Volume 31, Number 5 · March 29, 1984
The New Eighteenth Century
By Lawrence Stone
BOOKS DISCUSSED IN THIS ESSAY
In Defiance of Oligarchy: The Tory Party 1714–60
by Linda Colley
Cambridge University Press, 377 pp., $45.00
The Birth of a Consumer Society: The Commercialization of Eighteenth-Century England
by Neil McKendrick, by John Brewer, by J.H. Plumb
Indiana University Press, 345 pp., $29.95
Industrialization before Industrialization: Rural Industry in the Genesis of Capitalism
by Peter Kriedte, by Hans Medick, by Jürgen Schlumbohm
Cambridge University Press, 356 pp., $44.50; $14.95 (paper)
Augustan England: Professions, State and Society, 1680–1730
by Geoffrey Holmes
Allen and Unwin, 332 pp., $37.50
Bath 1680–1850: A Social History, or, a Valley of Pleasure, yet a Sink of Iniquity
by R. S. Neale
Routledge and Kegan Paul, 466 pp., $45.00
The Impact of English Towns, 1700–1800
by Penelope J. Corfield
Oxford University Press, 206 pp., $25.95; $9.95 (paper)
The Georgian Triumph, 1700–1830
by Michael Reed
Routledge and Kegan Paul, 240 pp., $19.95
The Experience of Labour in Eighteenth-Century English Industry
by John Rule
St. Martin's Press, 227 pp., $27.50
Marriage Settlements, 1601–1740: The Adoption of the Strict Settlement
by Lloyd Bonfield
Cambridge University Press, 136 pp., $34.50
Electoral Behavior in Unreformed England: Plumpers, Splitters, and Straights
by John A. Phillips
Princeton University Press, 353 pp., $35.00
Sexuality in Eighteenth-Century Britain
edited by Paul-Gabriel Boucé
Manchester University Press/Barnes and Noble, 262 pp., $25.00
Hogarth's Marriage À-la-mode
by Robert L.S. Cowley
Cornell University Press, 177 pp., $48.50
Strict Settlement: A Guide for Historians
by Barbara English, by John Saville
University of Hull Press (US distr. Humanities Press), 144 pp., $12.50 (paper)
English Society in the Eighteenth Century
by Roy Porter
Penguin Books, 424 pp., $5.95 (paper)
The 'long eighteenth century' from 1660 to 1800 has always been something of an enigma in English history. Before it, there came world exploration, the first settlements in North America, agricultural, commercial, industrial, and demographic growth, the Reformation, the rise of Puritanism, the formation of the Tudor state, and its temporary collapse in the violent upheavals and astonishing intellectual ferment of Europe's first Great Revolution. But what happened next? What filled the mysterious century between the end of feudalism and the establishment of capitalism, to use Marxist terminology, between the century of revolution and the Victorian age of radical improvement and reform?
Review, 7295 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |