A deftly critical, readable contribution to the historiography of empire.
A historian of colonialism examines its effects on the quietest corners of rural Britain.
Colonialism, writes Fowler, reshaped every inch of the British Isles, “from small Cumbrian ports and Scottish islands to rural Norfolk and the depths of Cornwall.” As the subtitle promises, she hits the hiking trails and backroads in the company of scholars, descendants, and activists, turning up evidence of the kind that drives the Tories crazy: Knowing that a country manor was built on the backs of enslaved people can “guilt-trip visitors into feeling ashamed of British history,” as one querulous commentator objected. Of course, countless country manors were funded by the slave trade. For example, the island of Jura, Scotland, was an important entrepôt for a sugar trade controlled by members of the Campbell clan, who intermarried with other sugar barons and, living in splendor around Glasgow, organized resistance to reform: “Unsurprisingly, given the money to be made, Glaswegian businesspeople supported the slavery system.” Slavery meant that Welsh wool went to make plain cloth with which to clothe the enslaved people on sugar plantations in the Caribbean. Providing pasturage for the textile industry meant enclosing the land, which meant wresting the commons from country people and building walls and fences. Fowler’s essays tend to run a touch too long, but she turns in some fascinating tidbits, including the role of William Wordsworth’s colonializing brother in paying William’s way so that he could write at leisure (and, in the bargain, opening the door to the opium trade, whose fruits William’s pals de Quincey and Coleridge so enjoyed); the subtle critique of slavery in Jane Austen’s descriptions of the English rural gentry; and the ongoing effects of a new kind of empire, financial and globalist, on Britain’s byways and hedgerows.
A deftly critical, readable contribution to the historiography of empire.Pub Date: June 11, 2024
ISBN: 9781668003978
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
HISTORY | NATURE | EXPEDITIONS | WORLD | GENERAL HISTORY
A rousing, suspenseful adventure tale.
A harrowing expedition to Antarctica, recounted by Departures senior features editor Sancton, who has reported from every continent on the planet.
On Aug. 16, 1897, the steam whaler Belgica set off from Belgium with young Adrien de Gerlache as commandant. Thus begins Sancton’s riveting history of exploration, ingenuity, and survival. The commandant’s inexperienced, often unruly crew, half non-Belgian, included scientists, a rookie engineer, and first mate Roald Amundsen, who would later become a celebrated polar explorer. After loading a half ton of explosive tonite, the ship set sail with 23 crew members and two cats. In Rio de Janeiro, they were joined by Dr. Frederick Cook, a young, shameless huckster who had accompanied Robert Peary as a surgeon and ethnologist on an expedition to northern Greenland. In Punta Arenas, four seamen were removed for insubordination, and rats snuck onboard. In Tierra del Fuego, the ship ran aground for a while. Sancton evokes a calm anxiety as he chronicles the ship’s journey south. On Jan. 19, 1898, near the South Shetland Islands, the crew spotted the first icebergs. Rough waves swept someone overboard. Days later, they saw Antarctica in the distance. Glory was “finally within reach.” The author describes the discovery and naming of new lands and the work of the scientists gathering specimens. The ship continued through a perilous, ice-littered sea, as the commandant was anxious to reach a record-setting latitude. On March 6, the Belgica became icebound. The crew did everything they could to prepare for a dark, below-freezing winter, but they were wracked with despair, suffering headaches, insomnia, dizziness, and later, madness—all vividly capture by Sancton. The sun returned on July 22, and by March 1899, they were able to escape the ice. With a cast of intriguing characters and drama galore, this history reads like fiction and will thrill fans of Endurance and In the Kingdom of Ice.
A rousing, suspenseful adventure tale.Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-984824-33-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Jan. 29, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
A valuable contribution to our understanding of one of history’s most vital figures.
An epistolary memoir of Nelson Mandela’s prison years.
From August 1962 to February 1990, Mandela (1918-2013) was imprisoned by the apartheid state of South Africa. During his more than 27 years in prison, the bulk of which he served on the notorious Robben Island prison off the shores of Cape Town, he wrote thousands of letters to family and friends, lawyers and fellow African National Congress members, prison officials, and members of the government. Heavily censored for both content and length, letters from Robben Island and South Africa’s other political prisons did not always reach their intended targets; when they did, the censorship could make them virtually unintelligible. To assemble this vitally important collection, Venter (A Free Mind: Ahmed Kathrada's Notebook from Robben Island, 2006, etc.), a longtime Johannesburg-based editor and journalist, pored through these letters in various public and private archives across South Africa and beyond as well as Mandela’s own notebooks, in which he transcribed versions of these letters. The result is a necessary, intimate portrait of the great leader. The man who emerges is warm and intelligent and a savvy, persuasive, and strategic thinker. During his life, Mandela was a loving husband and father, a devotee of the ANC’s struggle, and capable of interacting with prominent statesmen and the ANC’s rank and file. He was not above flattery or hard-nosed steeliness toward his captors as suited his needs, and he was always yearning for freedom, not only—or even primarily—for himself, but rather for his people, a goal that is the constant theme of this collection and was the consuming vision of his entire time as a prisoner. Venter adds tremendous value with his annotations and introductions to the work as a whole and to the book’s various sections.
A valuable contribution to our understanding of one of history’s most vital figures.Pub Date: July 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63149-117-7
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Liveright/Norton
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
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