Description
Book SynopsisFrom Tristram Hunt, award-winning author of The Frock-Coated Communist and leading UK politician, Ten Cities that Made an Empire presents a new approach to Britain''s imperial past through the cities that epitomised it
Since the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997 and the end days of Empire, Britain''s colonial past has been the subject of passionate debate. Tristram Hunt goes beyond the now familiar arguments about Empire being good or bad and adopts a fresh approach to Britain''s empire and its legacy. Through an exceptional array of first-hand accounts and personal reflections, he portrays the great colonial and imperial cities of Boston, Bridgetown, Dublin, Cape Town, Calcutta, Hong Kong, Bombay, Melbourne, New Delhi, and twentieth-century Liverpool: their architecture, culture, and society balls; the famines, uprisings and repressions which coursed through them; the primitive accumulation and ghostly bureaucracy which ran them; the British supremac
Trade Review
A grand history of the British empire ... this is a book about ideas, for all that it is rich in architectural description, economic fact and colourful anecdote ... well-written, cleverly constructed and beautifully balanced -- James McConnachie * Spectator *
A fascinating and readable book -- Justin Huggler * Independent *
Ingenious and timely ... Hunt skilfully constructs his itinerary to provide a lively and cliché-busting survey of imperial history ... he uses the urban lens to terrific effect -- Maya Jasanoff * Guardian *
An original and inventive approach to tackling empire ... This is a book which is experienced through the life on the streets, in the buildings and across the physical layout of large urban centres, where jostled men and women of different races and creeds ... readable and engaging ... It is a work of great ambition ... impressive -- Kwasi Kwarteng * Standpoint *
