Book Review: K Theodore Hoppen, Governing Hibernia: British Politicians and Ireland 1800-1921
| DOI | 10.1177/1478929917716091 |
| Date | 01 November 2017 |
| Author | Mark Klobas |
| Published date | 01 November 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Book ReviewsBritain and Ireland |
657
Governing Hibernia: British Politicians and
the vast literature on the subject, all of which
Ireland 1800-1921, by K Theodore Hoppen.
he has marshalled to make a major contribution
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. 337pp.,
to the scholarship on his subject. It is a book
£35.00 (h/b), ISBN 9780198207436
that should be read by anyone with an interest
in the topic, as well as those seeking historical
When it was passed in 1801, the Act of Union
perspectives on the now-relevant issue of the
represented the most earnest effort yet by the
failure of multinational unions.
British political leadership to bring Ireland per-
Mark Klobas
manently into their fold. The failure of that
(Scottsdale Community College, Arizona)
effort little more than a century later has gener-
ated a mountain of scholarship seeking to
© The Author(s) 2017
understand the various factors involved in it.
Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1478929917716091
Not the least of Theodore Hoppen’s achieve-
journals.sagepub.com/home/psrev
ments in this book is his identification of one
such factor often overlooked by historians of
the era, which is the evolving mindset of
What Did You Do During the War? The Last
British politicians towards Ireland and the role
Throes of the British Pro-Nazi Right, 1940-
that their attitudes played in the eventual
45 by Richard Griffiths. Abingdon: Routledge,
foundering of Union.
2016. 380pp., £19.99 (p/b), ISBN 9781138888999
Hoppen sees the perspectives of British
political leaders going through three distinct
When Richard Griffiths’ book Fellow
stages. The first of these was one in which their
Travellers of the Right was first published in
thinking about Ireland was shaped by a persis-
1980, it provided readers with a groundbreak-
tent view of Ireland’s alienness relative to the
ing study of the public support by right-wing
rest of the United Kingdom. Such attitudes
...
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