God Is an Englishman (The Swann Family Saga: Volume 1)

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The reading public, always a confederation of wildly dif ferent tribes of people with exceedingly different tastes in books, was never so frag mented as it is today. One man's memorable and signifi cant novel is another's abomi nation. Another man's thor oughly enjoyable novel is an other's mess of commercial pottage. Which brings us to the news that R. F. Delderfield's new novel, “God Is an English man,” is now published. Over the fearful spring of 1942, as the German Luftwaffe sought to bomb the allies into surrender, William Beveridge worked away on the report set to transform postwar Britain. By nature, Beveridge was a rather dry civil servant and his draft for a new welfare state looked set to be equally austere. Until, that is, his future wife Jessy Mair got hold of it. She urged him to put aside the bureaucratic language and instead insert some "Cromwellian spirit" into the prose. And so the Beveridge report became one of the most inspiring publications of the 20th century, with its call to slay the "Five Giant Evils" of Squalor, Ignorance, Want, Idleness and Disease, and to build a new Jerusalem of social justice.

Now and Forever - BFI Filmography". filmography.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on 15 February 2020.From master author R. F. Delderfield, the first in the beloved classic God Is an Englishman series.The first novel in the epic God Is an Englishman series, this book is a stirring saga of England in the 19th century, as the Industrial Revolution takes hold, forever changing the landscape of England and her people. In 2008, the University of Canberra announced the establishment of the Donald Horne Institute for Cultural Heritage. [5] Donald Richmond Horne AO (26 December 1921 – 8 September 2005) was an Australian journalist, writer, social critic, and academic who became one of Australia's best known public intellectuals, from the 1960s until his death. He sat down beside the boy, saying nothing for a moment, but then he saw Briarley's lip quiver and lifted his arm, resting it gently on the boy's shoulder. He said, at length, 'Was he a professional, Briarley?' and when Briarley nodded, 'We couldn't have held out this long without them, lad. They taught us everything we knew in the early days,' and then, when the boy made no reply, 'Do you care to tell me about him? I've served in the Lys sector twice. Maybe we met, spoke to one another.' Then there is the prose – its delicious precision, knowing understatement and witty asides. Above all, there is Hill's winning conviction that you cannot begin to appreciate Britain's island story or the passage of the "Cromwellian spirit" from the battle of Naseby to the Beveridge report without knowing "Old Nol" himself. In his generosity, wisdom and tangible feel for the significance of the 17th century, Christopher Hill stands as the finest of guides to the man of the times.

Adam Swann is a very interesting and smart character and his aims to build his own place in the world are a kind of microcosm of how industry and entrepreneurism changed the world in the mid-1800s. His feisty wife, Henrietta, adds another dimension to both this man and the story, and Delderfield peoples the novel with a supporting cast that feels real and substantial. While there are sections in which the building of Swann-on-Wheels, Adam’s business, can become a little laborious, the understanding of it is essential to understanding the characters and their lives. And for all the advances of contemporary historical research, God's Englishman nonetheless speaks powerfully to a contemporary audience. Arguably, the focus on Cromwell as a decidedly English figure is even more relevant in 2013, with Scotland on the brink of a referendum on independence, than it was in the more settled British culture of 1970. What is more, that peculiarly English strand of political radicalism, wordful expression and dogged, Puritan cussedness that Hill explores offers an exciting narrative of philosophical alternatives to the traditional, conservative dominance of "Middle England". Similarly, Hill's foregrounding of Cromwell as the vital enabler of Britain's development as an imperial power – through Ireland, the West Indies and the East India Company – has a relevant tone today as Britain comes to appreciate its post-colonial place in the world. It is always helpful for modern, globalised, history-lite England to understand its origins.

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My favorite part of the story is Adam's own heart for the downtrodden. As an army officer, he witnessed devastation to the civilian populations of the Crimea and India, which is a major reason why he decides to quit the army. (This isn't dwelt upon too much thankfully.) He is sensitive to the suffering of his fellow human beings, whether that be the factory hands in cotton mills or the street orphans in London. When Adam starts his business, his early employees are the street kids whom Saul Keate and his wife have been housing and feeding. He pays a fair wage and treats each man in his employ as a human being. He knows names, histories, and steps in himself when there is a problem or dispute. This certainly works well as a narrative device, but it's clear that Adam really cares. A major dispute and turning point between Adam and Henrietta comes about because of the suffering of a chimney sweep. Yet, as for so many of his generation, his childhood spiritual faith was replaced by Marxist philosophy. By 1934, Hill had joined the Communist party and started to work with Soviet scholars in Moscow, who were then introducing a more materialist interpretation into English social and economic history. After the war, Hill, together with the likes of Eric Hobsbawm and Victor Kiernan, was a central figure in the Communist Party Historians Group, which was determined to abandon the history of "great men" for a more socially attuned, finely grained discipline drawing on lost voices and vernacular sources. (Hill left the Communist party in opposition to the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary, and what he regarded as the absence of any effective internal debate within the party.) Several of Delderfield's historical novels and series involve young men who return from war and take up careers in peacetime that allow the author to delve deeply into social history from the Edwardian era to the early 1960s. a b c d e f "Horne, Donald Richard". Muswellbrook Shire Hall of Fame. Muswellbrook Visitors Centre. 2005. Archived from the original on 25 April 2013 . Retrieved 14 June 2013. The many thousands of read ers who delighted in Mr. Del derfield's “A Horseman Riding By” and “The Green Gauntlet” will in all probability clutch “God Is an Englishman” to their bosoms with glad cries. It is cut from the same bolt, a long, leisurely, rambling tale about many characters told from the point of view of many characters. Technically it is a historical novel, since its action takes place between 1857 and 1866. It is a romantic tale, too, crammed with dramatic inci dents, ingenious inventions, co incidences and diverting im probabilities. Although difficult to take seriously, “God Is an Englishman” provides a good bird's‐eye view of Victorian England and contains numer ous snippets of social history —glimpses of the spreading blight of industrialization, of a plush London brothel, of the plight of the homeless children of London, of the cruel treat ment of chimney sweeps.

While modernism has dominated 20th century fiction, story tellers held their own as well. Englishman R F Delderfield specialized in the story-telling novel. Out of print for many years, his God is An Englishman is available once again. It is the first of a trilogy of books about Adam Swann, a soldier turned businessman in Victorian Britain. The intelligent tourist. McMahons Point, New South Wales: Margaret Gee Publishing (published 1992). 1993. p.415. ISBN 978-1-875574-16-2. Despite all the long stories involved, I do really like large multigenerational sagas. So far, this God is an Englishman Series is among the best I have ever read. Horne, Donald; Australia Council (22 February 1985). The arts and the Australian economy (Speech). Melbourne, Victoria: Australia Council . Retrieved 14 June 2013.God is an Englishman is historical fiction written in the 1970s about the Victorian era. I’ve always had a soft spot for this era, and only turned to historical fiction once I grew tired of re-reading my favorite classics of the period. Finally, I've found something that satisfies what I’ve been searching for ever since, something that goes beyond an individual or two who happen to be living in a Victorian setting. Enjoyed the story of how the 2nd generation of Swanns is now doing, but in my opinion there should have been much more about there stories and less about remembering.