History and Biography: Essays in Honour of Derek Beales

by Edited by T. C. W. Blanning , David Cannadine

• ISBN13: 9780521893176
• ISBN10: 0521893178
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-05-02
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

For too long, too many historians have been too much concerned with impersonal forces, underlying structures and long-term developments. Now, "people" are back. In a postmodern age it is easier to appreciate the decisive role played by individuals, as they ride their luck and seize their opportunity to bend the world to their will. As these essays by twelve eminent historians demonstrate, biography is too important to be left to the amateurs. Among the rich variety of strong characters analyzed here are an Austrian emperor, a German kaiser, a Victorian prime minister, an Italian dictator, and an American president.

Table of Contents

Introduction T. C. W. Blanning and David Cannadine

1. Baron Bartenstein on Count Haugwitz's 'new system' of government P. G. M. Dickson

2. The rise of the first minister in eighteenth-century Europe H. M. Scott

3. An old but new biography of Leopold II T. C. W. Blanning

4. John Marsh's History of My Private Life 1752-1828 John Brewer

5. The gallows and Mr Peel Boyd Hilton

6. Szé

chenyi and Austria R. J. W. Evans

7. Past and future in the later career of Lord John Russell J. P. Parry

8. Documentary falsification and Italian biography Denis Mack Smith

9. Kaiser Wilhelm II and the British monarchy David Cannadine

10. The historical Keynes and the history of Keynesianism Peter Clarke

11. Bastianini and the weakening of the Fascist will to fight the Second World War Owen Chadwick

12. The New Deal without FDR: what biographies of Roosevelt cannot tell us Tony Badger

History and biography: an inaugural lecture Derek Beales

Derek Beales: a chronological list of publications.