Heroes and Villains of the British Empire

Heroes and Villains of the British Empire PDF Author: Stephen Basdeo
Publisher: Pen and Sword History
ISBN: 1526749424
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
From the sixteenth until the twentieth century, British power and influence gradually expanded to cover one quarter of the world’s surface. The common saying was that “the sun never sets on the British Empire”. What began as a largely entrepreneurial enterprise in the early modern period, with privately run joint stock trading companies such as the East India Company driving British commercial expansion, by the nineteenth century had become, especially after 1857, a state-run endeavor, supported by a powerful military and navy. By the Victorian era, Britannia really did rule the waves. Heroes of the British Empire is the story of how British Empire builders such as Robert Clive, General Gordon, and Lord Roberts of Kandahar were represented and idealized in popular culture. The men who built the empire were often portrayed as possessing certain unique abilities which enabled them to serve their country in often inhospitable territories, and spread what imperial ideologues saw as the benefits of the British Empire to supposedly uncivilized peoples in far flung corners of the world. These qualities and abilities were athleticism, a sense of fair play, devotion to God, and a fervent sense of duty and loyalty to the nation and the empire. Through the example of these heroes, people in Britain, and children in particular, were encouraged to sign up and serve the empire or, in the words of Henry Newbolt, “Play up! Play up! And Play the Game!” Yet this was not the whole story: while some writers were paid up imperial propagandists, other writers in England detested the very idea of the British Empire. And in the twentieth century, those who were once considered as heroic military men were condemned as racist rulers and exploitative empire builders.

Heroes and Villains of the British Empire

Heroes and Villains of the British Empire PDF Author: Stephen Basdeo
Publisher: Pen and Sword History
ISBN: 1526749424
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
From the sixteenth until the twentieth century, British power and influence gradually expanded to cover one quarter of the world’s surface. The common saying was that “the sun never sets on the British Empire”. What began as a largely entrepreneurial enterprise in the early modern period, with privately run joint stock trading companies such as the East India Company driving British commercial expansion, by the nineteenth century had become, especially after 1857, a state-run endeavor, supported by a powerful military and navy. By the Victorian era, Britannia really did rule the waves. Heroes of the British Empire is the story of how British Empire builders such as Robert Clive, General Gordon, and Lord Roberts of Kandahar were represented and idealized in popular culture. The men who built the empire were often portrayed as possessing certain unique abilities which enabled them to serve their country in often inhospitable territories, and spread what imperial ideologues saw as the benefits of the British Empire to supposedly uncivilized peoples in far flung corners of the world. These qualities and abilities were athleticism, a sense of fair play, devotion to God, and a fervent sense of duty and loyalty to the nation and the empire. Through the example of these heroes, people in Britain, and children in particular, were encouraged to sign up and serve the empire or, in the words of Henry Newbolt, “Play up! Play up! And Play the Game!” Yet this was not the whole story: while some writers were paid up imperial propagandists, other writers in England detested the very idea of the British Empire. And in the twentieth century, those who were once considered as heroic military men were condemned as racist rulers and exploitative empire builders.

Six of the Best

Six of the Best PDF Author: Sean Brunton
Publisher: Austin Macauley
ISBN: 9781398429024
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 142

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Book Description
Suffer with Richard the Lionheart in the desert - fight alongside William Wallace at Stirling Bridge - set sail with Lord Nelson - stand your ground with the Duke of Wellington - fly high with Albert Ball VC - and defy the Nazis with 'Big X'... Hark back to our distant and not so distant past and read about the audacious, courageous and defiant deeds of six Great British heroes. Spanning our island history from the middle ages to the Second World War, these pithy and punchy biographies tell their glorious, moving and sometimes shocking stories. Striking a determined blow against modern political correctness, Sean Brunton's book will restore your faith in men, Britain and life.

Heroes in Contemporary British Culture

Heroes in Contemporary British Culture PDF Author: Barbara Korte
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000382699
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 161

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Book Description
This book explores how British culture is negotiating heroes and heroisms in the twenty-first century. It posits a nexus between the heroic and the state of the nation and explores this idea through British television drama. Drawing on case studies including programmes such as The Last Kingdom, Spooks, Luther and Merlin, the book explores the aesthetic strategies of heroisation in television drama and contextualises the programmes within British public discourses at the time of their production, original broadcasting and first reception. British television drama is a cultural forum in which contemporary Britain’s problems, wishes and cultural values are revealed and debated. By revealing the tensions in contemporary notions of heroes and heroisms, television drama employs the heroic as a lens through which to scrutinise contemporary British society and its responses to crisis and change. Looking back on the development of heroic representations in British television drama over the last twenty years, this book’s analyses show how heroisation in television drama reacts to, and reveals shifts in, British structures of feeling in a time marked by insecurity. The book is ideal for readers interested in British cultural studies, studies of the heroic and popular culture. Introduction of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons [Attribution (CC-BY-)] 4.0 license.

Soldier Heroes

Soldier Heroes PDF Author: Graham Dawson
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135089515
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 366

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Book Description
Soldier Heroes explores the imagining of masculinities within adventure stories. Drawing on literary theory, cultural materialism and Kleinian psychoanalysis, it analyses modern British adventure heroes as historical forms of masculinity originating in the era of nineteenth-century popular imperialism, traces their subsequent transformations and examines the way these identities are internalized and lived by men and boys.

