Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #16621 in Books
• Published on: 2008-10-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 640 pages

Review
'This is an immense book...It's the telling, often hilarious detail that propels the vast narrative'.
--Independent

'he has not only followed major contours but has also skilfully filled in the crevices, often with wry humour' --History Today

Literary Review
'Quite simply, a masterpiece of historical narrative'

Scotland on Sunday
'Brendon with an acute eye for detail...serves up a veritable gorefest in which all sides slake their lusts'

Customer Reviews

An Empire of Anecdotes
"The Decline and Fall of the British Empire" by Piers Brendon is an entertaining narrative history of the British Empire from the time of the American Revolution to the lowering of the Union Jack in Hong Kong barely a dozen years ago. The cover of the book itself nicely sums up Brendons iconoclastic attitude, at the top we have what might be termed a painting of the "Imperial Realism" school: a bunch of jaunty chaps from across the Empire marching to War (non whites at the back); the reality, or one reality, is below: an informal grouping of young imperialists, rat arsed with the chap sitting on the bench in agonizingly tight trousers sporting a moustache (which he has somehow wangled from a walrus) and looking particularly deranged.

Brendon seeks to capture the essence of Empire by demystifying it with a stream of anecdotes that are firmly anchored to the events that make up that Empires History. His accounts of the various characters, British and otherwise who had their moments at the centre of the Imperial stage is in a manner that is both illuminating, wry and occasionally even hilarious (especially regarding facial hair of which his knowledge is encyclopaedic). He has an eye and for the apposite quote, writes in an extremely fluent prose which is a pleasure to read and manages to treat the whole subject in a light and accessible manner without trivialising such brutal events as the Bengal "famine" of World War 2, the Opium Wars, the Bengal "famine" after conquistador Clives conquests or the abysmal treatment of aboriginal peoples in Australasia.

I would hesitate to call it a scholarly work which is not to say that there is anything incorrect in the narrative or dubious in Brendons opinions, just that the book lacks the in depth analysis of Economic, Demographic, Political and Cultural factors both in Britain in particular and the Empire in general. What it does do is give the reader a whirlwind tour of Imperial History from 1781 to 1997 and as such would be ideal either as an introductory book to the Empire or as a diversion for the more jaded scholar.

Wide ranging, absorbing account of the last years of the British Empire
By pulling together the experiences of so many countries, this book provides a fascinating insight into the diversity of the colossus that was the British Empire. India, Burma, Ceylon, Nigeria, Kenya, Cyprus and others described in this book all made different journeys to independence which helps us, to some degree, better understand these countries today some 50+ years after independence.

Of course one constant remains: "perfidious Albion". But the book does maintain a balance by describing both how Britain conducted itself in its colonies (which at times is appalling) but also providing the context relative to both the time of these events and the conduct of other colonial powers.

The only criticism is the relentless references to Gibbon's study of the end of the Roman Empire. These don't add significantly to the story and make the book, at times, something of a struggle to read.

Ambitious
This is an ambitious attempt to chronicle the rise and fall of the British Empire. And it is by no mean flawless. Still, the book's "unromaticising" of the Empire must not be taken too personally by some of the reviewers here. There is no victimisation - considered the looting the Empire has inflicted on its colonial subjects. This book is one of course readings at the LSE (not the bourse). And it is an eye-opener. I would also suggest "Merchants to multinationals : British trading companies in the nieteenth and twentieth centuries" by Geoffrey Jones, which explains more about the political economic impacts of the British Empire.