Overview

London in 1900 was the greatest city on earth-the capital of an empire on which the sun never set. This book is the first to examine this powerful and influential city at the turn of the century and to investigate its relationship with Britain's far-flung empire. Jonathan Schneer focuses on the diverse, contentious, contradictory personalities of London and its inhabitants, showing the many ways that the empire impinged on them. He describes how a range of citizens-from architects to zoologists, from financiers to striking dockers-helped to define and shape the imperial metropolis. He also shows how the city was influenced by people other than native-born male Anglo-Saxons. Schneer traces the attempts of some of these overlooked peoples to delineate its boundaries: four extraordinary women-two political hostesses, a journalist, and an explorer-ethnologist-as well as anti-imperialist Irish, South Asians, West Indians, and Africans living in London at this time. In a concluding chapter, Schneer examines the general election of 1900 in London, in which the ruling Conservative government successfully defended its imperialist policies. The people of London, says Schneer, made their city and continually remade and reshaped it-as they continue to do today.

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9780300089035

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Reviews

A very rich and wide-ranging book. The evocation of a great city is vivid and memorable. David Cannadine This work of magisterial scholarship is a portrait of the city at that empire's zenith and turning-point. Janet Watts, Sunday Times Jonathan Schneer... vividly displays the inhabitants and leaders of the capital of the world's greatest empire at the apogee of its self-regarding glory. Ben Pimlott, Independent Specialists will certainly be amused, enterained and informed by Jonathan Schneer's presentation of fascinating information, as he creates a kaleidoscope of images and impressions of London in 1900. Martin Daunton, Times Literary Supplement What is fascinating in Schneer's book is not how much has changed about London over the century but how little. Simon Jenkins, Evening Standard ... a work of persuasive scholarship, written with verve and insight... this rich and original study... The Economist A thorough, impressive tour of imperial London a century ago and of the dissenting voices that finally helped the sun set on this bastion of Eurocentrism. Schneer lets readers view the grimy streets, polished offices, and dockside warehouses of old London, as well as the hearts and minds of its elitist, racist denizens... [A] masterful work. Kirkus Reviews Elegantly and imaginatively written, [this book] adds a new dimension to the history of the metropolis and to our understanding of the imperial idea at its zenith. It offers instruction and entertainment in equal measure. Peter Cain, International History Review

""A very rich and wide-ranging book. The evocation of a great city is vivid and memorable."" David Cannadine ""This work of magisterial scholarship is a portrait of the city at that empire's zenith and turning-point."" Janet Watts, Sunday Times ""Jonathan Schneer... vividly displays the inhabitants and leaders of the capital of the world's greatest empire at the apogee of its self-regarding glory."" Ben Pimlott, Independent ""Specialists will certainly be amused, enterained and informed by Jonathan Schneer's presentation of fascinating information, as he creates a kaleidoscope of images and impressions of London in 1900."" Martin Daunton, Times Literary Supplement ""What is fascinating in Schneer's book is not how much has changed about London over the century but how little."" Simon Jenkins, Evening Standard ""... a work of persuasive scholarship, written with verve and insight... this rich and original study..."" The Economist ""A thorough, impressive tour of imperial London a century ago and of the dissenting voices that finally helped the sun set on this bastion of Eurocentrism. Schneer lets readers view the grimy streets, polished offices, and dockside warehouses of old London, as well as the hearts and minds of its elitist, racist denizens... [A] masterful work."" Kirkus Reviews ""Elegantly and imaginatively written, [this book] adds a new dimension to the history of the metropolis and to our understanding of the imperial idea at its zenith. It offers instruction and entertainment in equal measure."" Peter Cain, International History Review""

A thorough, impressive tour of imperial London a century ago and of the dissenting voices that finally helped the sun set on this bastion of Eurocentrism. History professor Schneer (Georgia Institute of Technology) lets readers view the grimy streets, polished offices, and dockside warehouses of old London, as well as the hearts and minds of its elitist, racist denizens. History's greatest empire, controlling 400 million people, was governed from a metropolis of 6 million, with a vast port and financial center. Yet while the horns of African rhinos and skins of Canadian seals piled up alongside mineral and material wealth taken in tribute from the West Indies, South Africa, Australia, India, etc., Schneer produces those who defied the continual barrage of imperialist propaganda. Beginning with half a million Irish and swelled by eastern and central Europeans, Jews, and Asians, there were sufficient foreigners and people of color to bristle at the exotic, caged darkie and animal spectacles and to join liberals, unionists, and early feminists who fought the many injustices of Britannia. Schneer documents the battles of several individuals who saw beyond the profits of near-slave labor on Chinese railroads, Latin American sugarcane fields, African mines, Borneo robber plantations, and Ceylonese tea farms. Just as Ben Tillet's Stevedores Union took on London shipping, Lord George Hamilton did not believe that Indians should serve as cannon fodder as conflicts beside the Boer War flared. A cultural hero and pioneer of anthropological relativism was Mary Kingsley, who explored deepest Africa and shockingly concluded that blacks are different, not inferior. Schneer's masterful work reminds us how far we've come in our ongoing Copernican revolution to prove that' the globe doesn't revolve around white English-speaking men. (Kirkus Reviews)

Author Information

Jonathan Schneer is professor of history at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

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