Linda Colley. Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707-1837. Rev. ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009.
In her 1992 publication, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707-1837, Linda Colley explores the “forging of the British nation between the Act of Union joining Scotland to England and Wales in 1707 and the formal beginning of the Victorian age in 1837” by following the dual trends of citizen identity and worldview, and the slow development of a “British national identity,” set against the backdrop of near-perpetual conflict with France. What becomes evident as the reader continues is that the British nation of this period is not quite as united as its proponents should like, and right up to Britons’ conclusion simmering unrest and popular irritation strive with the longsuffering champions of unity. Colley’s take on Great Britain’s political and social evolution is both insightful and pessimistic, building up for the Britons an inflated sense of self seemingly at the expense of author objectivity.
Remarkably, Colley manages to present a categorical tale of British history that nonetheless flows in chronological order. Beginning with an examination of the triumph of sixteenth-century Protestantism, Britons addresses trade, boundaries, the aristocratic and royal powers, the “separate spheres” of men and women, and the social changes that eventually culminated in universal suffrage. Colley allows her talking points to flow freely, knitting divergent themes of power politics, religion, and social anxieties into a seamless historical narrative. Much (indeed perhaps all) of Colley’s evidence is print-based, whether county registers, newsprint, diaries, or the prolific political cartoons. These are carefully dissected for social meaning in such a way that, regardless of whether her opinions are correct, one cannot accuse Colley of neglecting her homework.
Colley’s interpretations of most any meeting of ink and parchment typically manifest in claims of anxiety-ridden propaganda, such as James Gillray’s Buonaparte 48 hours after Landing! which weds British patriotic feeling with aristocratic unease at the notion of a gentleman’s execution by the masses. At times Colley seems to take the propaganda theorist act too far, her interpretations often based upon the villainy of religion, and one wonders at the sheer negativity that Colley channels in her recurrent examination of Protestantism. Although her cases are often winningly reasoned, they suffer from a markedly one-sided bent, such as when Colley renders Thomas Coram’s rescue of orphans ultimately soulless, smoothly insisting that – all selfless motives aside – the philanthropist only wanted to flesh out Great Britain’s labor force. Similarly, the desire to emancipate black slaves is largely stripped of religious inspiration, a small allowance for humanitarian interest hastily injected then abandoned in favor of an economic explanation and a more patriotic belief in the façade of Free Britain. Even social movements are overcast by a diabolically religious tone, made out to be themselves objects of worship. Popular “cults” dominate Britons’ pages like the darkling silhouette of a Hellenic deity – cults of commerce and trade, cults of juvenile fortitude, of heroism, of “heroic endeavor and aggressive maleness,” of female propriety, and even a bizarre pseudo cult of the Virgin, tailored to the tastes of deprived protestant ladies – each lovingly embellished by Colley’s merciless psychoanalysis.
Despite these biases, Britons is an excellent read for the student of Georgian England thanks to its broad range of topics presented in so manageable a volume. In a mere 384 pages, Colley offers a look into the foundations for the world and worldview of the British Empire’s “home” residents, demonstrating how Britons saw themselves and their world, and thus providing a point of reference for readers curious about this era.
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