The imperial imperative

In the Shadow of the Gods: The Emperor in World History Dominic Lieven, London: Allen Lane, 2022, 500 pps. hb., illus., £35 In the battle for precedence between the ‘great man’ and more ‘inclusive’ views of history, an account of emperors across centuries and cultures feels like a defiant assertion of the older school. Cambridge… Continue reading

Sustained magnificence – Max Hastings’ Winston’s War

Sustained Magnificence Winston’s War: Churchill 1940-1945 Max Hastings, New York: Alfred A. Knopf 576 pp., $35.00 Sixty-five years after the last guns ceased firing on the last Pacific atoll, Britons of all political persuasions are still wallowing in tepid World War II nostalgia. For Atlanticists, neoconservatives, and classical liberals, the war was a great Anglo- sphere… Continue reading