Heroes and Heroism in British Fiction Since 1800

Heroes and Heroism in British Fiction Since 1800 PDF Author: Barbara Korte
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 331933557X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
This book is about the manifestations and explorations of the heroic in narrative literature since around 1800. It traces the most important stages of this representation but also includes strands that have been marginalised or silenced in a dominant masculine and higher-class framework - the studies include explorations of female versions of the heroic, and they consider working-class and ethnic perspectives. The chapters in this volume each focus on a prominent conjuncture of texts, histories and approaches to the heroic. Taken together, they present an overview of the ‘literary heroic’ in fiction since the late eighteenth century.

Heroic Failure and the British

Heroic Failure and the British PDF Author: Stephanie L. Barczewski
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300180063
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 311

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Book Description
Aan de hand van heroïsche mislukkingen zoals de Charge van de Lichte Brigade en Captain Scott wordt licht geworpen op het Brits zijn.

From Servants of the Empire to Everyday Heroes

From Servants of the Empire to Everyday Heroes PDF Author: Tobias Harper
Publisher:
ISBN: 0198841183
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 311

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Book Description
A history of the British Crown honours system in the 20th century, showing its evolution through a period of democratisation and decolonisation, Tobias Harper examines how governments used the honours system to shape ideologies of loyalty and service, while dissidents turned the symbolism of honours against the Crown.

Rogue Heroes

Rogue Heroes PDF Author: Ben Macintyre
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 1101904178
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 344

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The incredible untold story of World War II’s greatest secret fighting force, as told by the modern master of wartime intrigue—now a limited series on Epix! “Reads like a mashup of The Dirty Dozen and The Great Escape, with a sprinkling of Ocean’s 11 thrown in for good measure.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times ONE OF NPR’S BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • “Rogue Heroes is a ripping good read.”—Washington Post (10 Best Books of the Year) Britain’s Special Air Service—or SAS—was the brainchild of David Stirling, a young aristocrat whose aimlessness belied a remarkable strategic mind. Where most of his colleagues looked at a World War II battlefield map and saw a protracted struggle, Stirling saw an opportunity: given a small number of elite men, he could parachute behind Nazi lines and sabotage their airplanes and supplies. Defying his superiors’ conventional wisdom, Stirling assembled a revolutionary fighting force that would upend not just the balance of the war, but the nature of combat itself. Bringing his keen eye for detail to a riveting wartime narrative, Ben Macintyre uses his unprecedented access to the SAS archives to shine a light on a legendary unit long shrouded in secrecy.

Britain's Everyday Heroes

Britain's Everyday Heroes PDF Author: Gordon Brown
Publisher: Mainstream Publishing
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
"This book is about people in all parts of Britain who have given me a fresh insight into the needs and aspirations of our country, what is great about it now and how it can become greater in the future. It is the story of Britain’s everyday heroes: the kind of heroes who live next door, and in the next street, and throughout our neighborhoods – the kind of heroes we might ourselves become." In Britain’s Everyday Heroes, Gordon Brown tells the stories of ordinary people whose willing commitment to a cause or a community has informed and inspired him. The stories tell of a real Britain neither flawless nor broken down but caring, innovative, passionate, and determined. He tells of the woman who has been the inspiration behind community reconciliation in Northern Ireland and the leader of a campaign tackling gang culture in Manchester. Of the innovator transforming the way we use the Internet as a tool of democracy and the campaigner who has established the World’s first Fairtrade Town. Of councillors leading local regeneration efforts and public servants going far beyond the parameters of their job. Of a new generation of social entrepreneurs proving that successful business can benefit communities. Of the creative pioneers who brought the arts to a deprived housing estate, gardening to the refugees, and opera to the homeless. And of the carers, mentors, coaches, and volunteers he has met who give of themselves quietly, every day, never expecting praise or recognition. Royalties from sales of the book will go the the charity Community Links.

Decolonising Imperial Heroes

Decolonising Imperial Heroes PDF Author: Max Jones
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317270118
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
The heroes of the British and French empires stood at the vanguard of the vibrant cultures of imperialism that emerged in Europe in the second-half of the nineteenth century. Their stories are well known. Scholars have tended to assume that figures such as Livingstone and Gordon, or Marchand and Brazza, vanished rapidly at the end of empire. Yet imperial heroes did not disappear after 1945, as British and French flags were lowered around the world. On the contrary, their reputations underwent a variety of metamorphoses in both the former metropoles and the former colonies. This book develops a framework to understand the complex legacies of decolonisation, both political and cultural, through the case study of imperial heroes. We demonstrate that the ‘decolonisation’ of imperial heroes was a much more complex and protracted process than the political retreat from empire, and that it is still an ongoing phenomenon, even half a century after the world has ceased to be ‘painted in red’. Whilst Decolonising Imperial Heroes explores the appeal of the explorers, humanitarians and missionaries whose stories could be told without reference to violence against colonized peoples, it also analyses the persistence of imperial heroes as sites of political dispute in the former metropoles. Demonstrating that the work of remembrance was increasingly carried out by diverse, fragmented groups of non-state actors, in a process we call ‘the privatisation of heroes’, the book reveals the surprising rejuvenation of imperial heroes in former colonies, both in nation-building narratives and as heritage sites. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History.