How much do the English really care about their stately homes? In
this pathbreaking and wide-ranging account of the changing fortunes
and status of the stately homes of England over the past two
centuries, Peter Mandler melds social, cultural, artistic, and
political perspectives and reveals much about the relationship of
the nation to its past and its traditional ruling elite.
Challenging the prevailing view of a modern English culture
besotted with its history and its aristocracy, Mandler portrays
instead a continuously changing and modernizing society in which
both popular and intellectual attitudes toward the aristocracy --
and its stately homes -- have veered from selective appreciation to
outright hostility and only recently to thoroughgoing admiration.
With great panache, Mandler adds the missing pieces to the story
of the country house. Going beyond its architects and its owners,
he brings to center stage a much wider cast of characters --
aristocratic entrepreneurs, anti-aristocratic politicians,
campaigning conservationists, ordinary sightseers and voters -- and
a scenario full of incident and local and national color. He traces
attitudes toward the stately homes, beginning in the first half of
the nineteenth century when public feeling about the aristocracy
was mixed and divided. Criticism of the "foreign" and "exclusive"
image of the typical aristocratic country house was widespread. At
the same time, interest grew in those older houses that symbolized
an olden time of imagined national harmony. The Victorian period
also saw the first mass tourist industry, and a strong popular
demand emerged for the right to visit all the stately homes. By the
1880s, however, hostilitytoward the aristocracy made appreciation
of any country house politically treacherous, and interest in
aristocratic heritage declined steadily for sixty years. Only after
1945, when the aristocracy was no longer seen as a threat, was a
gentle revival of the stately homes possible, Mandler contends, and
only since the 1970s has that revival become a triumphant
appreciation. He enters today's debate with a discussion of how far
people today -- and tomorrow -- are willing to see the
aristocracy's heritage as their own.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
