Englishness identified
Subtitle: manners and character, 1650-1850
By: Paul Langford ; illustrated by Martin Rowson.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2000
Place of publication: Oxford; New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 389
Subjects: National characteristics, English -- History; National characteristics, English, in literature; England -- Social life and customs -- 17th century; English literature -- History and criticism; England -- Social life and customs -- 18th century; England -- Social life and customs -- 19th century
Description: "In the seventeenth century the English were often depicted as a nation of barbarians, fanatics, and king-killers. Two hundred years later they were more likely to be seen as the triumphant possessors of a unique political stability, a vigorous industrial revolution, and a world-wide empire. These may have been British achievements, but the virtues which brought about this transformation tended to be perceived as being specifically English. Ideas of what constituted Englishness changed from a stock notion of waywardness and unpredictability to one of discipline and dedication.

The evolution of the so-called national character - today once more the subject of scrutiny and debate - is traced through the impressions and analyses of foreign observers, and related to English ambitions and anxieties during a period of intense change."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [321]-375) and index.