Clarendon And The English Revolution
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Very good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the heart of one of England's most turbulent centuries stands Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon — statesman, historian, and royal counsellor — whose life was inextricably bound to the convulsions of the English Revolution. Clarendon and the English Revolution by R. W. Harris chronicles the remarkable career of this towering figure, tracing his path from a committed Parliamentarian critic of royal excess to the chief architect of the Restoration monarchy under Charles II, a journey that illuminates the profound contradictions and shifting loyalties of seventeenth-century English political life. Harris presents a richly detailed portrait of a man who witnessed the execution of one king, the exile of another, and the collapse and rebirth of constitutional order, all while composing his monumental History of the Rebellion — one of the greatest works of historical prose in the English language. With scholarly precision and a keen sense of narrative drama, Harris argues that Clarendon's ultimate tragedy was not his final impeachment and exile in 1667, but the irreconcilable tension between his conservative Anglican vision of England and the political realities of a court he could no longer control. The author situates Clarendon within the broader intellectual and religious currents of the age, illustrating how one man's unflinching commitment to law, church, and crown made him both indispensable and expendable to the Stuart cause. For anyone seeking to understand the ideological fault lines that defined early modern Britain, this biography poses an urgent and enduring question: can a man of principle survive a revolution of his own making?
Author: R. W. Harris
Format: Hardback
Published: 1983, Chatto & Windus
Genre: British & Irish history
Condition remarks:
Book: Very good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the heart of one of England's most turbulent centuries stands Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon — statesman, historian, and royal counsellor — whose life was inextricably bound to the convulsions of the English Revolution. Clarendon and the English Revolution by R. W. Harris chronicles the remarkable career of this towering figure, tracing his path from a committed Parliamentarian critic of royal excess to the chief architect of the Restoration monarchy under Charles II, a journey that illuminates the profound contradictions and shifting loyalties of seventeenth-century English political life. Harris presents a richly detailed portrait of a man who witnessed the execution of one king, the exile of another, and the collapse and rebirth of constitutional order, all while composing his monumental History of the Rebellion — one of the greatest works of historical prose in the English language. With scholarly precision and a keen sense of narrative drama, Harris argues that Clarendon's ultimate tragedy was not his final impeachment and exile in 1667, but the irreconcilable tension between his conservative Anglican vision of England and the political realities of a court he could no longer control. The author situates Clarendon within the broader intellectual and religious currents of the age, illustrating how one man's unflinching commitment to law, church, and crown made him both indispensable and expendable to the Stuart cause. For anyone seeking to understand the ideological fault lines that defined early modern Britain, this biography poses an urgent and enduring question: can a man of principle survive a revolution of his own making?