Private Lives, Public Spirit: Britain: 1870-1914

by José Harris

The later-19th century and Edwardian era, suggests Jose Harris in this book, represent a sharp break with the early years of Queen Victoria's reign. Indeed, despite the intense upheavals of two world wars, it was the beliefs, social structures and oppositional forces established between 1870 and 1914 which dominated British life right up until the 1960s.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Victorian, 19th Century, Sociology, Politics

Paperback

First published July 29, 1993

Reviews

[Mir]

At the time this was written (published in 1993, so...the 1980s, I assume) there had been a revolution in "historical fashion" that shifted research from institutions and social forces to texts, language, and artifacts. (Let's be honest, that study of institutions was pretty played out). Harris wanted to reconstruct the "objective reality" of the past.

Harris sees the Victorian age as Clapham "gigantic hinge" of manuacturing and agriculture affecting world politics: mass production, demographic growth and change, secular Christianity, crusading feminism, enlarge concepts of citizenship, the decline of the landed classes and the rise of labour. But he promises to hedge his generalizations carefully!

"Riotous pluralism" of sources (despite having complained in the introof other people using these.)

There are differences within as well as between classes. Harris characterizes "serious" vs "gay and rowdy" as one of the most significant, which I thought was interesting.

General historical themes:
-Continuity/change
-impact of Empire
-emergence of class
-Individualism/collectivism
-From Ancient Constitution to 'Great Society'
-nationalization of culture
-Sex and gender (relationships, women's rights debates)
-modernity (people's sense of living in a new modern era)

[Frank Stein · Rating 3 out of 5]

Whenever I read books about British history I almost inevitability have the same complaint: the writers expect their readers to already know everything they're writing about. This book is no exception. If you don't know what the Contagious Diseases Act of 1868 was, or are not familiar with "the famous Featherstone Colliery riot of 1893," or want to know what exactly "Lady Bell" did, don't expect this book to tell you. For a book purporting to be a general survey of British life in this period, it's endlessly frustrating.

This book also suffers from the modern historian's distaste for making generalizations. A portrait of 40-odd years of British life will by necessity demand lots of exceptions to any claims made, but the writer seems so intent on providing almost equal space to the opposite of any statement that it's almost impossible to tell what she's stating. Even a false generalization or two would have given the reader something to grasp on to and organize one's thoughts around.

Still, there are valuable insights here. One is on the decline as such of the aristocracy. As late as 1875 a parliamentary inquiry known as the New Domesday found that 4500 people owned half the land in England and Wales, and a smaller clique owned almost all of Scotland, but the worldwide spread of cheap American wheat around this time devastated the agricultural sector and led to a mass emigration of laborers off these semi-feudal estates. In a move to allow those who remained to shake off the shackles of tradition, the Settled Land Act of 1882 allowed life tenants to dispose of their land like any other property. Aristocrats became less the rulers of the country than antiquated status-holders.

Nonetheless, landlords remained the largest occupation in Parliament up to 1900, and composed the majority of all British cabinets right down to 1906, and this held even among the supposedly more commercial Liberal Party (they were replaced, almost simultaneously in all parties, by financiers). Also, the book shows how the aristocracy learned to profit from their status by going on corporate boards. After the first "Lord" graced the Stock Exchange in 1875, every company wanted the benefit of an aristocratic honorific, and by 1896 a quarter and by 1910 half of the peerage were corporate directors.

Another worthwhile discussion is the continuing strength and importance of religion in British life. Despite widespread claims of secularization, slightly more people attended church every Sunday (about 25%) at the end of Victoria's reign than than in the first big Census of 1851. Despite claims of the death of working class religion, many workers became more attuned with Christianity in the late 19th century through post-1870 compulsory schooling and Sunday Schools (which came to be seen as essentially for the poor).

If one has a general understanding of this period in Britain, this book might supplement that. If one doesn't, I maintain my increasingly futile hope that there has to be a better book out there.

[Gareth Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

A compact and dense work which lives up to its title. Its compactness is a positive in that of covers a lot of ground in just over 250 pages of close type. It gives the reader a good overview of a variety of issues. Its brevity does work against it however, in that all subjects are presented at a high level and it is rarely leavened by interesting detail. The author does seem to equivocate quite often. I suppose this is a positive, if evidence can’t be found to take a particular line, then the fair academic will say so. However, it can make if difficult for the naive reader (i.e. me) who would find a judgment helpful.

Its not a book for the faint hearted, its brevity stops the author from explaining references to events. This one needs to either know the context or be prepared to do a bit of work on the side to pick up on all the references.

For me, this was an interesting overview.