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Roy Jenkins

Gladstone Hardcover – 13 Oct. 1995

by Roy Jenkins (Author)

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His most ambitious and most satisfying book...As befits the heroic grandeur of its subject, this is an admirably proportioned and beautifully written book, by turns enthralling, moving and (sometimes) very funny. It is the best single-volume biography of a Victorian stateman, since Robert Blake's life of Disraeli. What higher praise can there be?' - David Cannadine, Observer; It is a notable achievement and will not be easily superseded.' - Robert Blake, Times;William Ewart Gladstone stands alone as the only man who was four times Prime Minister, and the most remarkable person ever to have held that office. Roy Jenkins uses Gladstone's life not only to shine light on his manifold activities but also to compare the nineteenth century with the present day: the political rhythms, travel patterns and religious assumptions of Victorian England are all related to our era. This is an authoritative interpretation of a great career, and a revelation of a strange and brilliant character.

Print length

720 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Macmillan
Publication date

13 Oct. 1995
Dimensions

16.51 x 5.08 x 24.77 cm
ISBN-10

0333602161
ISBN-13

978-0333602164
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Macmillan; Second Impression edition (13 Oct. 1995)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 720 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0333602161
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0333602164
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 16.51 x 5.08 x 24.77 cm

Best Sellers Rank: 503,740 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 58 in British Political Biographies
- 16,560 in Historical Biographies (Books)
- 25,404 in Government & Politics

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4 star		24%
3 star		10%
2 star		2%
1 star		5%

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Steve247

As turgid and infuriating as anything he has written

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 23 December 2020

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This book seems to have been written as an opportunity to show off a huge amount of knowledge in as exasperating detail as possible. Exhaustingly long sentences ramble into whole sections that dragged me down into the depths of despair.
It seems that some people actually like this book. I'd hate to be in a room with them: I may lose the will to live.
I'm interested in reading about Gladstone but had to give up with this, and am now looking for another book on the subject.

2 people found this helpful

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Cheshire Tiger

Detailed, painstaking and scholarly.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 27 July 2014

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Lord Jenkins was a highly educated man of great ability and this comes through in this scholarly volume. I was a bit daunted by is length, but I took it bit by bit. Sometimes the words were challenging: clericy, valetudinarian, cicerone and immanent I could take, but I struggled with eleemosynary and manichaean to name but two. I also wondered at an obscure reference to Winchester 'notions'. In addition, the book is very detailed and I was glad I was reading it for pleasure rather than as an undergraduate, preparing, for example, for tricky questions on the various budgets.

I am not sure that I would have liked Gladstone. He comes across as priggish, long-winded and humourless, but his long career is a fascinating one. He also had a remarkable capacity for hard work, which resulted in various achievements, varying from reform of the University of Oxford, to electoral reforms, to the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, though the ultimate goal of Irish Home Rule of course eluded him. However, I had not realised that it was a far more complex issue than "give it them but what about the Ulster Protestants?". For example, continued representation at Westminster and what powers should be devolved were matters of considerable import. Another curiosity is that in 1886 Gladstone was elected MP for two constituencies, Leith and Midlothian.

There are one or two oddities. The author on one occasion confuses daughters in law with step daughters. Also it is surprising that there is no mention of the Chartists, because Gladstone was certainly on the political scene when they were active. And the spin-off from the 'Alabama' incident is described, but not the details of the event itself.

Apparently Roy Jenkins "condemned big books that were too heavy to hold up in bed". This is ironic, because it certainly applies to the hard back version I bought. But it has been described as "elegant" and likely to attract history students, and this is certainly the case.

