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Ornamentalism: How the British Saw Their Empire - Review
Contemporary Review, July, 2001
Ornamentalism: How the British Saw Their Empire. David Cannadine. Allen Lane: The Penguin Press. [pound]16.99. 264 pages. ISBN 0-713-99605-8. This latest study of the Empire argues that Britain and British history in the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries were very much part of the Empire's creation, consolidation and decline.
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The book also sets out to tell readers how Britons perceived the Empire, from the days of Clive, through Rhodes and into the Empire Day ceremonies still remembered by some. This book therefore concentrates on the Empire as a social structure in which the whole was seen as a unit, and on the Empire as 'social perceptions'. The author feels that his interpretations adequately explain in 179 pages of text an Empire as long lasting and vast as the British. They are, of course, marked by his own views and prejudices so that this becomes a rather personal interpretation. Sometimes, to score a point, he seems to set up a target in such a way that he can easily knock it down, lie tells us how Prince Charles thinks and what he believes without tracing hi s assertions to any quoted speech or comment from the Prince. (The reference is to a biographer of the Prince.) This then allows him to criticise these 'views' as examples of the 'imperial hierarchy', a bad thing. There is much clever writing reminiscent of A. J. P. Taylor and a hint of selecting evidence to fit a preconceived view of a vastly complex and confusing history. (T.B.)
COPYRIGHT 2001 Contemporary Review Company Ltd.
COPYRIGHT 2001 Gale Group
