Product Description

John Adamson's book traces the careers and fortunes of the small group of English noblemen who risked their lives and fortunes to challenge the king's attempt to create an authoritarian monarchy in the Stuart kingdoms during the 1630s. What was achieved in 1641 astonished - and alarmed - contemporaries: the trial and execution of the king's most powerful minister; a new, and sometimes violent, phase of religious reformation; the drastic curbing of the powers of the Crown; the planning of a major Anglo-Scottish military intervention in the Thirty Years' War. The threat of war was rarely absent and the resort to armed force come to seem a viable, perhaps even the only, means of resolving the conflicts within the Stuart realms.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #182438 in Books
• Published on: 2009-02-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 768 pages

Review
"There have been many books on the English Civil War but this magesterial first of two volumes looks set to become one of the most important." (SUNDAY TELEGRAPH )

'Monumental in size and scope' (HUDDERSFIELD DAILY EXAMINER )

ED SMITH, THE TIMES
"a work of great style and imagination as well as scholarship... As with a great 19th-century novel, the story and the characters will become your friends for life."

THE SUNDAY TIMES
"vigorously refutes more than a century of debate on the reasons for Charles's downfall.. a compelling argument... a good old-fashioned political history."

Customer Reviews

An excellent book about events
Having read Michael Braddicks' "God's Fury, England's Fire: A New History of the English Civil Wars" I was prepared for Adamson's magnum opus. This is not a book about the civil war; it ends some seven years before Charles's execution. What Adamson does is to take a small period - the summer 1640 to Charles' flight from London in January 1642 - and chronicles the days and weeks showing the machinations leading to the war. Harold Macmillan, when asked what blew governments of course replied - "events!" This is a book about events, a detailed analysis of calamitous, compelling and intricate politics.

The object, the king, meets the force, the parliamentary nobility. For such a weighty book, there is little biographical detail, certainly it is not revealing about the king himself, just his actions. After 11 years of controversial personal rule, taxation, in selecting his advisers, his legal and religious policies, Charles needed money to fight the Scots so has to deal with parliament. It was Charles misfortune to run up against a nobility that "was perhaps the most theologically and legally literate in English history", united by a sense of God given destiny. So the battle of wills between an assertive, cohesive cabal of nobles determined to reduce the power of a principled, but conceited and ineffective monarch begun. It was fought - in the initial phase that this book covers - with deference to procedure; parliament was the cockpit. This was not a revolution but a redefinition of government with resolution nearly achieved on numerous occasions.

The noble cabal was in a precarious position, constantly risking all to seize the initiative. That meant winning hearts and minds beyond the court and parliament, with popularity a vital part of successful politics. To say more is to spoil the plot, this is an intricate story of linkages, divided loyalties and betrayal, flattery and deceit. Royal authority suffered a catastrophic collapse and government had to be reinvented. No one actually wanted a republic. Charles had to negotiate on three home fronts, England certainly but equally Scotland and Ireland while there was a foreign policy dimension that had to be managed. Charles was ultimately a bad politician who was aggressor and appeaser and by "allowing the two strategies to run in tandem virtually guaranteeing the failure of both." Adamson gives an excellent account of the demise of Strafford, even knowing his eventual fate does not detract from the story, how near he was to keeping his head if not his dignity. This aspect alone makes a good book while he deals in fine detail with the Anglo Scottish alliance.

Adamson writes well, his data collection and organisation is formidable although in emphasising points he tends towards persistent repetition. His frequent use of contemporary English quotes and spelling adds texture. There are excellent illustrations, colour plates, drawings and maps. Yet of the 742 pages, 221 (30%) are notes and index and amid the text, footnotes are extensive. I wonder if a web site might be a better place for these. Those interested could make fuller use of them in this format and think of the paper saved.

This is a credible book, essentially a melodrama of hard-core politics with Machiavellian conspiracies pilled high. Adamson is opinionated, and so he should be given the depth of his scholarship. It requires a good knowledge of the Carolinian period. If you want to know what happens next, you will have to wait for him to write more or go elsewhere. Adamson tells a good story, intriguing characters with no shortage of "events."

Intriguers and Revolutionaries
First and foremost, do not be put off by the books size, for despite it's girth there is a phenomenally comprehensive bibliography and compendious source notes. You WILL want more! I became utterly absorbed by machinations of the (many) various protagonists.
This book is not a `revisionist' work with the negative connotations that the term implies, but more an investigation into the causes of the internecine conflict of the 1640's with forensic detail. It is told with a fluid and informative, as well as entertaining narrative and the pace rarely slackens, indeed there is much ground to be covered for such a short period of English history.
In short, Adamson's arguments are well supported with convincing documented evidence and although a truly scholarly work, there is enough here for the curious historical thriller reader to become engaged with.
I echo others comments: surly a sequel/s will (I hope) be forthcoming.

Well worth waiting for
This book is an astonishing 'tour de force'. History for grown-ups.

To most readers a tome of this size and weight will be quite a daunting prospect however I beg you not to be put off by its sheer physical dimensions. Adamson's style is easy to follow and intelligent. He has written a Rolls Royce of a book. One might ask if all the footnotes are necessary but who am I to criticise a master craftsman?

The book is worth buying just for its; maps, plans, genealogies and colour illustrations. These will be invaluable aids to any student of this crucial period in our history. The picture editor deserves a bonus!

My favourite part of the book is the treatment of Strafford's Trial. I must have read a dozen different accounts of this event but never before have I heard the tale told in such a visceral manner. Adamson's insights into the motivation and behaviour of the key participants are masterful.

One of my only disappointments with the book is that I think that there is more to say about the role of the Providence Island Company in the events described. Never mind there is always the sequel (or even the prequel)that one feels must surely follow ...

Sam Hearn