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BobH

THE Grand Old Man

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 25 March 2014

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‘Gladstone’(1996) by Roy Jenkins is a well-written and highly effective single-volume biography. ‘He was the most remarkable specimen of humanity of all the fifty who, from Walpole to Major, have so far held the office of British Prime Minister’ (P. xvi) states the author sat the start and proceeds to show why.
William Ewart Gladstone was a rather enigmatic character and so is the author’s treatment of him. He frequently declares how great Gladstone was, how he dominated 19th century British politics, but Jenkins still carps at his rigid religious views, his verbose treatment of virtually everything he wrote – including diaries (kept 1825- 94 and published in 14 volumes) and a proposal of marriage -, his prurience, his (often ill-considered) rush at doing everything. Nevertheless, for most of the book I was asking, does Jenkins like his subject?
In old age Gladstone was described as an ‘old man in a hurry’. Jenkins demonstrates that he was also a young / middle-aged ‘man in a hurry’ – reading voraciously, travelling continually, reclaiming fallen women, speaking verbosely, writing at inordinate length and one aspect, giving Jenkins ample opportunity for his witty description, sticking his ‘sanctimonious and judgemental’(P. 95) nose into other people’s business. Throughout the GOM remains an enigma. What was it about his attempts to rescue ‘fallen women’ which often led him to scourge himself afterwards? How can Jenkins describe his interest in prostitutes like Marion Summerhayes and Elizabeth Collins as ‘infatuation’ when some evidence suggests ‘marital fidelity’ – or am I getting into Bill Clinton /Monica Lewinsky country here?
In the world of politics Gladstone was a mystery with his amazing switches in political loyalty and viewpoint– but Disraeli was an equal weather-cock. He was a Peelite clinging to the Conservative mantle long after his belief system had wandered elsewhere (e.g. remaining a member of the Carlton Club long after loyalty had dwindled). He was the greatest prime minister the Liberal party ever produced but chose to be absent from the June 1859 meeting at the Willis’s Rooms which basically formed the Liberal Party and promptly voted against that group in the Commons. Even so his talents were considered so valuable that he served in a variety of political kaleidoscopic cabinets, despite strong personal differences (e.g. vs. both Disraeli and Palmerston). He was against foreign involvement (e.g. Crimean War) but supported Italian reunification – and his views on Ireland turned somersaults during his career.
All this is excellently covered by Jenkins, providing astute observations linking 19th century with contemporary politics. For example, he states, regarding the Crimean War that: ‘he became an early advocate of peace without victory..... rather like R. A. Butler at the time of Suez, he got the worst of both worlds, and offended all parties, including himself, becoming guilt-ridden for his initial attitude’ (P. 159). In fact, such comparisons made me think that today Gladstone would be a political disaster.
Almost as a side issue Jenkins explores some of the differences between the 19th century and today – multiple constituencies, multiple franchises, MP’s resigning from their constituency when accepting a government post, elections on the death of a sovereign, limited parliamentary terms but prolonged sittings (including Saturdays), patronage and corruption. Some of these conditions were changed then, some later but they all played their part in his career. Gladstone himself represented a series of constituencies (some of which he scarcely ever visited), both major parties and served twice as both Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer simultaneously. How matters were arranged differently a century ago!
But the reader also gets a close look at Gladstone the man. ‘He was psychologically incapable of flattery with some people, most notably the Queen, with Chamberlain as a runner up...... Sometimes, with others, his courtesy failed because it was too elaborate and heavy-footed, but mostly......he had not tried, hardly knew or noticed the person concerned.’ (PP.296-7) – and Gladstone confessed as much regarding the Queen’ (see the comments PP.336-7). He often referred to her ‘perfect courtesy’ but also to her ‘great frankness’ (normally about who should be in his Cabinet and what they should do). Jenkins stresses how much Disraeli, especially 1874-80, poisoned the Queen’s mind against his rival, overlooking the young Victoria playing such games with Melbourne vs. Peel 30 years before. Gladstone confessed to Roseberry that ‘the Queen alone is enough to kill any man' and to Dilke that ‘she looks forward to the day of my retirement as a day if not of jubilee yet of relief’ (P.468).
Gradually the author’s affection for his subject becomes clear. Gladstone’s opponents are suitably castigated. ‘Disraeli paid his debts with theatre, mainly devised for his own amusement, Gladstone with a heavy-footed almost interfering devotion’ (P419). Chapter 27 (‘Gladstone Becomes the Grand Old Man’) is a masterpiece of character assessment. Queen Victoria is exposed by her actions (e.g. rushing to receive Gladstone’s resignation but showing reluctance to let him into power, especially in 1880) but even more by her own words. Here, for instance, are her views on the proposal for women to study medicine: ‘But to tear away all the barriers wh surround a woman, & to propose that they shld study with MEN – things wh cld not be named before them – certainly not in a mixed audience – wd be to introduce a total disregard of what must be considered as belonging to the rules and principles of morality’(P.342) [abbreviations are Her Majesty’s]. Jenkins insists Gladstone’s defeat in 1886 over Irish Home Rule was due to not winning over Joseph Chamberlain and his ‘killer instinct’......once ‘battling Joe’ was lost to the government, the bill was at his mercy’ (P.551).
