden Victorian age was in the past, the birth of modern Britain was only just beginning.

Reviews

'The Edwardians have long been the lost decade of British history, yet they are that history at its climax. Alwyn Turner sets the record straight, bringing its characters, strains and stresses brilliantly to life' - Simon Jenkins

'The very best sort of panoramic portrait, full of vivid characters, emblematic anecdotes and telling social detail, all underpinned by penetrating historical judgement. The Edwardians have fascinated readers for more than a century, yet even those who think they know the period will find much to discover and savour in Alwyn Turner's sometimes unsettling but always life-enhancing pages' - David Kynaston, author

'Britain's most electrifying contemporary social historian conjures the forgotten country of more than a century ago ... to reveal a strikingly foreign world which nonetheless holds up a dusty mirror to our own. A magnificent triumph over cultural amnesia, brimming with insight and impossible to put down. Fiercely recommended' - Alan Moore

'Every page grips and delights as Alwyn Turner presents a deeply researched yet gorgeously entertaining double vision of something now almost fantastical - a United Kingdom in full Imperial glory - yet unnervingly familiar' - James Hawes, author

'Alwyn Turner is a wonderful raconteur of historical eras. He has a sense for character, and story, and bizarre anecdote, that makes an epoch come alive and makes you feel, at times, that you're living in Edwardian times, albeit with much better food. This is history written from below, and above, and all milieus in between' - Simon Kuper, author

Author Bio

Alwyn Turner is best known for his trilogy of books about Britain in the last decades of the 20th century: Crisis What Crisis (2008), Rejoice! Rejoice! (2010) and A Classless Society (2013). His last book, All in it Together: England in the Early 21st Century was a Sunday Times 'Book of the Year'.