Davies’ “The Isles” was written in 1999, and despite his observations on “the end of the reasons for Britain” he ended his book on a optimistic note that maybe something could be found.
Searched for interviews to see if he still had even that very qualified optimism.
Lol.
Searched for interviews to see if he still had even that very qualified optimism.
Lol.
The last chapter’s historical review is probably the best in the book, because it explains the devolution from Imperial British historiography to the consequences of what Peter Hitchens talks about in “Abolition of Britain” for history writing about the peoples in the isles.
Gradually, the political and social reality of the UK and Ireland parted ways with the late imperial historians, who could not (or would not) describe what was happening in this great implosion. Davies counts Clark, Halevy, and Trevelyan as the last “British” historians.
Davies, however, mildly condemns these last historians, particularly Clark, because they pushed the field into minute specialization and seclusion at the point national history needed to be rewritten most, as history itself was under the greatest assault.
In education, the curricula lost all cohesion, the Old Whig, Imperial, and Anglo-Saxonist assumptions were obviously imploding with the Empire and every former Imperial justification. The abandonment of set curricula led to indifference or hostility to the subject.
Pollock, a New Zealander steps in to attempt to correct the unmaking of English history, which he considers too important to lose for its international significance. He may yet be right, though perhaps in a less flattering eventuality than he anticipates.
Attempts to rediscover English National history without the contours of Britain or the UK inevitably strengthen countervailing and competing national historiographies as well. In this way, “the road back to Britain” seems blocked, and this is problem beyond post national assaults
Davies summarizes his thoughts on what could be the future of a “Post-British” idea for the Isles, before everything is lost. His points here are to cut past the contradictions of existing British hang ups and create something confirming to a new geopolitical reality.
I agree with most of the basic points, but I honestly don’t know where this can go from here, and I don’t think any of the leadership is or was there to navigate towards “a new Britain” without fucking everything up. It assumes the leadership isn’t extractive and cares about this
Still, and I’m sure as Davies knows, “All Foundations of Britishness are in advanced state of Decay.” Is not exactly sounding like a situation that is going to resolve itself passively because as he also knows, it never has resolved itself through passivity.
After dropping all of that on us, Davies hits us with a cautious optimism that the UK “is not Yugoslavia” and that a road map to destruction was not drawn in 1999. As my OP states, I don’t think he agrees that this is the case anymore.