WEG had his foibles: his Diary records in November 1869: ‘Worked 6 hours on my books arranging and re-arranging: the best brain-rest I have had (I think) since Dec last’; his favourite physical exercise was chopping down trees at Hawarden’ even when his son, Harry, was still in the branches (P.275); he could very clumsy (he shot off his left forefinger while reloading a gun); he was often ill, especially with erysipelas; he loved staying at country houses – and once delayed his departure, resulting in his having to dry-out his socks on the train back to London. ‘His slightly officious sense of family duty, his morbidity and his religious commitment united to make him an exceptional mourner’ (P.232); his public comments on the dead Disraeli may have gratified the Queen but in private he remarked, ‘As he lived, so he died – all display, without reality or genuineness’ (P459), also his sister, Helen (a Catholic convert) still received an Anglican burial under his direction. He spent most of his life as a guest of others or renting accommodation but never seemed to considered others might expect favours in return. He loved mixing with ‘the upper-crust’ but still became the ‘people’s William’. I could go on but if you read this book you’ll also be amazed by a FASCINATING man.
Jenkins sums up Gladstone, the Prime Minister, as ‘the one who most dominated the busy junction where executive power, parliamentary command and democratic validity jostle together.’ (P.291) Again Jenkins declares: ‘His ideal polity was a mass of contradictions.... Gladstone put these incompatibilities through the mincing machine of his mind and came out at first with a rather bland pate’. (P.355) – but then he got down to work. In old age Gladstone was certainly not imprisoned in what Jenkins terms ‘a departure lounge of at Hawarden to a local library), despite deteriorating eyesight and hearing. life’(P.565), remaining physically active (e.g. shifting books by wheel-barrow from his home
However, he became obsessed by his ‘mission to pacify Ireland’. This necessitated ditching Parnell, the leader of the Irish Nationalist MPs so essential for that cause, after the O’Shea divorce case. Jenkins, in a full account, insists that ‘Gladstone took his stand on the likely political consequences and not on morals’(P.570).That is undoubtedly true but the GOM, certainly no fool, had been quite willing to accept Mrs. O’Shea as an intermediary with her lover. Was the ditching a strategic error? He’d already sacrificed Charles Dilke in 1886 due to his being named in a divorce case. Jenkins points out the wide variations sometimes in political support in different parts of Britain -e.g. 37% of Liberal MPs elected in Scotland failed to support Gladstone over Home Rule (P.55) - the English figure was 19% - and the Liberal vote was halved in the counties (P.557) in the subsequent election.
Gladstone’s 4th term in 1892 should never have happened as his Diary records: ‘I am no longer fit for public life: yet bidden to walk in it’ (P.585) But a sense of duty (and stubbornness!) prevailed. He pushed an Irish Home Rule Bill through the Commons only to have the Lords reject it by 419-41. That was the end, although Gladstone struggled on till 28 February 1894 before handing over to Lord Rosebery. He died on the 19 May 1898. Jenkins brushes aside the Queen’s evaluation of him as ‘one of the most distinguished statesmen of my reign.’ And forcibly states that ‘he was the quintessential statesman of her reign, its epitome, and, almost as much as herself, its symbol’ (P. 631).
It’s amazing how much detail Jenkins fits into a single volume. Not only is there so much about WEG but so many characters have snapshots about their work, character or social position. He reveals a deep knowledge of the background (political AND religious) of the period as well as useful comparisons with what has happened since 1898.The illustrations (especially of key figures) are excellent, as are the footnotes and bibliography. It’s a runaway 5 stars.
PS Another warning / bonus is the remarkable vocabulary possessed by the author and the reader may have to resort to a BIG dictionary; for me this included ‘eleemosynary’ (P.44) and ‘dithyramb’ (P.345).

9 people found this helpful

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Kevin Viney

Gladstone Revealed

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 1 May 2019

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Not in wonderful condition but still fine and what a wonderful biography of William Ewerton Gladstone.

Absolutely delighted with this product.
Promptly and safely delivered. Well priced and good condition.
Thank you

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Peter John McIver

Outstanding biography.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 21 March 2020

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Brilliant biography of the outstanding statesman of the 19th century. Jenkins gives us a balanced yet sympathetic overview of the life and career of one of our greatest PMs.Out

One person found this helpful

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S. McHugh

Essential for understanding the world of today as the Third World goes through Britain's 1850s - 1880s

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 9 October 2013

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Mid-century and later in the Victorian era in Britain sounded unpromising as far as entertainment goes, but I found the late Roy Jenkins biography of Gladstone excellent. The knowledge of politics at the highest level Jenkins brings to this extraordinary man's life lights up this book.

2 people found this helpful

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graham

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 29 May 2018

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In good condition when received.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 7 November 2014

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As was often the case with Roy Jenkins' writing, this book had me scurrying for the dictionary rather more often than I would like. However, there is a wealth of interesting information about the greatest statesman of the Victorian age.

2 people found this helpful

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Gladstone Hardcover – 13 Oct. 1995

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