Forging of the Modern State: Early Industrial Britain, 1783-1870

'Evans's elegant and fluent treatment is quite superb.' Times Educational Supplement In this hugely ambitious and wide-ranging history of Britain, Eric Evans surveys a period in which Britain was transformed into the world's first industrial, while the foundations of the largest empire the world had seen were also being securely laid. This was an era of unprecedented political crisis, economic opportunity and social upheaval unparalleled in Britain, yet one during which transformation was achieved without revolution. The unique and potent combination of transition and transformation is a major theme in this book. The book ranges ranges across key political, diplomatic, social, cultural, economic and religious themes in a series of short, lively chapters whose purpose is to convey the overall drama of hectic change which stopped well short of political revolution. Britain was still ruled by wealthy landonwners in 1870 as it had been in 1783. The world over which they presided, however, had been transformed utterly. It had become an urban, industrial and commercial society, a change achieved without revolution. [Evans examines whether their success in doing so was due more to good management than good fortune.] This new edition includes a new and revisionist introductory chapter and a thoroughly updated bibliography. The book appears with illustrations for the first time. Eric J. Evans is Professor of History at Lancaster University and the author of a number of seminal books on the political and social history of eighteenth and nineteenth century Britain.