Little Englanders: Britain in the Edwardian Era

‘There have been plenty of books on the Edwardians before, but never one as richly enjoyable as this … nobody has done a better job of capturing what ordinary people thought and cared about more than a century ago’ Dominic Sandbrook, Book of the Week, Sunday Times ‘In Little Englanders, Alwyn Turner reveals striking parallels between Britain in decline at the start of the 20th century and our own divisive age … [a] page turner of a popular history’ Andrew Marr, New Statesman ‘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.